By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

 

BEIJING, China –

Local authorities in Shenzhen have released a statement stating that the deadly landslide last week was caused by breaches in construction safety rules and was not a natural disaster. Shenzhen authorities have vowed to punish those accountable for the landslide in accordance with the law.

The central government in Shenzhen organized an investigation team to look into the causes of the landslide. The team found that the cause of the landslide was the movement of construction waste in a landfill site rather than geological movement. Xinhua, China’s state run news source, has reported that the industrial site where the landslide occurred continued to take waste for 10 months after it was supposed to stop accepting all waste. Officials also ignored warnings that the site was dangerous.

According to local news sources, the landslide killed at least seven people, with several others in serious condition in local hospitals and over 70 people still missing. The disaster also buried 33 buildings in the industrial site where the construction waste was dumped.

Currently, there is still a risk of additional landslides in three other places in the Shenzhen industrial park according to Xinhua. Yang Shengjun, head of the Shenzhen Housing and Urban Rural Development Bureau, says that there are also dangerous chemicals that need to be dealt with.

Ma Xingrui, the Communist Party Chief of Shenzhen, has made a formal apology and has pledged to accept responsibility for the landslide. Officials are often dismissed after disasters in China, with others facing prosecution for their responsibility for such disasters. Now that it is apparent that the landslide was due to human error, it is even more likely that Shenzhen officials and others found to have contributed to the disaster will carry the blame.

Parts of Asia, including China, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka are particularly prone to landslides due to their dense populations and rapid growth of urban centers. The Shenzhen landslide has raised concerns about China’s industrial safety regulations and the lack of oversight that may have contributed to other similar disasters. An extensive amount of infrastructure has been built up in recent years to meet the growth of industrial hubs and cities in China. That infrastructure, if not built according to safety regulations, could pose a serious threat of future disasters.

 

For more information, please see:

CNN – China Says Landslide Caused by Safety Violations, Vows to Punish ‘Seriously’ – 26 December 2015

The International Business Times – China Shenzhen Landslide Caused by Safety Violations, Not Nature, Officials Say – 25 December 2015

The New York Times – Chinese Official Vows Punishment Over Shenzhen Landslide – 25 December 2015

The Guardian – Is the Shenzhen Landslide the First of Many More? – 23 December 2015

By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

 

PYONGYANG, North Korea –

North Korea’s Supreme Court sentenced Canadian Pastor Hyeon Soo Lim to life in prison with hard labor last week. Mr. Lim was detained in February and was charged for “subversive plots and activities” while on a routine missions trip to North Korea. Prosecutors originally called for the death penalty as punishment for his alleged crimes against North Korea’s government. 

North Korea’s official news agency, KCNA, has reported that Mr. Lim confessed to committing anti-DPRK religious activities, conducting false propaganda, and aiding in an operation to lure and abduct North Korean defectors.

Mr. Lim traveled to North Korea in January for a visit that his family describes as a routine humanitarian trip. Mr. Lim, who emigrated from South Korea to Canada in 1986, is a minister at the Light Korean Presbyterian Church in Toronto. He has completed over 100 trips to North Korea in order to support projects that his church initiated there, including an orphanage, nursery, and nursing home.

In July, Mr. Lim was brought to a news conference by authorities, where he read a statement confessing to attempts at bringing down North Korea’s government. Associated Press reports that Mr. Lim admitted that he was working toward creating a religious state in North Korea while taking advantage of the policies of the United States and South Korea. Mr. Lim gave another confession at a church in Pyongyang in August.

Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs objects to the sentence given to Mr. Lim, especially in light of his age and poor health. Canadian officials were not given access to Mr. Lim during his detainment. The Department of Foreign Affairs also commented on this in its statement, stating that the North Korean government’s refusal to let Canadian officials confirm Mr. Lim’s health and wellbeing is a violation of the rights of states to have access to their citizens under the Vienna Convention.

North Korea has been known to detain foreigners for religious or missionary activities, accusing them of committing crimes against the state. Other westerners that have been held by North Korea in the past have also given public confessions under pressure from its government.

International human rights groups have criticized North Korea for its trials of foreign detainees, in part because their family members and outside lawyers are not allowed to visit them or defend them in court.

For more information, please see:

BBC News – N Korea Sentences Canada Pastor to Life in Jail – 16 December 2015

CNN – North Korea sentences Canadian pastor Hyeon Soo Lim to life in prison – 16 December 2015

The New York Times – North Korea Sentences Canadian Pastor to Life in Prison – 16 December 2015

The Guardian – Hyeon Soo Lim: Canadian Pastor Given Life Sentence in North Korea – 15 December 2015

 

By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

 

SEOUL, South Korea –

Talks between high-level officials of both North and South Korea on December 11 failed to result in an agreement between the two sides. Disagreement between the two Koreas over the most important topic to be discussed apparently led to the standoff.

South Korea wanted to discuss reunification of family members permanently separated by the Korean War, citing its importance as a humanitarian issue. North Korea instead wanted to first discuss the continuance of cross-border tours suspended by South Korea in 2008. South Korea believes that the two issues should not be likened to each other.

During the talks, in which officials of both sides met for the first time in two years, the delegations were unable to reach any type of agreement and did not release a joint statement at the close of the summit. North Korea blames South Korea for the breakdown of the talks between them. According to chief South Korean delegate Hwang Boogi, he offered to resume talks in the future, but North Korea has not shown interest in continuing talks.

North Korea wanted to reach an agreement on the tours during the talks before moving on to discuss the family unification issue. Because it is having financial difficulties, North Korea hoped to resume the cross-border tours, which were halted in 2008 after a South Korea tourist was shot and killed.

South Korea wanted to discuss the family unification issue before any discussion on resuming cross-border tours. South Korea hoped that North Korea would help family members separated by the Korean War locate their family members on the other side and allow them to write to each other. South Korea also wanted to arrange regular reunions between family members so that they can temporarily reunite before they die from old age. While the two sides arranged for temporary reunions between family members this year, South Korea had hoped for further agreements on the issue. 

The two Koreas have had especially poor relations since land mines injured two South Korean soldiers at the border in August. The two sides agreed at the time to put a stop to an impending military conflict and agreed to meet for negotiations.

The two sides’ failure to come to an agreement during this month’s talks could signify a further setback in relations between them.

 

For more information, please see:

International Business Times – South, North Korea Talks Fail? No Agreement Reached, No Further Meeting Dates Set – 12 December 2015

The New York Times – Negotiations Break Down Between Two Koreas – 12 December 2015

Reuters – North, South Korea Talks End Without Agreement – 12 December 2015

The Wall Street Journal – Talks Between North and South Korea End Without Agreement – 12 December 2016

By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

BEIJING, China –

Amidst China’s memorializing of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, a new museum depicting the plight of Chinese comfort women during World War II has opened in Nanjing.

The comfort women, among them many Chinese women, were forced into acting as sex slaves for members of the Japanese military during World War II. Over 200,000 Chinese women were forced into sexual slavery during that time.

The new museum was built in Liji Alley in Nanjing, where China’s oldest “comfort station”, or military brothel, once stood. It contains over 1,600 items and over 600 photographs depicting the comfort women’s experience. Some of the items were donated by the families of former comfort women.

The founder of China’s first research center on comfort women, Professor Su Zhiliang, has stated that getting survivors to come forward is an immense challenge and that most of the survivors choose to stay silent about the atrocities that they experienced.

Fewer than two-dozen comfort women are estimated to be alive at this time. Most of those who are still alive live in poverty.

One former comfort woman who has come forward, 96 year-old Wei Shaolan, lives in a mud hut with her son. While being held as a comfort woman, Ms. Wei escaped the station where she was being held as a sex slave to an officer. Upon her return home, her husband wanted nothing to do with her. She then became pregnant with her son, who was her abuser’s child. Her son has faced ridicule in their community because he is half Japanese.

Ms. Wei states that she traveled to Japan in 2010 in hopes of securing reparations and compensation, but the Japanese courts dismissed her case. The officer who made her his sex slave denied Ms. Wei’s accusations against him.

Activists have attempted to secure justice and reparations for the survivors with little success. China’s establishment of the comfort women museum is one of the only measures taken to commemorate the comfort women.

The account of comfort women has often been overshadowed by accounts of the Nanjing Massacre, in which thousands of Chinese were killed. Japan and China disagree on how many were killed during the Nanjing Massacre, and it has been a point of contention between the countries since World War II.

China and Japan have made recent efforts to improve ties between themselves despite their troubled history. Last month, China, Japan and South Korea held a three-way summit, an event that had not occurred in three years.

 

For more information, please see:

Channel NewsAsia – As China remembers Nanjing Massacre, ex-WWII Sex Slave Recounts Ordeal – 14 December 2015

The Straits Times – China Holds Low-Key Memorial for Nanjing Massacre – 14 December 2015

CCTV America – Nanjing Museum Pays Tribute to World War II Comfort Women Victims – 12 December 2015

GB Times – Comfort Women Museum Opens in Nanjing – 2 December 2015

 

 

By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia 

 

BEIJING, China –

One of the most prominent human rights lawyers in China, Pu Zhiqiang, will go on trial next week for his blog posts criticizing the Communist Party. Mr. Pu faces a potential sentence of eight years in prison for charges of “inciting ethnic hatred” and “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”. The Chinese government has brought the latter charge against many other government critics and rights advocates to support their detainment and imprisonment since President Xi Jinping became the leader of China’s Communist Party in late 2012.

Mr. Pu will go on trial before Beijing’s Number Two Intermediate Court on Monday. The court’s only evidence against him consists of seven among thousands of posts that Mr. Pu posted on a micro-blog service, according to one of his defense attorneys, Mo Shaoping. Mr. Mo believes that Mr. Pu is almost certainly going to be convicted and sentenced to imprisonment by the court, which is controlled by the Communist Party.

The prosecutors who brought charges against Mr. Pu have stated that his posts on the micro-blog were insulting to others and disrupted public order. His posts included statements questioning the Chinese government’s treatment of the Uighurs, a Muslim ethnic group living in the province of Xinjiang, and critical remarks against the Communist Party. Mr. Mo has stated that Mr. Pu has admitted that his posts were rude and has offered to apologize for his remarks.

Police detained Mr. Pu last year after he attended a seminar marking the 25^th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. He has remained in detention for over a year and has not been allowed to see his wife, who says that he has been interrogated extensively and has been tortured both physically and mentally.

Human rights groups such as Amnesty International have called for Chinese officials to release Mr. Pu, along with the United States. Max Baucus, the United States’ Ambassador to China, has urged the Chinese government to release Mr. Pu because he and other human rights lawyers should be seen as partners, rather than enemies of China’s government.

China’s government, led by President Xi Jinping, has increasingly cracked down on dissidents and human rights advocates, including several lawyers. According to China Human Rights Lawyers Concern Group, over 250 people have been questioned and detained and nearly 30 people have been prohibited from leaving China in the last several months.

 

For more information, please see:

Hong Kong Free Press – China to Put Top Human Rights Lawyer on Trial Next Week – 10 December 2015

The New York Times – Chinese Rights Lawyer’s Trial Over Online Comments to Begin Soon – 10 December 2015

Radio Free Asia – Charges Against Top Chinese Rights Lawyer Based on Seven Tweets – 8 December 2015

Voice of America – US: Detained China Lawyers ‘Partners, not Enemies” – 10 December 2015