Beijing considers the KPSEZ and the deep-sea port especially vital to the BRI, as they will give China direct access to the Indian Ocean, so allowing Chinese trade to bypass the congested Strait of Malacca near Singapore.
Category: Myanmar
Global demand for rare earth elements fuels environmental destruction in Kachin State
In the remote mountains of Kachin State, rare earth elements used in everything from wind turbine generators to television screens are being mined illegally with seemingly toxic chemicals.
‘Weapons, power and money’: How rare earth mining in Kachin enriches a Tatmadaw ally
The leader of a Tatmadaw-controlled Border Guard Force in a remote region of Kachin State has emerged as a key player in the global rare earth trade, and has turned the territory under his de facto control into a mining hub at a high environmental cost.
Myanmar Junta Weaponizing Aid
is no surprise to anybody. It is just one more crime against humanity committed by the regime, which has already committed a long list of genocidal actions, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
Ethnic communities in Myanmar opposing a coal plant see their fight get harder
In Myanmar’s ethnic areas, Indigenous people have faced the loss of their lands, community forests, and deteriorating health conditions.
There’s still room to save Asia’s hoolock gibbons, study says, but only just
Researchers, whose study was published July 16 in Global Ecology and Conservation, came up with estimates for the area of hoolock gibbon habitat that disappeared between 2000 and 2018, and the area remaining today, across the four countries of Myanmar, India, Bangladesh and China where the apes occur.
Myanmar’s economy to contract by 18% this year: World Bank
The World Bank said the 18 percent contraction in fiscal year 2021 (October 2020-September 2021), coming on top of weak growth in FY2020, “would mean that the country’s economy is around 30 percent smaller than” it would have been in the absence of the pandemic and the military takeover on Feb. 1
Myanmar junta implementing China’s BRI projects by stealth
Amid political upheaval, the COVID-19 crisis and ongoing fighting between the military and civilian resistance fighters and ethnic armed groups, the junta is quietly attempting to pave the way for the implementation in Myanmar of China’s strategic infrastructure projects under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
EU sanctions no ‘silver bullet’ against Myanmar’s illegal timber trade, experts say
Local activists are urging the international community to do more as globally significant tracts of forests in the country come under threat, with illicit logging financing the military’s repressive rule.
Calls for sanctions to prevent illegal teak entering the UK
The UK Government is being urged to impose sanctions on Myanmar Timber Enterprises (MTE), the state-run regulator responsible for timber exports, to prevent illegal teak from entering the UK. Myanmar teak is highly prized in the boat building industry.