Plans by the Myanmar junta to forcibly conscript young people have prompted thousands to flee the country. Many are trying to get to Thailand. Julian Küng reports from the border region. In the village of Wale, Thailand and Myanmar are connected by a small wooden bridge. The narrow river that flows beneath it constitutes the border. The villages on the two banks share the same name, and their lives are closely entwined. Locals carry rice and vegetables back and forth across the little footbridge; children splash and play in the water below. The Thai border guard in the observation post is paying far more attention to his cellphone than to the flow of commuters. The majority of people who cross here are from the local villages. In recent weeks, however, an unusually large number of young people from other parts of Myanmar have been crossing the border in this quiet village. "I can spot them straight away by their big rucksacks," said Tungsa, as she plays dominoes outside her general store on the Myanmar side of the river. 'If they make it here, they're safe' These young people are fleeing conscription into Myanmar's military. Thousands are seeking to go abroad before mandatory military service comes into effect in April, for men between 18 and 35 years old and women aged 18 to 27. Anyone who doesn't go into hiding risks being ordered, as a soldier, to commit war crimes. And refusing to do military service is punishable by several years in jail. "If they make it here, they're safe," said Tungsa. That's because the Myanmar side of Wale is controlled by the Karen National Union. It's one of the ethnic militias that are fighting the Myanmar army inside the country on several fronts. The military junta has suffered some bitter defeats in recent months. The United States Institute of Peace estimates that the Myanmar army has just 130,000 soldiers at most, and that only about half are combat-ready. Observers believe the impending obligatory conscription is a desperate attempt to forcibly augment their greatly reduced troop numbers. And so more and more young people trying to escape conscription are now thronging into neighboring Thailand. In the past few weeks, hundreds have been arrested by patrolling border police. Human rights activists report that, depending on the policeman or arresting authority, they may be detained, sent back over the border, or, on occasion, released on payment of a bribe. Porous 'green border' allows many to cross However, most refugees from Myanmar make it into Thailand undetected, either by sneaking across the porous, virtually unguarded jungle border, or by mingling with regular commuters. At the Ban Mun Ru Chai river border to the west of Wale, the Thai guard post isn't even staffed. A couple of goats who have taken up residence watch the many people crossing the river to the Thai side. The Thai government seems to have been wholly unprepared for the situation in Myanmar, said security expert Panitan Wattanayagorn, a professor at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. He assumes that fighting between the military junta and resistance groups will intensify over the coming months, and that forced conscription will continue to drive people across the border into Thailand. On the TV channel Thai PBS, Wattanayagorn warned that Bangkok urgently needs to put measures in place to deal with the impending influx of refugees from Myanmar. The Thai foreign minister has announced plans to establish a humanitarian security zone along the western border, providing refugees with food and medical assistance. However, authorities have not given any information about where exactly the protected zone would be located, or when it would be established. Meanwhile, only random checks are being carried out along the 2,000-kilometer (1,240-mile) border between Myanmar and Thailand. "I check people on a random basis," said the border guard in Wale. Last week, he arrested six people trying to escape conscription. But "sometimes I just let them through," he admited, fixing his attention on his plate of rice as three people from Myanmar scuttled unchallenged over the bridge. Thailand needs cheap workers from Myanmar People in Wale don't seem to fear an influx of refugees. "Just let them all in," said Pattanew, a motorcycle taxi driver who is at the waiting area near the border bridge. He transports day laborers on the back of his moped; they work for very little money, tending Thai fields and cleaning houses. "Without the migrant workers from Myanmar, we would have a lot of issues," he said. "They're very hardworking; they tolerate the sun and rain and don't complain." Most of his passengers work in the surrounding border region. The new refugees, on the other hand, mostly travel on to big cities like Bangkok, Chiang Mai or the migrant quarter of Samut Sakhon, where they find places to stay among their fellow countrymen. It's estimated there are between 2 and 3 million people from Myanmar living in Thailand. No one knows the exact number, as many are in the country illegally. One of them, a man in his early 20s, asked to be referred to by the pseudonym "Mao Uh." He's afraid that otherwise, he may be detected by the authorities' radar. Hoping for a work permit It has been almost a month since he left his family in Ayeyarwady, west of Yangon, and set out for Thailand. The journey was a nerve-wracking one. Every time he passed through one of the junta's checkpoints, he ran the risk of being detected and arrested. "I was very lucky," he said. Eventually he made it across the "green border" in the countryside, into Thailand. Since then, he has been holed up in a Bangkok suburb, in a stuffy room that he seldom leaves. He's worried about his sister back home. Like him, she faces being called up for military service. "We've already agreed that she'll follow as soon as I have work here," said Mao. Ideally, he would like to work in the security sector as a guard, protecting people. But essentially he's prepared to do any work, "no matter what, no matter where." Mao is hoping for a so-called worker amnesty from the Thai authorities. Four times a year, illegal migrants can apply for an amnesty that will allow them to work in the country legally for a certain period of time. However, labor lawyers are critical of the procedure; they say it's too complicated and susceptible to corruption, which is why many refugees from Myanmar simply work illegally. Thai authorities 'turning a blind eye' According to the International Labor Organization, the invisible migrant workers from Myanmar already contribute up to 6.6% of Thailand's GDP. Sompong Srakaew from the Labor Rights Promotion Network is convinced the influx of workers from the neighboring country will further support the economy. "It's good for the Thai economy, because employers need cheap workers to remain competitive," he said. Srakaew, who advocates for migrant rights, estimates more than 10,000 people fleeing conscription have already crossed the border, with more coming every day. "It seems that the Thai authorities are turning a blind eye, and allowing many to enter the country unofficially," he said.  

Social media platform Facebook has been activated again after a temporary server error. Facebook, Messenger and Instagram were restored after being shut down for about an hour. Earlier, there was a sudden outage on Facebook after 9 pm. At the same time, Instagram was not working. "There were more than 3,00,000 reports of outages for Facebook, while there were more than 20,000 reports for Instagram," according to Downdetector.com.  "We're aware people are having trouble accessing our services. We are working on this now," Meta spokesperson Andy Stone stated in a post on X social media.

Social media platform Facebook has suddenly become inactive. Users in Bangladesh are not able to log in to Facebook. Even the IDs that are active on Facebook are automatically logged out. Users have been reporting the problem since 9 pm Bangladesh time on Tuesday (March 5). According to some sources, due to technological default in Meta the service of Facebook, Instragram and Messenger are currently unavailable all over the world.     

A new conservative political party is looking to tap into discontent among men who say it is unfair that they have to put in 18 months of military service when women are not obliged to serve. A new conservative party set up in South Korea ahead of the general election in April has provoked debate about the future of the nation's military by calling for women to complete compulsory military service if they want to subsequently take up careers in the police, fire brigade or the corrections service.  At present, all able-bodied Korean men are required to serve at least 18 months in one of the branches of the nation's armed forces, but all female members of the military are volunteers. That policy has been sustainable for the armed forces until now but — faced with a shrinking population — it will soon be unsustainable for national defense, the leaders of the New Choice Party said recently as they began their election campaign. Announcing the party's platform in late January, joint-founders Keum Tae-sup and Ryu Ho-jeong said requiring women to complete the same mandatory service would help to solve gender conflicts in Korean society as well as bolster the nation's armed forces. Imbalance in North-South forces At present, approximately 360,000 men and women serve in the South Korean ground forces, facing the 1.1-million-strong North Korean army across the heavily fortified border. As the South's birthrate continues to decline, however, it is anticipated that its army will have a pool of 290,000 service personnel to call on in a decade and just 190,000 in 20 years from now. North Korea, however, will still have a standing army of more than 1 million men and women. "Gender is a heated topic in South Korea at the moment, especially as we get closer to the election," said Kim Seong-kyung, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.  "In the last general election, the threat posed by North Korea was high up on the agenda and won or lost votes for parties, but we also saw women increasingly gaining a voice and the spread of feminism in Korean society as women spoke out against cyber-bullying because of their gender and other similar issues," she told DW. "But when young women raised their voices and we saw the MeToo movement here, young men reacted against that," she said. "These are the young men who feel that the nation's patriarchal system no longer exists, that their lives are really difficult, that only they have responsibility, and a sense of anger that only men have to serve in the military." Targeting dissatisfied men That resentment towards women has manifested itself in the emergence of a populist conservative party that is unabashedly targeting dissatisfied 20- and 30-year-old males. Another New Choice Party policy that is proving successful is the proposal to scrap the scheme that allows pensioners to travel free on Seoul's subway system, which the party is portraying as adding to the burden on working men. Han Ye-jung, a lawyer in Seoul, is strongly opposed to the party's proposals. "They say they are doing it to guarantee gender equality? That's not good enough," she said. "This is a male-dominated society, where men are the priority and enjoy all the privileges simply because they are men," she said. "For me, the price that they have to pay for that privilege is the time they have to serve in the military." Han believes that military service should remain optional for women and there should be no link between mandatory service and future job opportunities in other public sector jobs, but she stressed that the issue will not need to be addressed imminently. "That party will not win many votes in the election in April because they just do not have enough support for their policies, which is not surprising as they are doing nothing to appeal to female voters," she said. Alternative solutions Some analysts have put forward alternative solutions to the problem of a dwindling population in a country facing a belligerent and unpredictable neighbor, including longer periods of conscription and increased integration of technology into the armed forces, but both have drawbacks. Men are unlikely to want to serve even longer in the armed forces, while technology is expensive and far from infallible, while existing systems still require human oversight. Neither of South Korea's two main parties — the ruling People Power Party of President Yoon Suk-yeol, and the main opposition Democratic Party — has made commitments on women compulsorily serving in the armed forces. And the Defense Ministry this week said it was not drawing up plans to introduce female conscription.   Kim agrees that the New Choice Party is a fringe political group that is unlikely to attract sufficient votes to give it a voice in the new parliament, although the issues facing the armed forces that it has raised will need to be addressed sooner or later.   "There are simply not enough people in South Korea at a time when tensions with North Korea are worsening," she said. "This is the reality and we also need to reflect changing mindsets among the younger generations. We need to have the discussion on whether women should also serve in the military and the issue is going to become even more heated in the next couple of years."  

The startup Vay has launched its first commercial service in the city of Las Vegas. The company's "teledriving" involves a human driver controlling the vehicle remotely from a physical steering station miles away. German remote-driving startup Vay said on Wednesday it had launched its first commercial service in the US city of Las Vegas. The service is currently available around the University of Nevada Las Vegas and the city's arts district renting out electric cars by the minute. The launch comes at a challenging time for autonomous vehicle developers amid increased regulatory scrutiny into safety issues. But Vay says, unlike autonomous vehicles, its cars rely on a remote human driver, who controls the vehicle from a physical steering station located miles away. The company outfits its vehicles with cameras, GPS, radar, ultrasound and a slew of other sensors to reproduce car surroundings, including traffic sounds, at the purpose-built "teledrive" station, which is equipped with a steering wheel, pedals, monitors and other controls. A driver sits in this station and remotely controls the car.   A massive use case? CEO Thomas von der Ohe told Reuters that the startup sees a "massive use case" for remote driving functions. "If every vehicle drives off the production line equipped with teledriving... you can have an on-demand tele-valet that parks your car for you," said von der Ohe, "and then teledrives you home in your own car if you have a few glasses to drink." The company, founded in 2018, has been testing the technology for over four years. It says its approach presents an alternative to driverless mobility. In February 2023, Vay achieved a milestone by becoming the first company to drive a vehicle without a person inside on a public road in Europe.   More and more autonomous features CEO von der Ohe said Vay's vehicle fleet should number in the "low double digits" during the first quarter. The company has so far raised about $110 million (€101 million) from investors including Sweden's Kinnevik, Coatue and France's Eurazeo. The startup said it will gradually introduce autonomous features as it learns from the cameras included on its vehicles that are much cheaper than the lidar and radar technology used by most autonomous vehicle developers. "We see a decade or two of human-machine interaction where autonomous driving will play a part once it's available and ready to deploy, and then the other part will always be done by a teledriver," he said.

The report reveals that this connection enabled the balloon to transmit bursts of data to its home base in China, utilising high-bandwidth collections over short periods. The identity of the involved company has not been disclosed. US Intelligence officials have disclosed that the Chinese spy balloon, traversing the United States for a week in February, used an American internet service provider for communication. The balloon, detected over Alaska on January 28, ventured into U.S. airspace, passing over the Malmstrom Air Force base in Montana, a location housing nuclear assets. On February 4, the Air Force dispatched an F-22 fighter jet armed with an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile to intercept the balloon over water. According to a recent NBC report, citing reliable U.S. sources, the balloon was linked to a U.S.-based company, facilitating communication with China regarding its navigation. The report reveals that this connection enabled the balloon to transmit bursts of data to its home base in China, utilising high-bandwidth collections over short periods. The identity of the involved company has not been disclosed. Chinese Embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu insisted that it was a weather balloon engaged in meteorological research that inadvertently drifted into U.S. airspace due to weather patterns. The unnamed internet service provider refutes these claims. This revelation follows reports that the Biden administration initially planned to keep the spy balloon incident confidential, acknowledging intelligence gaps. A senior Biden administration official denied any intention to withhold information from Congress, emphasising the need to protect intelligence interests. NBC disclosed that on January 27, General Mark Milley and NORAD Chief Gen. Glen VanHerck discussed deploying F-22 jets to assess the balloon’s characteristics. Following this, the Pentagon confirmed the object as a surveillance-equipped balloon, roughly the size of three school buses. President Biden became aware of the situation on February 1, with the public learning about it after NBC’s report. Gen. VanHerck underscored that the incident exposed intelligence gaps, cautioning that the Chinese balloon program remains active. Source: Firstpost

During the blockades and hartals called by Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and its like-minded opposition parties since the October 28, at least 253 arson attacks is recorded by fire service till 6:00am today (December 5). Shajahan Shikder who is the media officer from the fire service headquarters has confirmed the matter on Tuesday (December 5).  As the opposition parties called rail and waterways blockade, One arson attack was reported in 24 hours till 6:00am on Tuesday during the second day of the latest blockades and hartals. A total of 10 members and two fire engines worked to douse the fire, he added. On December 4, BNP again announced a nationwide blockade programme on December 6 and 7 and will form a human chain on December 10, to realise their demand for holding the 12th parliamentary election under a nonparty caretaker government.

two buses were set to fire during the 3-day blockade in front of Ideal School in Mugda and Aminbazar.  In support of the blockade miscreants were set to fire around 10:55 a.m. on Wednesday, November 1 at Mugda. Duty Officer of Fire Service and Civil Defense Lima Khanom said that a fire service unit went to the spot and brought the fire under control. On the other hand, another bus was set to fire during the second day of the three-day nationwide blockad Aminbazar.

For about three-and-a-half decades, there has been a cycle of people’s protests, demands and sectarian riots in Gilgit-Baltistan. Sectarian riots are very brazenly set off to break people’s united demands for human rights. They demand right to food, water to drink, their land and property, electricity, their natural wealth and above all, just governance.  These demands were building up since the end of last year and were stepped up this year. The current reports of Shia-sunni tension in parts of Gilgit-Baltistan are not surprising for those who keep a watch on this part of occupied Kashmir. The present tension was clearly staged managed. An FIR registered for blasphemy against a Shia Imam Agha Baqir-Al-Hussaini of Skardu (a Shia majority district) was clearly meant to create Shia-Sunni tensions. Shias protested against the FIR. On the other hand, the people in Sunni majority Diamar district went on a protest to demand his arrest and punishment for his alleged blasphemous remarks. Shias took out counter rallies against the FIR. As a result of Shia-Sunni tensions, schools were closed. Foreign tourists were stranded when the Government closed the Karakoram highway. According to Shias in Skardu, the blasphemy allegation was made because Imam Baqir had mobilized the support of Shias, Sunnis and others to start work on water project for the good of everybody – Shias, Shunnis and others in the area. But the Gilgit-Baltistan administration which receives huge funds for such projects, didn’t like it. It started a campaign against Imam Baqir. And that was that. The irony in Gilgit-Baltistan is that it is rich in water resources but people have very little drinking water. It is like Samuel Coleridge’s “water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink.” Lack of drinking water is one of the major causes of protests. People say the Gilgit-Baltistan government can solve this problem by constructing dams. But since this government is made up of politicians of Pakistan-based political parties, it is mainly concerned about Pakistan’s interests here. Ensuring drinking water to the local population is not its priority knowingly or unknowingly. Imam Baqir tried to sabotage Pakistan’s game of keeping Shias and Sunnis at war so that they do not challenge Pakistan’s illegal occupation of their land.  Shias and their sect Ismailis formed the majority of Northern areas (now Gilgit-Baltistan) population. Before 1947, when Gilgit was made under British control, the population was treated as non-humans without any civil and human rights but also without any distinction between Shias and Sunnis. After Pakistan illegally captured Northern areas when the British left, it treated the locals the same way- no civil and human rights. But locals wanted these rights plus constitutional identity. Shias and Sunnis unitedly demanded these rights from the cussed Pakistani government. They staged daily rallies which got publicity in Pakistan and even abroad including India. When Gen Zia ul Haq captured power in Pakistan in July 1977, he decided to put an end to Shia-Sunni joint rallies by dividing them and drastically change the demographic profile of the Northern areas. Gen Zia put this diabolical scheme to practice in May 1988 when Shia-Sunni agitations were gaining momentum. He sent thousands of armed Sunni tribesmen to invade Northern Areas to kill and plunder fields. Zia’s scheme succeeded in as much as they forgot their demands and became thirsty of each other’s blood. Anti-Shia Sipah-e-Sahaba and pro-Shia Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Fiqh Jafaria became active with weapons received allegedly from Iran and Saudi Arabia. In 1992, there was an eight-day Shia-Sunni bloodbath in Gilgit when Sunni from Chilas and Kohistan descended here reacting to rumors that Shias were raping Sunni women. The military allowed the mayhem to continue for eight days.      Gen Zia split Shia and Sunnis to thirst after each other’s blood and changed the demographic profile, but Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s reforms in 1974 which allowed party-based elections proved more damaging. As a result of these reforms, all Pakistani parties and Islamic groups have captured political power in Gilgit-Baltistan, reducing locals to non-entities. This is causing much resentment among both Shias and Sunnis who have become helpless and dependent. But the government does not worry; it has an easy formula – divide “n” misrule. Source: Islamkhabar.com

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been inaugurated new train service on Dhaka-Bhanga route through Padma Bridge today, October 10. Then, PM crossed the Padma Bridge by a special train as the train will be reached at Bhanga in Faridpur from Mawa Railway Station. According to UNB, The railway line is being constructed in three phases (plus a 3km link being built between Dhaka and Gandaria): 37km Gandaria-Mawa section, a 42km Mawa-Bhanga section, and an 87km Bhanga Junction-Jashore section. Some 43.2km of loops, siding and Y-connections bring the total track length to 215.2km. The entire railway project from Dhaka-Jashore is scheduled to be completed by June, 2024.