In a village in China’s jap Jiangsu province, a immobile determine is filmed standing in a darkish hut. Because the digicam attracts nearer, it reveals a girl with a sequence and heavy lock round her neck, alone within the chilly whereas her household gathers for a meal within the adjoining home.
The viral clip of the girl, later recognized as Xiao Huamei, sparked outrage after being uploaded to the short-video platform Douyin in January. That fury has centered on the state’s failure to search out and shield victims of human trafficking that proliferated on account of China’s one-child coverage.
Censors shortly deleted the video, however it was too late to quell the backlash. It garnered billions of views throughout social media websites and triggered a rolling, month-long disaster that has rocked Beijing’s claims to be creating gender equality and “frequent prosperity”.
Derek Hird, a China gender research professor at Lancaster College, stated that the video, recorded by a vlogger making an attempt to lift consciousness about poverty in rural areas “touched a nerve with the general public”. Hird stated that behind the “shiny picture of China that the propaganda machine promotes” is struggling brought on by China’s historic inhabitants management measures.
The video was launched simply as Beijing was making an attempt to quell anger over tennis participant Peng Shuai’s accusation, in a Weibo put up, {that a} former Communist celebration official had sexually assaulted her — dealing one other blow to Beijing’s assertion that girls’s situations had improved below Communist rule.
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Peng has since denied that she was sexually assaulted, though some specialists stated she might need been pressured by the authorities to retract her allegation.
Xiao’s case additionally presents a problem to Xi Jinping’s frequent prosperity agenda — to scale back the gulf between the city wealthy and poorer countryside — as he seeks an unprecedented third time period as president.
Yi Fuxian, an skilled on the one-child coverage on the College of Wisconsin-Madison, stated the nation’s feminine trafficking downside was exacerbated by Beijing’s resolution to ban households from having a couple of little one in 1980 due to overpopulation fears.
“It created a gender imbalance that persists as we speak,” stated Yi. The desire for boys created a intercourse imbalance that’s significantly acute in rural areas resembling Feng County, the place Xiao Huamei was filmed. In 2021, there have been 108 males for each 100 ladies within the countryside, based on authorities statistics.
Feng County is among the poorest areas within the in any other case affluent coastal province of Jiangsu. Two individuals with households in Feng County stated that the trafficking of ladies within the area, which lies on the border of three provinces, had been rife within the Eighties with ladies taken from the comparatively poorer southwestern provinces of Yunnan, Sichuan and Guizhou.
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Native authorities stoked the controversy by releasing conflicting accounts of Xiao’s historical past. At first, Feng County denied that she was a sufferer of human trafficking and justified her imprisonment due to her “psychological sickness” and historical past of “beating up kids and the aged”.
Many web customers questioned the reason, together with Hu Xijin, a former editor of state-backed tabloid the International Occasions. Hu criticised authorities for believing Xiao’s husband somewhat than stopping her abuse. Following the web backlash, officers admitted that Xiao was bought to her husband’s household within the late Nineteen Nineties and gave start to eight of his kids.
Lu Pin, a Chinese language feminist activist dwelling in New York, stated that by blaming Xiao, officers revealed how the “patriarchal society internalises and protects” abusive misogynistic behaviour. She stated Xiao’s case revealed that whereas many ladies “have benefited from China’s financial improvement”, others had been “deserted” by society.
The controversy was reignited final week when it emerged on WeChat {that a} man within the western province of Shaanxi allegedly saved his trafficked spouse in a cage. An article shared broadly on WeChat alleged that the person bragged on social media that he would “punish” his spouse if she tried to flee.
The Monetary Occasions was unable to confirm the claims. Many on-line commentators have argued the newest scandal highlights how widespread circumstances resembling Xiao’s are, regardless of official makes an attempt to current it as an remoted incident.
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“This isn’t simply Xiao Huamei’s ache, however the ache of many ladies and youngsters who’ve been trafficked,” wrote a Weibo consumer, who known as for penalties for human traffickers to be elevated.
Trafficking has lengthy been barred below Chinese language regulation. However it solely grew to become a legal offence in 1997, with a sentence of as much as three years in jail, which a authorized scholar identified was a lighter punishment than the penalty for promoting an endangered frog.
Again in Feng County, Xiao’s husband is dealing with legal costs of human trafficking. Three senior officers, together with the native Communist celebration chief, have been sacked for his or her half within the public relations disaster.
The 2 revelations about ladies imprisoned by their husbands prompted China’s highly effective Ministry of Public Safety final week to announce a 10-month countrywide marketing campaign to root out victims of human trafficking.
“The voices of ladies which have been trafficked aren’t heard,” Lu stated, “however sometimes proof emerges that makes them unimaginable to disregard.”
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
India’s former prime minister Manmohan Singh, who liberalised the economy and then led the country through a period of strong economic growth, has died.
Singh, 92, was being treated for age-related medical conditions, the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi said, as it announced his death on Thursday.
The Oxford university-educated economist set India on a path to becoming a fast-growing economy as finance minister from 1991 to 1996, when he opened up the country to more foreign trade and private investment.
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Considered a political lightweight by some in India at that time, Singh was a surprise choice by the Congress party to be prime minister after it won parliamentary elections in 2004.
Alongside a growth rate of almost 7 per cent, Singh’s decade as premier was marred by allegations of widespread corruption against his party’s leaders, although his personal integrity was rarely questioned.
Singh was accused of inaction and opposition parties claimed he was subservient to Congress’s chief at that time, Sonia Gandhi.
Shortly before Congress lost elections to Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party in 2014, Singh said in a speech to parliament that “history would be kinder to me than the contemporary media, or for that matter opposition parties”.
Prime Minister Modi on Thursday described Singh as one of India’s most distinguished leaders, saying he left a “strong imprint on our economic policy over the years” and had “made extensive efforts to improve people’s lives” as premier.
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Rahul Gandhi, a senior member of the Congress party, paid tribute to Singh, saying he had lost a “mentor and guide” whose “humility and deep understanding of economics inspired the nation”.
A member of parliament for more than three decades, Singh retired from active politics earlier this year.
The mild-mannered Singh, who belonged to India’s minority Sikh community, was born to a humble family in 1932 in a village in India’s Punjab prior to the country’s independence, which is now part of Pakistan.
Singh rose to become one of India’s most successful economists, serving the government in various capacities, including as head of the country’s central bank in the 1980s.
Tom Homan, President-elect Trump’s “border czar,” floated the idea of putting the children of illegal immigrants in halfway homes as part of the incoming administration’s mass deportation plan.
“As far as U.S. children — children, that’s going to be a difficult situation, because we’re not going to detain your U.S. citizen children, which means, you know, they’re going to be put in a halfway house,” Homan told NewsNation on Thursday, The Hill reported
.CALIFORNIA GOV. NEWSOM’S TEAM CONSIDERING WAYS TO HELP ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS AHEAD OF SECOND TRUMP ADMIN: REPORT
Incoming Trump ‘border czar’ Tom Homan speaks with Fox News.(Fox News)
“They can — or they can stay at home and wait for the officers to get the travel arrangements and come back to get the family,” he added.
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As part of his plan to address the border crisis, Trump has said he plans to deport large numbers of illegal immigrants.
One of the administration’s priorities will be to find the hundreds of thousands of migrant children unaccounted for in the United States.
MIGRANT CRIME WAVE DURING BIDEN-HARRIS ADMIN UNDER SCRUTINY AMID SERIES OF ASSAULTS, MURDERS: A TIMELINE
“We’re going to ask the American people to take notice: see something, say something and contact us,” Holman told Kellyanne Conway on “Hannity.” “If one phone call out of a thousand saves a child from sex trafficking or forced labor, then that’s one life saved.”
Homan acknowledged it would be a “daunting task,” but “we’re going to give it everything we’ve got.”
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During his interview with NewsNation, Homan said giving birth to children born in the U.S. won’t spare illegal immigrants from being deported.
“Having a U.S. citizen child does not make you immune to our laws, and that’s not the message we want to send to the whole world, that you can have a child and you’re immune to the laws of this country,” Homan said.
Migrants line up outside a migrant re-ticketing center at St. Brigid School on E. 7th St. Friday, Jan. 5, 2024, in Manhattan, New York City. (Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)(Barry Williams/New York Daily News/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
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In addition to mass deportations, Trump has threatened to go after birthright citizenship, which automatically grants American citizenship to those born in the country.
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Finnish authorities are investigating an oil tanker that is part of Russia’s shadow fleet over whether it cut an electricity cable between Finland and Estonia.
The Eagle S was stopped by Finnish authorities after the Estlink 2 subsea electricity cable in the Gulf of Finland was disconnected on Wednesday. The tanker, which is registered in the Cook Islands and is carrying oil from Russia to Egypt according to ship tracking data, was seen passing over the cable at the time of the incident.
The aged tanker is part of Russia’s shadow fleet and is the focus of Finland’s investigation, according to people familiar with the probe. The Eagle S is also under investigation over whether it cut three communications cables in the Gulf of Finland, the people added.
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The shadow fleet is a group of old and often poorly maintained ships used by Russia to circumvent international sanctions on its oil exports.
The Christmas Day incident appears to be the latest in a series of pipelines and cables being targeted in the Baltic Sea by foreign vessels, sparking fears of deliberate attacks on critical infrastructure between Nato countries.
“We must be able to prevent the risks posed by ships belonging to the Russian shadow fleet,” said Finland’s President Alexander Stubb in a post on X after a meeting with security chiefs on Thursday.
Last year a Chinese container ship, the Newnew Polar Bear, cut a gas pipeline between Finland and Estonia but was not stopped by authorities as it was in international waters.
A Chinese bulk carrier, the Yi Peng 3, last month passed over two data cables between Finland and Germany and Sweden and Lithuania about the times they were severed. It stopped for a month in international waters between Denmark and Sweden.
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Chinese investigators finally boarded the ship last week, with Swedish, Danish, German and Finnish representatives present as observers. But Sweden’s foreign minister criticised Beijing for not allowing the lead Swedish investigator to board or to inspect the vessel, which has now left the region.
The Eagle S case is different as the ship voluntarily stopped inside Finnish waters, according to people familiar with the investigation, leaving no question as to jurisdiction. Ownership of the Eagle S is murky but it appears to be the only vessel owned by a Dubai company. Attempts to reach the owner on Thursday were unsuccessful.
Authorities have not determined the cause of the disconnection of the Estlink 2 cable. Estonia has also said it will not affect its electricity supply. The cable is used to export electricity from Finland, which recently brought its latest nuclear power plant online, to Estonia.
Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said the country’s electricity supply would not be affected.
Finnish authorities are keeping an open mind on the latest incident, not least because dozens of poorly maintained vessels in the shadow fleet sail in the Baltic Sea.
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Environmental campaigners have issued repeated warnings about the dangers in the region and elsewhere of the dilapidated vessels.
In the Mediterranean, a Russian cargo ship under US sanctions for working with the Russian military sank between Spain and Algeria on Tuesday.
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