Malaysia, Thailand ready to join BRICS – Asian media report

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim is in conflict with many Western countries over his long-term support for Hamas and his fierce criticism of Israel. Now he is about to snub America again, by joining BRICS, the global south economic bloc.

'We have indicated that as a policy we are joining,' he said in an interview with Guancha, a Chinese news outlet. 'We have made a decision. We are placing the formal procedures soon.'

Anwar’s intention to join BRICS was reported in Singapore’s The Straits Times. BRICS is named after its initial members – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Saudi Arabia, Iran, the UAE, Ethiopia and Egypt joined on January 1.

His statement follows a decision by Thailand late in May to apply for membership. Thai Government spokesman Chai Wacharonke said Thailand recognised the importance of multilateralism and the increasing role of developing countries, Bangkok Post reported.

The Straits Times said Anwar’s comments came as China sought to deepen ties with smaller nations like Malaysia that had asserted their neutrality amid intense US-China competition.

Anwar’s interview was conducted immediately before a visit to Malaysia by Chinese Premier Li Qiang, following his trip to New Zealand and Australia.

In a separate story, the paper quoted Anwar as saying to Li: 'It is in Malaysia’s strategic interests to forge amity and co-operation with China, not against it.'

Global Times, an official newspaper, quoted Li as saying China-Malaysia ties were at the forefront among relations between countries in the region.

Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post said in an editorial that Anwar believed China was more responsive regionally than the US. 'While the US remains an economic superpower, it is far away,' the editorial said.

The Post published a long interview with Anwar, focusing on Hamas and Israel’s war on Gaza. He was bitterly critical of the US.

'The problem is no longer with Hamas now,' he said. 'The superpower there is the United States.

'It is totally insane to imagine that the killing can continue of children and women and this superpower, a major ally of Israel, is unable to do anything.

'Nobody believes that.'

Russia asserts its presence in Asia

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to North Korea this week, with the signing of a pact pledging mutual help in the event of aggression against either country – and his follow-up trip to Vietnam – show he is keen to play a more prominent role in Asia.

Jonathan Eyal, global affairs correspondent for The Straits Times, says Russia could provide a counterbalance to China’s regional influence.

Russia and North Korea were notional but distant friends until Russia needed ammunition to continue its war against Ukraine. It turned to Kim Jong-un.

The enhanced relationship with Russia has effectively ended North Korea’s international isolation, Eyal says.

Putin referred to the mutual defence pact as a breakthrough document, he says. The treaty enhances North Korea’s global standing and boosts the two leaders’ aim of rebalancing their dependence on China.

'Mr Putin is eager to hint to Beijing that although Russia may be in a difficult spot at the moment, their relationship is still one among equals,' Eyal writes.

There is also a message for the US. The Korea Herald quotes Putin as saying the two countries stand against politically motivated sanctions.

'Kim lauded the agreement as the ‘strongest treaty in the history of bilateral ties,’ elevating them to ‘a new high level of alliance’,' the paper reports.

The Japan Times carries a Bloomberg commentary that says the Biden administration remains focused on Beijing and the North Korean missile launches that once caused terror now elicit snoozes.

But the soon-to-be-ratified security pact between Japan, South Korea and the US, together with the Russia-North Korea agreement, mean the battle lines are being redrawn.

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Putin’s visit to Vietnam is a sign that while he is a pariah to the West, he still exercises political clout in Asia, Al Jazeera says in a commentary.

Unlike North Korea, major countries want closer ties with Vietnam.

'That backdrop makes Vietnam a choice destination for the Russian leader,' Al Jazeera says.

Rohingya girls forced into marriage

Child marriage, regarded internationally as forced marriage and a form of human trafficking, is common in parts of Malaysia and is not regarded as a crime.

'It is considered the norm in some parts of Malaysia,' says Sheila Devi Michael, head of International and Strategic Studies at Kuala Lumpur’s Universiti Malaya. Michael is quoted in article on child-bride trafficking, published by the Asian Catholic news site, ucanews.com. It is the fifth article in a planned10-part UCAN series on human trafficking in Asia.

In Malaysia, child marriage is practiced by all communities, the article says.

It tells the story of a 14-year-old Rohingya girl who lives in a remote part of the country where she is married to a 49-year-old man. She was taken from Myanmar to Malaysia by an agent who promised her parents she would get a good job.

She is one of dozens of girls trafficked to Malaysia from Myanmar or the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh.

'They are either forced into the sex trade or sold as child brides by agents who are part of a thriving network of international crime syndicates,' the story says. It quotes a volunteer translator: 'There is nothing anyone can do for her now because she is legally married.'

Frontier Myanmar, the Burmese exile online magazine, is also running an article on trafficking and forced labour – in the Golden Triangle Special Economic Zone in Laos.

When travellers pass through Thai immigration to enter Laos, the story says, signs in Thai, Chinese and English warn of the dangers of human trafficking.

This area of Laos is home to a massive cyber-scam industry. 'The industry relies on forced labour,' the article says. It has snared thousands of desperate Myanmar migrant workers who find it difficult to escape.

The area is controlled by guards from the United Wa State Army, Myanmar’s biggest non-state armed group.

A worker named as Ko Nyunt Tin was lured to Laos by a friend, who talked of the money he could earn. Nyunt Tin thought he was being hired to work for a tourism company but it turned out to be a cyber-scam operation.

He discovered his 'friend' had recruited him as a way of escaping – finding his own replacement.

Workers in Nyunt Tin’s company were subject to severe restrictions and harsh punishments if they failed to reach their targets. After three months, Nyunt Tin wanted to leave but he had to pay a ransom. His wife sold her jewellery and a block of land.

Nyunt Tin said he could have tried to find another person to replace him. 'But I didn’t want another person to suffer like me,' he said.

Author the victim of crackdown on dissent

Author Arundhati Roy is being prosecuted for making allegedly provocative statements at an event promoting Kashmir separatism – in 2010.

The Hindu newspaper said Delhi Lieutenant-Governor V.K. Saxena had sanctioned the prosecution on June 14. He had also sanctioned the prosecution of Sheik Showkat Hussain, a former professor of law at the Central University of Kashmir.

Two people named in an initial complaint at the time had since died.

Roy won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her novel The God of Small Things.

The paper reported opposition party leaders had supported Roy and Showkat, saying the prosecution would choke freedom of expression.

In an editorial, the paper said the resurrection of an old case was an unfortunate instance of an ill-motivated prosecution.

The present regime found it expedient to revive the case as part of its crackdown on dissenters and outspoken critics, it said.

'The new coalition regime should move away from the earlier era’s obsession with stamping out dissenting views and put an end to its propensity to criminalise speeches,' it said.

Weakened US seeks weapons role for allies

The US is struggling to keep pace with China’s defence industries. It cannot build the ships and submarines it needs. Wars in Ukraine and Gaza have thinned its equipment and armaments inventories.

War games show the US would run out of key weapons in one week in a conflict with China over Taiwan. CSIS, the American security think tank, says the US defence industrial base is not equipped to fight a prolonged, conventional war.

One solution is to change US thinking about allies, so that they help manufacture and maintain America’s weapons and equipment.

Brad Glosserman, a professor at the Centre for Rule-Making Strategies at Tokyo’s Tama University, says the US cannot fix the problem on its own. 'The smart solution enlists allies and partners in the construction of an alliance industrial base,' he says.

Writing in The Japan Times, Glosserman says alliance co-operation reached a milestone this month with the launch of the US-Japan Defence Industrial Co-operation, Acquisition and Sustainment forum.

It has four groups: air defence missiles; maintenance and repair work in Japan for US warships; the same for fighter jets; and enhancing defence-related supply chains.

The long-term payoff is greater co-operation on defence production. This goal, Glosserman says, drives AUKUS, which will produce submarines and develop new weapons technologies.

'US Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel has been an especially vocal advocate for including Japan in this process,' he says.

'Emanuel sees US-Japan co-operation as ‘a blueprint of what we can do with other countries’.'

Dozens die in scorching summer

India has some of the world’s biggest cities, including Delhi, home to almost 34 million people. These cities have become lethal heat traps as the country endures another gruelling summer.

The Statesman newspaper reports daily temperatures in Delhi have been above 40 degrees Celsius for more than a month.

The heat trap problem has been made worse by climate change and unbalanced urban development, the paper says.

'This relentless heat is not just uncomfortable,' it says in an opinion piece. 'It is deadly.

'Dozens of lives have already been lost to the scorching temperatures this year.'

Cities expand at the expense of natural landscapes that previously acted as natural cooling systems.

'The proliferation of impervious surfaces, such as concrete and asphalt, has exacerbated the problem,' the paper says. 'These materials absorb and retain heat, contributing to the urban heat island effect.

'Coupled with rising greenhouse gas emissions, the result is a vicious cycle of increasing temperatures and deteriorating living conditions.'

David Armstrong has worked in Asia for more than 20 years. He is a former chief editor of The Bulletin, the Canberra Times, The Australian and the South China Morning Post. He is a former president of the Bangkok Post company and lives in Bangkok.

This article first appeared in Pearls and Irritations.

Image credit (left to right): BRICS' twitter account (@BRICSza) posted on 7 Aug 2023 | Vladimir Smirnov, TASS via Kremlin.ru posted on 19 June 2024 | Shutterstocks/Sudarshan Jha posted on 15 April 2023.