Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
In Southeast Asia, as the health crisis escalates and countries go into different variations of a lockdown, it is affording regimes with authoritarian tendencies the opportunity to suppress political expression, enforce strict obedience and consolidate their rule. Unless this is called out and (...)
The new EU-Vietnam free trade agreement (FTA) shows the EU will look past human rights violations to push a trade agenda. But as FTAs with ASEAN states don’t offer the EU the same economic benefits, it’s unlikely the bloc will pen more in the near future.
Since the EU-Vietnam Free Trade (...)
The forced disappearances and assassinations of Thai republicans exiled in neighbouring countries has attracted considerable attention in recent months. But political exile can be a two-way street. The activities of Lao dissidents who have fled to Thailand can offer some insight into (...)
Save the Mekong, a coalition of non-government organizations, community-based groups and concerned citizens within the Mekong region, wish to express our shock and concern at the recent collapse of the Xe Pian - Xe Nam Noy hydropower project in Laos, and our deep condolences to communities (...)
Shrinking space, shrinking resources
As democracy experiences a global decline, and Southeast Asia oscillates between authoritarian endurance and democratic rollback, civil society in the region is facing a bleak future.
Dictatorships and quasi-democracies are racing to curtail freedom of (...)
Malacañang’s spokesperson has termed Asean’s commemoration of its 50th year a “tremendous success,” but based it mainly on the absence of any “untoward incident” rather than on the concrete and clear outcomes. There were the usual platitudes of the Asean 2017 chair being finally recognized “not just (...)
Civil society leaders and activists from the region under the banner of the ASEAN Civil Society Conference/ASEAN Peoples’ Forum deplored today the lack of substantial discussions and policy actions on critical issues such as human rights atrocities, peace and security, the territorial conflict (...)
Manila, Philippines - After two days of ceremonious meetings, Southeast Asian leaders missed the bullseye in talks about two major human rights issues affecting their region: Myanmar’s handling of the Rohingya crisis and the Philippines’ bloody campaign against illegal drug traffickers. (...)
Even ten years on, the first mental image that comes to mind with regard to Theravāda Buddhism is that of Myanmar’s Saffron Revolution of August-September 2007 : thousands of Buddhist monks peacefully demonstrating in the streets of Yangon, Mandalay, Pakokku, Sittwe and other towns against the (...)
The relationship between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations or Asean and civil society organizations (CSOs) has been a thorny one throughout 11 years of engagement. This is despite the fact that Asean has explicitly recognized the role that CSOs can play in the region. The main forum (...)
The move is in the tradition of grand power politics. Officially, it has been sweetened as something more, a goodwill gesture by Washington that is designed to rope in and keep partners in the Asian-Pacific area close to its bosom. More to the point, state of the Association of South East Asian (...)
A series of deadly suicide bombings and shootings in Jakarta have killed at least seven people, and been claimed by Islamic State (IS).
At first glance, this seems to confirm that long-held worries of a full-blown IS campaign in South-East Asia were well-founded – but viewed in context, the (...)
Some countries, as Vietnam, fear it, others, like Thailand, have high hopes - what can be expected of ASEAN’s neo-liberal project? About its future perspectives and an alternative vision.
By 31 December 2015, the targets and visions for a regional economic bloc through institutional reforms and (...)
Statement by local people on dams in the Mekong Region
We are people from local communities in the Mekong region, who depend on the eco-systems created by the Mekong river and numerous other rivers and lakes in the region, especially, the Tonle Sap, Sesan and Mekong Delta, for our food, (...)
The tension between the imperatives of “market sovereignty” and the entrenched principle of “state sovereignty” of authoritarian oligarchies will define the open-ended tendencies and outcomes of the ongoing regionalisation process in Southeast Asia.
For the 48-year-old Association of Southeast (...)
The following talk was presented by Sonny Melencio, chairperson of Partido Lakas ng Masa-Philippines (Party of the Labouring Masses), during the Socialist Alliance 10th national conference in Sydney, Australia on June 7, 2014. Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal — When I was (...)
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) is less than one year away from launching its Economic Community or AEC, a common market that will comprise 600 million people and have a combined GDP of nearly US$2 trillion (64 trillion baht).
It is being propped up by free trade and (...)
Bangkok Post, 21 March 2014 — The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) is less than one year away from launching its Economic Community or AEC, a common market that will comprise 600 million people and have a combined GDP of nearly US$2 trillion (64 trillion baht).
It is being propped (...)
Dear friends,
Find below the joint Phil-Malaysian CSOs statement appealing for dialogue and Humanitarian Ceasefire in Lahad Datu, Sabah as well as other affected areas in the standoff.
We are again circulating the joint statement as we continue to collect more signatures — now already (...)
By definition, a revolution is a collective process, not a one-man endeavour. While the social and political legacy of Hugo Chávez is remarkable, the Bolivarian Revolution has been intrinsically tied to him as the leader. With Chávez’s death, the Boliviarian Revolution faces a fundamental test. (...)
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