epubdos : Afghanistan
SCA MORNING PRESS CLIPS
Prepared for the U.S. Department of State
Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs
TO:
SCA & Staff
DATE:
Thursday, May 30, 2024 6:30 AM ET

Afghanistan
Nearly 3 out of 10 children in Afghanistan face crisis or emergency level of hunger in 2024 (AP)
AP [5/29/2024 9:24 AM, Rahim Faiez, 27514K, Negative]
About 6.5 million children in Afghanistan were forecast to experience crisis levels of hunger in 2024, a nongovernmental organization said.

Nearly three out of 10 Afghan children will face crisis or emergency levels of hunger this year as the country feels the immediate impacts of floods, the long-term effects of drought, and the return of Afghans from neighboring Pakistan and Iran, according to a report released late Tuesday by Save The Children.

New figures from global hunger monitoring body Integrated Food Security Phase Classification forecast that 28% of Afghanistan’s population, about 12.4 million people, will face acute food insecurity before October. Of those, nearly 2.4 million are predicted to experience emergency levels of hunger, which is one level above famine, according to Save the Children.

The figures show a slight improvement from the last report, released in October 2023, but underline the continuing need for assistance, with poverty affecting half of the population.

Torrential rain and flash floods hit northern Afghanistan in May, killing more than 400 people. Thousands of homes were destroyed or damaged and farmland was turned into mud.

Save the Children is operating a “clinic on wheels” in Baghlan province, which was hit the worst by floods, as part of its emergency response program. The organization added that an estimated 2.9 million children under the age of 5 are projected to suffer from acute malnutrition in 2024.

Arshad Malik, country director for Save the Children in Afghanistan, said that the NGO has treated more than 7,000 children for severe or acute malnutrition so far this year.

“Those numbers are a sign of the massive need for continuing support for families as they experience shock after shock,” Malik said. Children are feeling the devastating impacts of three years of drought, high levels of unemployment, and the return of more than 1.4 million Afghans from Pakistan and Iran, he added.

“We need long-term, community-based solutions to help families rebuild their lives,” Malik said.

More than 557,000 Afghans have returned from Pakistan since September 2023, after Pakistan began cracking down on foreigners it alleges are in the country illegally, including 1.7 million Afghans. It insists the campaign isn’t directed against Afghans specifically, but they make up most of the foreigners in the South Asian country.

In April, Save the Children said that a quarter-million Afghan children need education, food and homes after being forcibly returned from Pakistan.

Malik added that only 16% of funding for the 2024 humanitarian response plan has been met so far, but nearly half the population needs assistance.

“This is not the time for the world to look away,” he said.

Meanwhile, the European Union is allocating an additional 10 million euros (nearly $10.9 million) to the U.N. food agency for school feeding activities in Afghanistan. These latest funds from the EU follow an earlier contribution of 20.9 million euros ($22.7 million) towards the World Food Program’s school meal program in Afghanistan for 2022 and 2023.

The funding comes at a timely moment and averts WFP having to downsize its school meal program this year because of a lack of funding, the WFP said in a statement.

“Hunger can be a barrier to education. The additional EU funding to our long-standing partner WFP ensures that more children in Afghanistan receive nutritious food,” said Raffaella Iodice, chargé d’affaires of the EU’s delegation to Afghanistan.

The WFP’s statement said that the agency will be able to use the funding to distribute fortified biscuits or locally produced nutritious school snacks to pupils in more than 10,000 schools in the eight provinces of Farah, Ghor, Jawzjan, Nangarhar, Nuristan, Paktika, Uruzgan and Zabul.

Last year, WFP supported 1.5 million school-age children through this program.
Taliban appear set to take part in UN-organized Doha meeting on Afghanistan (VOA)
VOA [5/29/2024 1:17 PM, Ayaz Gul, 4186K, Neutral]
Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers stated their intention Wednesday to join a United Nations-organized meeting in Doha on June 30 that aims to facilitate and coordinate the world’s engagement with the country hit by a multitude of crises.

The announcement came a week after a senior U.N. diplomat visited Kabul and extended to the de facto authorities “an advance invitation” to participate in the two-day conference of special envoys on Afghanistan.

The international event will be the third Afghanistan-centered gathering in Qatar’s capital since U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres initiated the process in May 2023, aiming to increase interaction with Afghanistan “in a more coherent, coordinated and structured manner.”

Zakir Jalali, a senior Taliban foreign ministry official, said in a “keynote speech” to its staff in the Afghan capital that “representatives of the Islamic emirate will take part in the main discussions” in Doha. A ministry spokesperson posted details of his remarks on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Wednesday.

Jalali stated that a formal decision to attend the “Doha III” meeting would be announced later. He defended the Taliban’s decision not to join the previous two meetings, saying that any “symbolic participation would have been futile” for Kabul as the organizers had refused to accept its conditions and address objections over the agenda.

“However, the agenda for the third Doha format meeting has changed positively, and there are no significant differences regarding the topics of the discussion,” Jalali noted. He explained that the upcoming meeting would discuss financial and banking-related problems facing Afghanistan, alternative livelihoods for poppy growers, and climate change impacts on the country.

Jalali said the Taliban foreign ministry was waiting for the U.N. to share the latest details about the Doha huddle to enable Kabul to send its delegation there.

Rosemary DiCarlo, the under-secretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, visited Afghanistan from May 18 to 21, where her discussions with Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi, among others, centered on the June 30 meeting.

The Taliban had asked the U.N. in the run-up to the second Doha meeting in February that their delegates would be accepted as the sole official representatives of the country, meaning that Afghan civil society activists and members of opposition groups would not be present.

De facto Afghan authorities also sought a meeting between their delegation and the U.N. at “a very senior level,” saying it “would be beneficial.” The Taliban also opposed the planned appointment of a U.N. special envoy to coordinate international engagement with Kabul in line with the latest U.N. Security Council resolution on Afghanistan.

However, Guterres rejected the Taliban conditions while briefing reporters at the end of the second Doha meeting.

“These conditions, first of all, denied us the right to talk to other representatives of the Afghan society and demanded a treatment that would, I would say, to a large extent be similar to recognition,” the secretary-general argued.

It was unclear immediately whether the U.N. would relax those conditions to allow Kabul’s delegates to attend the upcoming meeting despite their controversial governance in poverty-stricken Afghanistan.

The Taliban have imposed sweeping restrictions since taking power in August 2021, including a ban on girls attending school beyond the sixth grade and prohibitions on many Afghan women’s access to employment and public life at large.

De facto Afghan leaders, who are ethnically Pashtun, have also rejected international calls for giving representation to other ethnicities in the government, saying all groups are represented in it.

The elusive Taliban supreme leader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, insists he is governing the country in line with local culture and Islamic law and dismisses international criticism of his policies as an interference in the country’s internal affairs.

Afghan rights groups and activists have criticized the U.N. for inviting the Taliban to the upcoming Doha meeting, saying it would embolden the Taliban to further tighten their curbs on women.

U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric, while responding to the criticism, told reporters in New York on Tuesday that his organization continues to engage with the Taliban “because they are the de facto authorities in Afghanistan.”

Dujarric emphasized that the U.N. is persistently urging the Taliban to uphold the rights of women and girls, as well as advocating for increased humanitarian aid for the Afghan people.

“We’ve invited envoys on Afghanistan to attend a meeting in Doha … to bring some clarity and consistency to the way the world deals with the situation in Afghanistan while continuing to put the human rights of women and girls at the forefront,” he said.

Separately on Tuesday, in her address to a U.N. Security Council meeting, DiCarlo cited Afghanistan as a “crying example” where women and girls are systematically denied rights and dignity, particularly in education. “Women in Kabul aspire to the same opportunities as men and seek international support to realize their rights and contribute to their country’s future,” she stated.

U.N. agencies describe Afghanistan as one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, where more than two-thirds of the estimated 40 million population needs assistance following years of conflict and natural disasters. In recent weeks, hundreds of Afghans have died in flash floods triggered by climate change-induced heavy seasonal rains, which displaced more than 80,000 people.

The Taliban’s return to power in August 2021 invited international financial and banking sanctions on the country, worsening economic and humanitarian conditions.
Taliban Govt Harbours Big Dreams For Afghan Rail (Agence France-Presse)
Agence France-Presse [5/30/2024 4:14 PM, Pascale Trouillaud and Qubad Wali, Neutral]
On the edge of the Afghan border with Uzbekistan, where the railway abruptly stops, throngs of young men transfer sacks of wheat or flour from freight trains to trucks.

Every day, 3,500 tons of flour and 1,500 tons of wheat are unloaded by hand at the border town of Hairatan in northern Afghanistan to trucks that brave mountain passes and war-damaged roads to ferry goods around the country.

Renovations are under way to connect the rundown track with Mazar-i-Sharif, the north’s largest city, and according to the Taliban authorities, it will come into operation from June.

Just 75 kilometres (47 miles) long, it is an important part of the Taliban government’s ambitions to revive several dormant railway projects.

The long-envisioned Trans-Afghan Railway aims to eventually connect Uzbekistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan with 700 kilometres of track, backed by the three countries that have established a working group.

"People have been talking about the Trans-Afghan Railway for more than 100 years," said Andrew Grantham, news editor of the UK-based Railway Gazette International, a media outlet dedicated to covering developments in the rail sector.

In addition to foodstuffs and logs from Russia, fuel and other materials arrive in Hairatan from Central Asian republics and China, with the Taliban government aspiring to see those goods traverse Afghanistan by rail under their rule.

"Trans-Afghan will become the economic corridor between Central Asia and South Asia," said Mohammad Shafiq Mahmood, head of the Balkh railway authority in Mazar-i-Sharif.

It is one of two railway projects the Taliban authorities are pursuing in a bid to better connect Afghanistan -- a country wracked by decades of war and poverty that has never built its own railways.

A second line of more than 200 kilometres at the other end of the country is intended to connect the city of Herat with its western neighbour Iran, providing Afghanistan with an outlet to the sea, Turkey and Europe.

This is a project envisaged for some 15 years, long before the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.

Railway transport is the fastest and cheapest means of transporting goods, with passenger trains not on the table at this stage in Afghanistan.

Building a line all the way through to Pakistan will take time, however, said Abdulsami Durrani, the national railway spokesperson in Kabul.

"According to our current estimates, once the actual work on this project begins, the construction phase will take three to five years," he told AFP.

He added preliminary figures suggest a price tag of $4-5 billion, though he remained vague about sources of funding.

"We are in discussions with various countries and financial institutions," he said.

Foreign funds have withered since the Taliban’s return to power, their government not formally recognised by any country.

"Building a railway on that scale in five years, it’s not going to happen," said Grantham.

"It’s just too ambitious," he told AFP, emphasising that Kabul will need foreign financial and technical aid.

Western companies will likely not be interested due to "security and safety issues and the political environment", he added.

But Central Asian countries such as Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, as well as Russia, are already working with Afghanistan.

Other countries, such as Iran, could also provide support.

"The projects do seem to be happening," said Grantham, noting that the line connecting Herat to Iran "can be up and running reasonably quickly".

"Assuming Iran is supportive, that should be a viable project," he said.

Last Sunday, work began on the final phase of this line.

The 47-kilometre section will be built in two years for $53 million, with Russian and Turkish partners, said Durrani.

This railway will give landlocked Afghanistan access to the sea and connect it with international trade routes, and will "significantly impact Afghanistan’s economy", he added.

"The more kilometres of railways are developed in the country, the more our trade with other countries will increase."

In addition to funding, there remain thorny technical issues to resolve, notably the track gauge.

Iran uses European gauge standards, but the railways coming from the former Soviet republics have a different gauge, and Pakistan’s have a third.

"You can have hours of fun," working out which of the three gauges Afghanistan should use, said Grantham.
Distrustful Of The Taliban, A Growing Number Of Afghans Ditch Banks (Radio Free Europe)
Radio Free Europe [5/29/2024 4:14 PM, Abubakar Siddique, Neutral]
An increasing number of Afghans are taking out their money from banks and closing their accounts, a trend spurred by mistrust in the unrecognized Taliban government and concerns about the country’s bleak economic outlook.

The Taliban takeover in 2021 triggered a cash and banking crisis. The militants were hit with international sanctions, and the country cut off from the global financial system and crucial foreign aid. Billions in the central bank’s foreign reserves were frozen.

The economic meltdown forced some of the 12 state-owned and commercial banks to close, while others worked at limited capacity. Caps were placed on how much people were allowed to withdrawal from banks.

While the economy has somewhat recovered, Afghanistan is still in the grips of a devastating humanitarian crisis, mass unemployment, and rising poverty. And trust in the formal banking system has collapsed.

Experts say Afghans closing their bank accounts has helped further constrain the money supply in the country and placed further stress on the economy.

Cut off from the international banking system, more Afghans are also turning to hawala, an informal system of lenders.

‘Concerning Trend’

Afghan banks lost around 11 percent of their customers from December 2022 to December 2023, according to the World Bank.

Among them was Ahmad, a resident of the western city of Herat. He said he closed his bank account after repeatedly trying and failing to transfer money inside the country.

“This indicates that the banks have failed,” Ahmad, who only goes by one name, told RFE/RL’s Radio Azadi. “They have become untrustworthy.”

Baseer, a resident of Kabul, also recently closed his bank accounts. He said he lost confidence in the banks after they enforced limits on how much of his own money he could withdraw.

“Bank employees used to harass and abuse us when we asked for our own money,” he told Radio Azadi.

The Taliban initially set a weekly withdrawal limit of $200 for individual bank accounts. In December, the Taliban-run central bank increased the cap to $1,000.

A commercial bank employee in Kabul, who requested anonymity, said that strict controls over how much money account holders can withdraw has damaged banks’ reputations.

The employee told Radio Azadi that banks’ inability to return depositors’ money made them “worthless” in customers’ eyes.

According to the World Bank’s 2017 Global Findex database, only 15 percent of Afghan adults had an account at any financial institution, a figure that has plummeted since the Taliban takeover.

The World Bank said in a report published in April that the banking sector since 2020 has lost around 25 percent of its total asset base, which it said signaled a “concerning trend for an already small industry."

“The banking sector is experiencing considerable strain from dwindling assets and deposits,” the report said, adding that this has “spurred a greater dependence on cash and non-traditional payment methods, further tightening the money supply and aggravating economic downturn and deflation.”

Azarakhsh Hafizi, an economist and former head of the Afghanistan International Chamber of Commerce, said that a modern economy is “incomplete without a banking system.”

“Countries where banks can channel their customers’ deposits to economic investments, such as building businesses and industry, are better off,” he added. “When you do not have enough deposits in the banks, you cannot give loans to people [and businesses] that need them.”

Sanctions And Islamic Banking

The strain on banks has been compounded by international sanctions.

Afghan banks have been cut off from the world’s dominant financial transaction network, SWIFT, greatly inhibiting the Taliban government’s ability to conduct trade.

It has also made it difficult for individuals and businesses in Afghanistan to transfer money and make payments.

Without access to SWIFT, Afghans are increasingly turning to the informal transfer system known as hawala, which uses individual brokers rather than banks. The system is difficult to trace and has been used by armed groups.

The Taliban’s shift to Islamic banking has also hampered the banking sector, experts said.

Islamic banking, first developed in the 1970s in the Gulf states, prohibits the practice of lending money with interest. Like conventional banks, Islamic banks make their profits by loaning money to customers. But whereas a bank loans with interest, Islamic banks do so through buy-and-sell transactions.

In March, the Taliban appointed a committee to review laws for Afghanistan’s central bank and the commercial banking sector.

The Taliban has said that Islamic banking prohibits “earning income through interest on investments, loans, or deposits.”

In its recent report, the World Bank said the “banking sector’s role as a financial intermediary is significantly hampered by the mandatory transition to Islamic Finance.”
Pakistan
4 Pakistanis killed by Iranian border guards in remote southwestern region, Pakistani officials say (AP)
AP [5/30/2024 12:39 AM, Staff, Negative]
Iranian border guards opened fire at a vehicle carrying a group of Pakistanis, killing four people and wounding two others in a remote area in the southwest, Pakistani officials said Thursday.

The incident happened near the border village of Mashkel in Baluchistan province on Wednesday, local police said. Government administrator Sahibzada Asfand said it was unclear why the Iranian forces opened fire.

Local police say the bodies of the four men had been handed over to their families.

There was no immediate comment from Tehran or Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry.

Security forces on both sides often arrest smugglers and insurgents who operate in the region. Pakistan in tit-for-tat strikes in January targeted alleged militant hideouts inside Iran, killing at least nine people in retaliation for a similar attack by Iran.
Four Pakistanis killed, 2 injured by Iranian forces in southwestern Pakistan, officials say (Reuters)
Reuters [5/29/2024 3:04 PM, Saleem Shahid, 45791K, Negative]
Four Pakistanis were killed and two were injured late on Tuesday night, when Iranian forces opened fire in the restive southwestern province of Balochistan in Pakistan, officials said.

The shooting took place near the Pakistan-Iran border, in Washuk District, confirmed Umar Jamali, additional deputy commissioner.

Naeem Umrani, deputy commissioner Washuk, said an investigation is being initiated to determine the reason for the shooting.

Former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi visited Pakistan in April on a three-day official visit as the two Muslim neighbours seek to mend ties after unprecedented tit-for-tat military strikes this year. Raisi’s visit was seen as a key step towards normalising ties with Islamabad.

Iran and Pakistan have had a history of rocky relations, but missile strikes in January were the most serious incidents in years, with Pakistan recalling its ambassador to Tehran and not allowing his counterpart to return to Islamabad, as well as cancelling all high-level diplomatic and trade engagements.

Swift efforts to lower the temperature subsequently led to assurances that they respected each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as vows to expand security cooperation and requests for envoys to return to their posts.

Islamabad said it hit bases of the separatist Baloch Liberation Front and Baloch Liberation Army, while Tehran said it struck militants from the Jaish al Adl (JAA) group.

The militant groups operate in an area that includes Pakistan’s southwestern province of Balochistan and Iran’s southeastern Sistan-Baluchestan province. Both regions are restive, mineral-rich and largely underdeveloped.
Pakistan court delays ruling on ex-PM Khan’s unlawful marriage conviction (Reuters)
Reuters [5/29/2024 6:29 AM, Gibran Peshimam and Asif Shahzad, 45791K, Negative]
A Pakistani court on Wednesday postponed a ruling on an appeal by former prime minister Imran Khan and his third wife against their conviction for unlawful marriage, their lawyer said.

Khan and his wife Bushra Khan, also known as Bushra Bibi, were sentenced to seven years in jail, just before a national election on Feb. 8, after being found to have broken Islamic law by failing to leave the requisite interval after Bibi’s divorce.

The delay was due to the judge recusing himself after being accused of bias by Bibi’s former husband, Khawar Maneka, the lawyer, Naeem Panjutha, said.

The case is one of four convictions for Khan, three of which came in the lead-up to the election. The 71-year-old former cricket star and his Pakistan Tehree-e-Insaf Party (PTI) say the cases were a politically motivated bid to thwart his return to power. Khan has been in jail since August.

The court in Islamabad had said last week that it would announce its judgment on Wednesday but Sessions Judge Shahrukh Arjumand instead asked the Islamabad High Court to "transfer the appeals to any other court", according to a copy of his letter shared by Khan’s media team and the lawyer.

The letter said Maneka had shown "distrust" in Arjumand and that it would not be appropriate to announce a decision.

It was not immediately clear whether the High Court would transfer the case or it would be heard afresh.

Candidates backed by Khan’s party won the most seats in February’s election but fell short of a majority, and his opponent Shehbaz Sharif was able to form a government with the help of allied parties.
Pakistan: Dozens killed as bus plunges into ravine (Deutsche Welle)
Deutsche Welle [5/29/2024 7:34 AM, Staff, 15611K, Negative]
At least 27 people were killed and dozens more were injured when a speeding passenger bus plunged off a highway into a rocky gorge in western Pakistan early Wednesday, officials said.

The crash happened as the bus was traveling in Washuk district from Turbat, the second largest city in Balochistan province, to Quetta, the provincial capital.

"The driver was navigating a turn in a mountainous area when the vehicle lost control and fell into a ravine," the French AFP news agency quoted local government official Ismail Mengal as saying.

Mengal said rescue workers and police responded quickly and provided first aid to the injured passengers. Police took the dead and injured to a hospital, where some of the injured were in critical condition.

In a statement, Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti expressed grief at the loss of life and ordered that the injured be given the best possible medical treatment.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi issued separate statements expressing grief over the deaths.

What caused the crash?

Authorities said they were investigating the cause of the incident. "It could be that the driver fell asleep or was speeding, which led to the accident," Mengal said.

Meanwhile, the German DPA news agency cited sources as saying it was the extreme heat that caused the bus tires to burst, leading to the fatal accident.

Most of Pakistan has been sweltering in a heat wave for a second week, with temperatures in some cities soaring above 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit).

The heat wave, the first of the summer for the climate-vulnerable South Asian nation, was expected to continue for another week.

Poor roads, poorly maintained vehicles and a poor safety record cause scores of accidents each year in Pakistan, killing thousands, according to government statistics.

In May, a bus crashed in the north of the country killing 20 people. In April, at least 17 pilgrims were killed and 41 injured in a crash while traveling to a shrine in Balochistan’s Hub district.
India
New Delhi Sweats Through Its Hottest Recorded Day (New York Times)
New York Times [5/29/2024 12:35 PM, Hari Kumar and Mujib Mashal, 5748K, Negative]
New Delhi recorded its highest temperature ever measured on Wednesday — 126 degrees Fahrenheit, or 52.3 degrees Celsius — leaving residents of the Indian capital sweltering in a heat wave that has kept temperatures in several Indian states well above 110 degrees for weeks.

In New Delhi, where walking out of the house felt like walking into an oven, officials feared that the electricity grid was being overwhelmed and that the city’s water supply might need rationing.

The past 12 months have been the planet’s hottest ever recorded, and cities like Miami are experiencing extreme heat even before the arrival of summer. Scientists said this week that the average person on Earth had experienced 26 more days of abnormally high temperatures in the past year than would have been the case without human-induced climate change.

Extreme heat can cause serious health issues and can be fatal.

Although late-afternoon dust storms and light drizzle in New Delhi had brought hope of some reprieve on Wednesday, the weather station at Mungeshpur, northwest of the capital, reported a recording of 126 degrees around 2:30 p.m. Dr. Kuldeep Srivastava, a scientist at the regional meteorological center in Delhi, said it was the highest temperature ever recorded by the automatic weather monitoring system, which was installed in 2010.

In a statement later on Wednesday evening, India’s meteorological department said the Mungeshpur station was “an outlier compared to other stations.” It said it was assessing whether that station’s recording of a higher temperature than other stations around Delhi was due to an error or a local mitigating factor.

The previous record for the highest temperature, around 48 degrees Celsius — about 118.5 Fahrenheit — was repeatedly crossed in recent days. Three of New Delhi’s weather stations reported temperatures of 49.8 degree Celsius — 121.8 degrees Fahrenheit — or higher on Tuesday, setting a new record even before the 52.3 degree reading on Wednesday afternoon.

For weeks now, temperatures in several states in India’s north have reached well over 110 degrees, and hospitals have been reporting an uptick in cases of heatstroke. In the Himalayan states, hundreds of forest fires have been reported.

Deadly fires in crowded buildings are regular occurrences in India, with many of them caused by short circuits. The rising temperatures have increased concerns about the risks.

Atul Garg, Delhi’s fire chief, said daily fire-related calls have crossed 200, the highest in the past decade.

“Normally during this period in the last eight to 10 years we would receive 160 calls per day,” Mr. Garg said. “We are stretched in terms of manpower.”

The heat wave has coincided with campaigning for India’s general election, with the last phase of voting set to take place on June 1. Candidates, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and opposition leaders, have continued holding large public rallies, despite the temperatures.

Nitin Gadkari, a cabinet minister who is running for re-election, fainted from the heat while addressing a rally, and on Tuesday, Rahul Gandhi, the opposition leader, took a break during a speech to pour water from a bottle onto his head.

“It’s quite hot, no?” he said.

To help conserve water amid the extreme heat, Atishi Marlena, Delhi’s water minister, announced the deployment of 200 teams to crack down on waste and misuse. Fines will be imposed for activities such as washing cars with hoses, “overflow of water tanks” and “use of domestic water for construction or commercial” purposes, she said.

Delhi’s lieutenant governor, V.K. Saxena, ordered measures to protect construction workers during the midday heat, and for water to be provided at bus stands.

The state broadcaster reported that Mr. Saxena, who was appointed by Mr. Modi, had also called for construction workers to get “paid leave” between noon and 3 p.m. But it did not say how that would be implemented, particularly at a moment when the capital region’s administration is paralyzed by infighting between its lieutenant governor and the elected chief minister.

Just how much the heat has affected daily life in the Indian capital was captured in the adjournment order of a consumer dispute court last week when the most intense period of the heat wave began.

The presiding official, Suresh Kumar Gupta, complained that the room had no air-conditioning, and the water supply in the bathrooms was also affected.

“There is too much heat in the courtroom, which led to sweating, as such it is difficult to hear arguments,” he said in the order. “In these circumstances, arguments cannot be heard, so case is adjourned.”

Jitender Singh, 42, an auto rickshaw driver in the eastern part of the city, said that business was down by about a third because people were avoiding leaving their homes. He said he and his colleagues had frequently fallen sick.

“But we must come on the road to support our families,” he added.
‘Unbearable’ heat in Delhi is testing limits of human survival (Washington Post)
Washington Post [5/29/2024 5:01 PM, Karishma Mehrotra and Dan Stillman, Negative]
India’s capital territory of Delhi experienced some of its hottest weather on record Tuesday and Wednesday, with highs in some neighborhoods near the landmark threshold of 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit). The exceptional heat has closed schools, endangered outdoor workers, stressed water supplies and infrastructure, and reached levels that would test the limits of human survival if sustained.

The searing temperatures in northern India are part of a broader heat wave across much of Southeast Asia, which is one of multiple heat waves occurring around the world because of a combination of short-term weather patterns and long-term warming trends fueled by human-caused climate change.

The heat wave, which began building more than a week ago, has at times surpassed a dangerous threshold.

A Washington Post analysis found that the wet-bulb globe temperature, which measures the amount of heat stress on the human body, reached 97 degrees to 100 degrees (36 to 38 Celsius) in Delhi on Tuesday. That is higher than the 89.6 Fahrenheit (32 Celsius) threshold that researchers have identified as posing a risk to human survival if such heat is prolonged. The wet-bulb globe temperature is based on a combination of factors including temperature, humidity, wind and clouds, and was calculated by The Post using data from a nearby weather station.

The extreme heat has had wide-ranging impacts.

“The intense heat has sharply increased the number of fires in dwellings, heatstrokes and trips to emergency rooms. It has made just going outside — a necessity for many who depend on manual labor for their daily wages — simply unbearable,” Ramanan Laxminarayan, president of One Health Trust in India, said in an email. “The rise in temperatures comes alongside water shortages, and together are making many areas simply unlivable.”

Amit Sah, a labor contractor, had hired seven workers to install tiles on a roof in east Delhi from 6:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. But, with the heat, he stops work from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. and resumes in the evening. “It creates a massive loss for me. But the past three days have been unbearable. It feels like we are on fire outside. Our mouths run dry for water. We are sweating nonstop.”

Last week, a local consumer court that had no air conditioner or coolers in the national capital adjourned as the judge stated in an order that “there is too much heat in the courtroom, which led to sweating to such an extent that it is difficult to hear arguments” and no water supply in the washroom, according to local reports.

The conditions spread across swaths of India, as all schools shut for the next week in the eastern state of Bihar after several students fainted from heatstroke. The north and western regions also had similar alerts.

One of Sah’s workers, Ramnath Paswan, for the first time in his life took the day off because of the heat, but said he has to work Thursday even if the heat continues to break records because he works for a daily wage. “I have never seen this type of heat in Delhi. But we will have to work. Our stomachs won’t listen to us, if it’s hot or not.”

Several cities in India recorded their all-time highest temperatures on Wednesday, according to climate historian Maximiliano Herrera, including 120 degrees (48.8 Celsius) at Rohtak and 117 degrees (47.2 Celsius) at Fursatganj. That followed a high temperature of 121 degrees (49.5 Celsius) on Tuesday at Sirsa, the highest ever in the state of Haryana.

Around Delhi, the highest reading recorded by a manually operated station Tuesday or Wednesday was 117.7 degrees (47.6 Celsius) on Tuesday in Aya Nagar, southwest of the city. Automated weather stations posted temperatures as high as 121.8 degrees (49.9 Celsius) in the region.

News reports on Wednesday morning that Delhi exceeded 50 degrees Celsius for the first time ever appear to have been premature. Several news organizations reported a temperature as high as 126 degrees (52.9 Celsius) in the Mungeshpur area of Delhi. That would have been an all-time high for anywhere in the country.

However, a news release from the India Meteorological Department said that measurement came from an automated weather station that is considered less reliable than its manually operated stations. Mungeshpur’s temperature of 52.9 degrees Celsius is “an outlier compared to other stations. It could be due to error in the sensor or the local factor. IMD is examining the data and sensors,” the Meteorological Department said.

Thunderstorms and dust storms riled parts of Delhi on Wednesday afternoon, but provided only temporary relief. After some minutes, the ground dried up again and the sky cleared quickly.

The Meteorological Department said that “heat wave conditions will reduce during next 2-3 days due to gradual fall in temperature in association with approaching western disturbance, rainfall/thunderstorm and southwesterly wind blowing from Arabian Sea to northwest India.”

Record heat has scorched not just India, but much of Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Mexico and Florida this month. The exceptional May heat follows an April that marked the 11th straight month of record global heat. That month began with a heat wave across West Africa that would have been “virtually impossible” without the influence of human-caused climate change, an analysis by World Weather Attribution showed.

Other factors contributing to the heat waves include stagnant areas of high pressure known as heat domes, El Niño and record-warm ocean temperatures worldwide. Forecasters predict El Niño to wane in the next several months, which could moderate global temperatures.
Temperature in India Capital Hits Extremes as Heat Worsens (Bloomberg)
Bloomberg [5/29/2024 12:01 PM, Atul Prakash and Pratik Parija, 24454K, Neutral]
Temperatures at a weather observatory in India’s capital city touched 52.9C (127F) on Wednesday, evidence of a worsening heat wave that also sent peak electricity demand in Delhi to an all-time high.

The extreme level was recorded at the Mungeshpur automatic weather station on Wednesday, according to the India Meteorological Department. The weather bureau doesn’t consider readings from such centers for tabulating record highs and lows as they were set up just a few years ago and don’t have enough historical data.

Unusually dry conditions in the world’s most populous nation further highlighted concerns that climate change is increasing the intensity and frequency of floods, droughts and cyclones across the planet. The Earth witnessed an 11th consecutive month of record-breaking heat in April, with warmer conditions prevailing in Asia and expectations for a scorching summer in Europe.

The maximum temperature varied from 45.2C to 49.1C in different parts of Delhi. However, “Mungeshpur reported 52.9C as an outlier compared to other stations,” the agency said in a statement. “It could be due to an error in the sensor or the local factor. IMD is examining the data and sensors.” It had earlier provided a figure of 52.3C.

Mungeshpur has more concrete structures and relatively reduced green coverage, and sometimes records higher temperatures also due to the “urban heat island effect” that occurs when a city becomes much warmer than nearby rural areas.

The official all-time high for Delhi is 48.4C, reached at Palam in May 1998, while the highest-ever level of 51C for the entire country was witnessed on May 19, 2016, in Phalodi, a city in Rajasthan. The temperature rose to as high as 48.2C in the northwestern state on Wednesday.

The blistering summer has pushed up power consumption, forcing outages in several parts of the country. Peak electricity demand in Delhi spiked to an all-time high of 8.3 gigawatts on Wednesday due to increased use of air conditioning, according to BSES, the biggest power distributor in the city.

Heat poses health risks for people, hurts farming, raises chances of fires and could damp economic activities in the South Asian nation. A long spell of dry weather tends to put a heavy burden on power grids and reduces productivity of workers and factories. Water levels in 150 major reservoirs, which play a crucial role in shaping winter-sown crops, also fall.

High temperatures, accompanied by humidity, can be dangerous for human lives. They contribute to dozens of deaths every year in India, where a majority of the 1.4 billion population, including construction workers, laborers, hawkers and farmers, often work outdoors.

The authorities advised people to drink plenty of fluids, avoid venturing out unnecessarily, and wear loose clothes. They have been taking other measures, such as using tankers to supply drinking water, setting up shelters for people and drinking water points for birds and animals, and installing giant coolers to prevent power transformers from overheating.

There have been 16,000 cases of heat stroke and 60 deaths since March 1, the Mint newspaper said Friday. However, the government has not confirmed media reports of weather-related hospitalizations and deaths.

The eastern state of Bihar ordered to close all private and government-run schools until June 8, after several cases of students fainting due to blistering heat, according to the Press Trust of India.
Indian capital swelters as temperature hits all-time high of 52.9 Celsius (Reuters)
Reuters [5/29/2024 11:35 AM, Sakshi Dayal and Priyanshu Singh, 82990K, Negative]
Delhi recorded an all-time high temperature of 52.9 degrees Celsius (127.22 Fahrenheit) on Wednesday as extreme heat conditions gripped the north and western parts of India, causing students to faint in schools and drinking water taps to dry up.

A heat wave alert has been in place for large parts of India since last week but on Wednesday the temperature in Mungeshpur, a densely packed corner of Delhi, crossed the 50 C mark, the weather office said.

The Indian capital has had temperatures of over 45 C in previous years but never gone as high as 52.9 C.

Streets in Mungeshpur in northwest Delhi were deserted and most shops were shut as people stayed indoors to avoid the searing heat, while residents handed out free cold drinks in Narela after temperatures went up to 49.9 C on Tuesday.

"When we go outside it seems like someone is slapping our faces. It has become difficult to live in Delhi," said resident Akash Nirmal.

India Meteorological Department (IMD) said it is examining the data and sensors to look into Mungeshpur’s temperature which was an outlier compared to other stations.

"There is so much heat in Delhi that students are fainting, some are falling sick, some are facing dehydration. The students are facing a lot of trouble in this heat. The fans don’t work in our institutions," said Nidhi, a student, who gave only their first name.

An unusual transition from El Nino to La Nina and the lack of winds bringing moisture, has resulted in prolonged heating, leading to record temperatures, Gufran Beig, chair professor at the Indian Institute of Science told Reuters.

El Nino is the warming of Pacific waters that is typically accompanied by drier conditions over the Indian subcontinent while La Nina is characterised by unusually cold temperatures in the Pacific Ocean.

"We suspect that it is all associated with climate change," he told Reuters.

A spot of light rain in other parts of Delhi later on Wednesday brought some respite and weather officials expect the heat to ease later this week over northwest and central India.

India declares a heatwave when the maximum temperature is 4.5 degrees C to 6.4 degrees C higher than usual and a severe heat wave when it is 6.5 degrees C higher than normal or more.

Local government authorities have set curbs on water supply in Delhi, citing a shortage, and imposed a fine of 2,000 rupees ($24) on those wasting water, such as by washing cars.

Authorities in the eastern state of Bihar directed schools to be shut till June 8 after reports of students fainting at a government school.

Video footage by news agency ANI showed a girl lying on a classroom bench as teachers sprinkled her face with water and fanned her with a book.

Asia has sweltered in a hotter summer this year - a trend scientists say has been worsened by human-driven climate change.

Rajasthan in central India has also been reeling under scorching heat with mercury touching 50 degrees C in some districts. Government data shows 4 people have died since March with 451 cases of heat stroke reported on Wednesday itself.

In a sharp contrast, parts of northeastern India have been battered by heavy rain in the aftermath of cyclone Remal, with at least 27 people killed in Mizoram after the collapse of a stone quarry and multiple landslides.

Parts of Assam, bordering Bangladesh, are also inundated.
India records its hottest temperature ever amid severe heat wave (ABC News)
ABC News [5/29/2024 11:39 AM, Julia Jacobo, 27514K, Negative]
One of the hottest countries on Earth potentially recorded its highest temperature ever.

India recorded a temperature of 52.3 degrees Celsius -- or about 126 degrees Fahrenheit -- on Wednesday at a weather station in Mungeshpur, a suburb of New Delhi, according to the India Meteorological Department.

The government is examining the data, saying that the temperature is an outlier compared to measurements at other stations and that there could be an error in the sensor or due to local conditions.

The temperature soared to more than 9 degrees Celsius higher than expected, according to the IMD.

Hot winds from northwestern India contributed to the hotter-than-expected temperatures, ABC News partner New Delhi Television (NDTV) reported.

The previous record at the Mungeshpur station occurred in 2002 -- 49.2 degrees Celsius (120.6 degrees Fahrenheit), according to NDTV. The previous record for hottest temperature recorded in India was in 2016, in Rajasthan, -- 51 degrees Celsius (123.8 degrees Fahrenheit), according to the IMD.

The India Meteorological Department released a severe heat wave warning for the region as a result of the forecast. Heat waves in India are considered "severe" once temperatures reach 6.5 degrees Celsius higher than normal.

A red alert health noticed was also issued in New Delhi, indicating a "very high likelihood of developing heat illness and heat stroke in all ages" for vulnerable groups within the region’s population of 30 million.

Local government officials set limits on water usage, citing a shortage, and threatened to fine those using water unnecessarily, such as to wash a car, 2,000 rupees -- or $24 -- Reuters reported.

Rain forecast in New Delhi for Wednesday evening could raise humidity levels, according to the IMD.

India is one of the hottest countries in Asia, known for its tropical climate and long-lasting summer conditions. The early-season high temperatures could be a predicator to a scorching summer to come.

Copernicus, Europe’s climate change service, has recorded 11 consecutive months of record-warm temperatures -- a trend that is likely to continue once the month of May has concluded.

Rising global temperatures are leading to longer and more frequent heat waves, according to climate scientists.

Sweltering heat that occurred across Asia in late April was 45 times more likely because of climate change, according to a study by the World Weather Attribution.
India’s Economy Is Powered by the South, While Modi’s Strength Draws From the North. Can He Combine the Two? (Wall Street Journal)
Wall Street Journal [5/29/2024 9:00 PM, Shan Li, Vibhuti Agarwal, and Tripti Lahiri, Neutral]
The divide between the politically powerful north and an economically powerful south has become a potent fault line in India, putting the geographical split at the center of this year’s national election.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi draws his political power from the landlocked north, which is home to massive but poor states such as Uttar Pradesh, with a population larger than Brazil’s. But India’s largely coastal south, where people are richer and live longer on average, is the bedrock of Modi’s goal to boost India’s economy into the world’s third-largest. The region is where factories are popping up to supply U.S. firms such as Apple, and Amazon.com has located its largest global office.

Making inroads in India’s five southern states is key to Modi’s pledge to win a supermajority in this election, which reaches a final round of voting on June 1.

A supermajority win would bring the ability to change the country’s secular constitution. But the southern region has long stood as a bulwark against the Hindu nationalist’s goal of reshaping the country into a world power united around a single religion and language.

Instead, the region prides itself on a unique identity based on diversity and flourishing local languages. Many believe those cultural elements, along with an educational push and efforts to foster industry, have helped drive their economic success.

Many southerners fear that their independence—and a more expansive vision of national identity—will be stamped out if Modi’s party gains traction in the region.

Modi has barnstormed through the south with at least 20 visits this year, including appearing at a campaign rally outside of Coimbatore where he sported a veshti, a traditional southern style of men’s dress. His slate of young, southern-born politicians has delivered speeches as the crowd cheered and chanted “Victory to Mother India!”

One, K. Annamalai, 39, gives thundering speeches about Hindu rights as he campaigns for a seat in parliament in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, where Coimbatore is the second-largest city. The former police officer frequently goes viral on social media for his spirited jousts with journalists.

At a recent campaign stop in a temple featuring the lotus flower, the symbol of Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, crowds swarmed him like a political rock star. A loudspeaker urged people to “Vote for Modi’s loving younger brother!”

In the last national election, in 2019, Modi’s party won zero seats in three out of the five southern states. The region has complained that Modi, in his decade in power, has governed in a way that puts the interests of his base in the north first, for example by leaning more heavily on tax revenues from the prosperous south to help shore up the economic laggards of the north.

“He would love to have victory in Tamil Nadu. But that’s only because he wants more ground under his feet,” said Kasturi Logeswaran, a 24-year-old homemaker who attended a recent rally by the regional party that rules the state, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam party. “His victory base is in the north. We are not his first concern. We are not the most important to him.”

Rise of the south

A coming redrawing of the electoral map based on population has unsettled southerners, who fear their power could shrink. A freeze that had capped seats according to 1970s population levels expires in 2026.

Population in the south is still growing, but at a slower pace than the north. As a result, it now accounts for about 20% of India’s population, down from a quarter in 1970.

Southern states fear that if the BJP wins more seats in the region, Modi will tweak the electoral map to favor the north, relegating the south to political irrelevance. The BJP party needs a two-thirds majority in parliament to carry out such a change, which political experts doubt can be accomplished in this election. The vote will be counted on June 4.

Leaders in the south say the redistricting plan would effectively punish the region for its successful population control measures and would reward the north for a population boom. “That would be a huge injustice to the southern states,” said T.R.B. Rajaa, the minister of industries for Tamil Nadu.

Southern states also fear that a BJP party with a supermajority would revise the constitution, which currently guarantees all religions equality under the law, to enshrine Modi’s vision of a Hindu-first country, and also seize more control on issues such as education and caste-based affirmative-action programs, in which states currently have a lot of input.

The major distinction between the regions is economic.

Modi has pushed to boost domestic manufacturing as part of his “Made in India” campaign. It has helped draw global manufacturers looking for alternatives to China—and many have ended up in the south.

Arizona-based First Solar, which searched for a location for its first Indian factory during the pandemic, chose the south’s Tamil Nadu.

The solar panel company said the southern state had simplified the application process for the many permits required with an online portal, said Kuntal Kumar Verma, chief manufacturing officer of First Solar. Government officials were also quick to smooth over any hiccups. “They were holding our hands,” Verma said.

The state and neighbors such as Karnataka are Exhibit A for the types of policies that have turned swaths of the south into an economic success story.

Automakers such as South Korea’s Hyundai and Japan’s Nissan churn out cars in Tamil Nadu, while electronics giants including Samsung operate factories there. Of Apple’s 14 suppliers in India, 11 are located in southern states—including seven in Tamil Nadu.

Many politicians in Tamil Nadu say a century-old social justice movement by lower-caste Hindus against the Brahmins at the top of the caste hierarchy laid the foundation for policies to invest in public education and healthcare for the masses and paved the way for the south’s current economic prosperity.

That history also explains why the south “is a hard fortress” in the face of Modi’s message exhorting Indians to rally around a Hindu identity, said Ashustosh Varshney, a political scientist at Brown University and director of its Center for Contemporary South Asia.

The social justice movement sees the Hindu nationalist message as a return to a hierarchy controlled by upper-caste Hindus that they have rejected for decades, instead fighting for opportunities for other groups in government jobs and public life.

The south’s advance was also spurred by India’s market reforms in the 1990s, which loosened the national government’s hold on the economy. States gained more independence to forge their own policies, including those that invested in health, education and infrastructure, and to aggressively court foreign investment.

Modi, as leader of the western state of Gujarat before he became prime minister, brought global CEOs to his state by establishing regular investment summits, producing an economic record that was key to his election as prime minister for the first time in 2014. But for the most part, northern states didn’t follow this path, because they lacked an educated workforce, decent infrastructure and supportive policies.

That is why differences between some Indian states are as stark as those between countries, said Nilakantan R.S., author of “South vs. North: India’s Great Divide.”

In the southern state of Kerala, the infant mortality rate is similar to that of the U.S., while the worst-performing northern state is in line with war-torn Yemen. A child born in Tamil Nadu can expect to live about seven years longer than in Uttar Pradesh, in the north. And a woman in the south is more likely to be educated and have a job than a woman in the north.

“At the time of independence and liberalization, the conception was that states would converge” in their level of development, said Nilakantan in an interview. “Except they have diverged, and the degree of divergence has exponentially increased.”

Industrial hubs

Companies say the south’s educated, English-speaking workforce, good infrastructure and better policies for businesses make the decision to set up there obvious. It also helps that southern India is largely coastal, which provides closer access to ports for international trade, while much of northern India is landlocked. As a result, India’s five southern states now account for nearly a third of GDP, and are home to at least one-third of India’s roughly 250,000 factories, according to government data.

That manufacturing prowess can be seen in industrial hubs such as Tamil Nadu’s Sriperumbudur, which began as a center for auto manufacturing in the 1990s, where low-slung factory buildings are dotted through a landscape of palm trees and maize fields. On a recent weekday, neon-yellow earth movers excavated more land for factories and roads, while shuttles ferried in commuting workers from the nearby capital of Chennai.

International Aerospace Manufacturing, a joint venture between Rolls-Royce and Hindustan Aeronautics, already had one factory in the south, in the tech hub of Bengaluru. For a second facility, it scoured many potential sites but zeroed in on the southern states, said B. Seenivasan, chief executive of the aircraft-parts manufacturer. The company settled on Tamil Nadu, which has a deep bench of engineers and skilled factory workers, and is conveniently close to its first factory.

The south has the kind of know-how in advanced manufacturing, built up over decades of experience that his firm requires for production of jet engine parts for customers like Airbus and Boeing, Seenivasan said. “It’s just not possible anywhere else,” he said.

Much of the north still struggles to attract manufacturing—some companies say governments there aren’t responsive and aren’t easy to work with. The region remains largely reliant on farming. The Modi government is trying to change that by investing heavily in infrastructure, including across Uttar Pradesh, which has opened six new airports in as many months. The state has in recent years begun holding an investment summit similar to those Tamil Nadu and Gujarat have long hosted, while education enrollment is also up across northern India more generally. The efforts are expected to start seeing payoffs in coming years.

In the meantime, the north’s failure to significantly industrialize is a drag on India’s overall growth and has sent both blue-collar workers and educated professionals to the south in search of work.

Nisha Prakash moved to the southern tech hub of Bengaluru in 2021 to work as a senior scientist at a laboratory developing equipment for India’s aerospace and defense industry. The 40-year-old said she would have rather stayed in her hometown of New Delhi, where most of her family lives, but didn’t find openings in the high-tech specialty she had trained for.

She moved to Chennai last year for a new job as a manufacturing engineer for First Solar. “The kind of work that I wanted, I was not getting in north India,” she said.

Prakash said she has grown to appreciate the region’s upsides, including the more visible presence of women working outside the home. She finds her co-workers easier to work with compared with New Delhi, where male colleagues would sometimes ignore her requests at work without explanation. “In the south, I feel very respected,” said Prakash. “I have never felt that anybody is doing any injustice to me.”

Hindu rhetoric

Still, Modi’s actions to build up the Hindu cause has brought him support in the south. Earlier this year, he was central to the consecration of a temple to Lord Ram in the northern Indian town of Ayodhya, on the site where a 16th-century mosque was razed by a Hindu mob in 1992. Many Hindus believe the mosque in its time was built on a destroyed Hindu temple to the Hindu deity Ram.

As Modi has crisscrossed the south in campaigning, dropping a smattering of southern Indian languages into his speeches, he has often gone to pay his respects to the region’s grandest Hindu temples.

S. Jayajothi, 50, said her family has voted for generations for the opposition Congress party on the national level and the DMK party, which rules in Tamil Nadu. Congress has long supported a vision of India as a secular democracy where all religions are protected, while the DMK has fought for the rights of its Tamil-regional speaking population and worked to expand access to education and economic opportunities to a broader swath of society.

But Jayajothi switched to the BJP after Modi became prime minister because he fulfilled the promise to build a temple in Ayodhya.

“Modi is the champion for Hindus and protects the Hindus,” she said during a recent Annamalai rally in Tamil Nadu.

Jayajothi, who co-owns a family business manufacturing edible oils, said she also appreciates the development that Modi has brought to India, such as a nationwide mobile payments system. “There have been advances and improvements under Modi,” she said.

BJP speeches in the south often tone down the anti-Muslim focus. In a speech in the north’s Rajasthan, Modi described Muslims as “infiltrators” and “those who have too many children.” In Tamil Nadu, Annamalai, Modi’s handpicked candidate for the parliament seat, smoothly delivered a platform that is less about Hindu nationalism and more about economic development.

“In terms of India’s growth story, we have gotten it right,” Annamalai said in a recent interview. “Be it the poor, be it the farmer, be it women, be it children—everybody we have taken care of.”

Many southern politicians and business owners say that Modi’s stewardship of the economy over the past decade has often resulted in setbacks for the south.

G. Krithiha, who runs a factory producing air compressors and pneumatic pumps for the farming and automotive sectors, said her family’s business had thrived for about three decades in Tamil Nadu partly due to state policies that helped small businesses. That changed shortly after Modi was elected prime minister for the first time in 2014 and implemented reforms.

A sweeping reform in 2016 called demonetization—which Modi said was a crackdown on money laundering—abruptly wiped out 90% of the value of India’s paper currency, crushing the rural economy Krithiha’s factory depends on. The lack of aid during the pandemic was also a huge hit to her company, which is down to 25 employees from 44 about a decade ago. Her factory has barely broken even in recent years.

“We have worked hard, we have put up factories, we have educated the masses,” said Krithiha. “But just because we have achieved and gained stature, now the government wants to limit us.”

Modi talks about prioritizing small-to-medium-size businesses, which are the country’s biggest employers, but Krithiha believes he clearly favors the big conglomerates. “The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.”
Modi heads for two days of island meditation as Indian election nears end (CNN)
CNN [5/29/2024 11:24 PM, Kathleen Magramo and Esha Mitra, Neutral]
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi is on his way to meditate inside an island shrine for two days to cap weeks of election campaigning – his latest public display of religiosity days after proclaiming he was sent by god.

India’s election is the world’s largest, a mammoth exercise in democracy that has taken place over six weeks. The final day of voting takes place on Saturday and results will be announced three days later.

Modi will visit the Vivekananda Rock Memorial in Kanyakumari, a pilgrimage site off India’s southernmost tip, from May 30 to June 1, according to Indian state broadcaster DD News.

The site is where popular Hindu monk and philosopher Swami Vivekananda attained enlightenment.

Modi has twice before ended an election campaign with meditation. But he has recently been making increasingly grand displays of piety, to capitalize on Hindu-nationalist sentiment as he eyes a third consecutive five-year term in power.

In an interview last week with local news channel NDTV, Modi said: “I’m convinced that God has sent me for a purpose, and when that purpose is finished, my work will be done.”

“God doesn’t reveal his cards. He just keeps making me do things,” he continued.

India is constitutionally bound to secularism, but since assuming power in 2014 Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have promoted a strident brand of Hindu nationalism that has deepened religious divides.

When he first contested national elections a decade ago, Modi chose India’s spiritual capital Varanasi as his constituency, making the ancient city the perfect backdrop to meld his religious and political ambitions.

At the end of that campaign, Modi visited Pratapgad in the western state of Maharashtra, where the Hindu-led Maratha forces won a historic battle against the Mughal empire army in the 17th century.

Toward the end of the 2019 national elections, which he also won, Modi went to meditate in the revered Kedarnath shrine dedicated to Hindu deity Lord Shiva high in the Himalayas.

In January, just months before campaigning began, Modi consecrated the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, a controversial Hindu temple that was built on the site of a destroyed mosque, taking on a role typically reserved for priests.

In a country where about 80% of the population are followers of the polytheistic faith, critics say Modi’s brandishing of Hinduism has led to rising Islamophobia and persecution of the country’s more than 200 million Muslims.

Modi and the BJP have increasingly resorted to overtly Islamophobic language during his recent election speeches. In a controversial speech last month, Modi said that if the opposition wins, they would distribute the country’s wealth among “infiltrators” and “those who have more children,” in apparent reference to the Muslim community.
‘This election is critical for Congress’: can India’s Gandhi dynasty survive? (The Guardian)
The Guardian [5/29/2024 11:37 PM, Hannah Ellis-Petersen, Neutral]
The Nehru-Gandhi dynasty were once the giants of India’s politics – the family at the forefront of the independence battle, who built up the formidable Congress party and produced three prime ministers.

But now the family are fighting for their survival. India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, and his Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) government are seeking a third term in power in elections taking place over six weeks. Most analysts believe a BJP victory against Congress and its allies once again seems likely.

Ten years in opposition have left Congress and the Gandhi family in decline, accused of elitism, disorganisation and weak leadership. The party presence on the ground remains lacklustre, compared with the BJP’s well-organised electoral machine and its disciplined cadre.

Analysts say that a third consecutive loss to Modi in June would deal another crippling blow to the family and could throw the future of the party as a viable political force into question.

Rahul Verma, a fellow at the Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research, said the Congress party was akin to a “large ship which has rusted for a very long period of time”. Verma said the problem was in part the Gandhi family leadership “but also the whole organisation of the party, which is very weak”.

Verma warned that if Congress faced another major election loss, it could find itself with state, or even national, rebellions on its hands, which could further diminish and even fracture the party to devastating effect. “This election is critical for Congress,” he said.

‘They don’t know how to behave in opposition’

It was in 1929 that Jawaharlal Nehru was made president of Congress, later becoming India’s first post-independence prime minister. Almost 100 years later, there is little doubt that the Gandhi family remains firmly in charge. In 2017, Rahul Gandhi took over as president of the party from his mother, Sonia Gandhi, who had ruled it for two decades.

Rahul resigned two years later after losing to Modi, but the family’s influence has not waned and the Gandhis have made little effort to find a long-term successor who is not within their dynastic ranks. Few believe the family will vacate the political arena voluntarily. After internal pressure, last year Congress voted in a new president, Mallikarjan Kharge, but he is 81 years old and seen as the choice of the Gandhis. For many within its ranks, Congress without the Gandhis still seems unfathomable and Rahul Gandhi remains the recognisable face of the party.

“Earlier there was a divinity associated with this dynasty: it was unstated but they very much felt they were destined to rule this country,” said Sugata Srinivasaraju, who authored a book on Rahul Gandhi. “They don’t know how to behave when they are in opposition.”

Nowhere has the battle for the Gandhi family legacy been more visible in this election than in Raebareli, a dusty, nondescript constituency in Uttar Pradesh. The state was once the stronghold of Congress but under Modi it slipped from its grip to become a bastion of the BJP. Raebareli is the only safe Congress seat left.

Raebareli already has undue importance for the Gandhis, who have kept the family business alive here for decades. It was the constituency of Indira Gandhi and later Sonia Gandhi. Now the baton has been passed on to Rahul Gandhi, with Priyanka Gandhi spearheading the campaign.

Among bustling markets of the city, the stature of the family was still evident. “We are proud to have the Gandhis represent us, they have done a lot of good here,” said Mohammad Riaz, 45, a rickshaw driver. “If the Gandhis were in charge of all of India, the country would be free again.”

Yet others accused them of neglect. “The Gandhis have taken our vote here for granted for too long, they only came here to win elections and then we didn’t see them again,” said Ranjana Singh, 24, a masters student. “But this time round Rahul Gandhi is present on the ground and he is talking about the terrible lack of jobs we are all facing. So I want to give him a chance.”

Rahul Gandhi is still Congress’s most plausible candidate for prime minister, though the party insists this decision will only be made after the election. However, much of the blame for Congress’s entrenched failures has been laid at his feet. Rahul is accused of being a weak leader who did not reform the party’s undemocratic structure, and is perceived as ambivalent to power, having seen both his father, Rajiv, and his grandmother, Indira, assassinated while in office.

“Rahul often veers more towards the spiritual rather than being that hard-nosed Indian politician he really needs to be to win elections,” said Srinivasaraju.

Perceptions of Rahul Gandhi began to shift in 2023 when he embarked on a 2,200km pilgrimage from north to south India on foot. In the face of the muscular, rightwing Hindu nationalism of Modi and the BJP, he spoke of religious harmony, equality and social justice, and took on the mantle of a rugged, street-fighting statesman, complete with a greying bushy beard. However, the pervasive view among commentators is that he still lacks the common touch, strongman political charisma and oratory skills to go up against Modi.

Priyanka Gandhi – who plays an organisational role in the party but is often described as a more natural politician than her older brother – has described Rahul as the “ideological centre of the party today”. “Our family is one of the things that holds the Congress together,” she said. “But primarily it is our ideology: that there is a place for every religion, every caste, every creed in this country.”

She hit back at Modi’s criticisms of Congress being a party of nepotism and privilege. “I can give you a long list of so-called dynastic politicians who are flourishing in the BJP and nobody is saying anything about it.”

‘An out and out ideological fight’

In the last election, Congress won just 51 out of 546 seats in parliament and now controls only three state governments. Priyanka Gandhi denied Congress was in decline, even as an opposition force. “We are standing up to them, we are standing up to all their unprecedented pressure tactics,” she said. “This election is an out and out ideological fight.”

Over the past decade, Congress has been among dozens of opposition parties saying they have faced a sustained attack by the Modi government, which has been accused of using instruments and agencies of the state to systematically go after and weaken political opponents and critics.

In 2023, Rahul Gandhi was convicted and sentenced to two years in jail for defaming the name Modi, in a case that opponents and activists alleged was politically trumped up to prevent him contesting elections. He was expelled from parliament before his sentence was overturned by the court. Then, weeks before the general election began, the tax authorities froze Congress party accounts.

No longer the political heavyweight it once was, in this election Congress is contesting the lowest number of parliamentary seats in 75 years and in many constituences is fighting as part of an opposition coalition of about 25 parties, who came together under the acronym “INDIA” in a bid to oust Modi.

Though the INDIA coalition was initially blighted by infighting and competing agendas, with Congress accused of trying to assert itself as a leader, it has proved more resilient than many analysts predicted. Opposition narratives around unemployment and growing inflation have gained momentum, and reports of low voter turnout have indicated that Modi and the BJP may lose some seats this time round, giving Congress and other opposition leaders renewed confidence.

“Modi’s rhetoric is getting progressively more and more shrill and that is generally the sign of someone who is in trouble or who is anxious or worried about something,” said Priyanka Gandhi.

Nonetheless, analysts said this confidence may be misplaced, with polls suggesting it remains unlikely Congress will make sizeable gains when results are counted on 4 June.

Srinivasaraju said a Modi third term was only likely to bring the family more grief. “When Modi came to power he spoke about creating an India without Congress. This didn’t mean wiping out the party, it meant wiping out the Gandhi dynasty.”
Absconding India MP to return to face sex abuse cases (BBC)
BBC [5/29/2024 4:15 AM, Imran Qureshi, 70613K, Negative]
An Indian lawmaker who fled the country after being accused of sexual assault is set to return this week, more than a month after thousands of USB sticks with videos of the alleged abuse were circulated in his home state.

Prajwal Revanna, an MP from Hassan district in Karnataka who is seeking re-election, had left India on 27 April using his diplomatic passport after the videos went viral.

This week, he posted a video from an undisclosed location, saying he would return to India on 31 May to appear before a police team investigating the charges.

He has denied the allegations of rape and sexual abuse, terming them a “political conspiracy”.

Mr Revanna belongs to an influential political family - he is the grandson of former Indian prime minister HD Deve Gowda, who is the leader of the state’s politically powerful Vokkaliga community. His Janata Dal (Secular), or JD (S) party, is an ally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Prajwal Revanna’s father HD Revanna and uncle HD Kumaraswamy are both influential legislators in the Karnataka state assembly.

HD Revanna is also accused of sexual harassment and criminal intimidation in the police complaint lodged by a former employee of the family. He was arrested for six days but freed on bail last month. He has also denied the allegations, calling them a political conspiracy.

In the past month while Mr Revanna was absent, fear and disquiet have gripped Hassan, which has been a stronghold of his family for decades.

“It is too embarrassing to speak about what happened here,” a young shopkeeper in the district told the BBC.

Roopa Hassan, a women’s rights activist working in the state, says a lot of families have left the district over the past month.

"Many haven’t come out of their houses for weeks," she said.

The allegations against Mr Revanna first came to light in June last year, but he obtained a court order preventing media from reporting what was described as "morphed videos". But five days before the 26 April election in Hassan, thousands of pen drives were circulated in public places such as bus stands and parks.

They contained 2,960 clips, which reports say were shot by Mr Revanna himself, and showed the faces of the women.

On 28 April, one of the survivors lodged a police complaint, accusing Mr Revanna of raping her between 1 January 2021 and 25 April 2024 in his official government bungalow.

She alleged that the politician had recorded the assault on his phone and used it to blackmail her and that he threatened her and her husband with a gun if she did not "obey" him. Mr Revanna did not address any of these direct allegations in his video.

The couple, who said they had been “loyal” JD(S) party workers for decades, have alleged that they were forced to leave Hassan since their police complaint.

The state government formed a special investigation team to look into the charges against Mr Revanna after another woman approached the women’s commission with similar accusations.

Since then, police have received two more complaints of rape against the MP.

On 1 May, Mr Revanna’s lawyer told the SIT that he would not be able to participate in the inquiry since he was not in the country.

In a social media post the same day, Mr Revanna also sought a week’s time to appear before investigators, saying that the “truth will prevail soon”. But he didn’t return to India in a week.

In May, the state government wrote to the federal foreign ministry twice, asking it to cancel Mr Revanna’s diplomatic passport. Foreign Minister S Jaishankar responded saying the request had been received late and that action was initiated on the request on 23 May.

The case has sparked a political storm in Karnataka with the state’s governing Congress party and the opposition blaming each other over who should have taken action against Mr Revanna when the videos surfaced.

A state minister accused the BJP of fielding Mr Revanna for the election despite knowing that "hundreds of women had been abused by the candidate". Some reports said that the BJP’s state leaders had warned party leaders in Delhi about Mr Revanna’s alleged misconduct.

Meanwhile in Hassan, people remain reluctant to discuss the case, with two female students called it “disgusting”.

“Boys in our college are talking about it. But we feel repulsed and don’t even want to listen to what happened," one of them said.

"People switch off their TV sets now because they only show this shameful episode,” a resident who did not want to be named said. “We are sick of this. This has given the district such a bad name."

Mr Gowda and Mr Kumaraswamy have distanced themselves from the controversy and made several public appeals for Prajwal Revanna to return to the country.

Last week, Mr Kumaraswamy apologised to party workers on behalf of the family.

"Be assured that I shall do everything possible to fight for your cause," he said.

But a senior JD(S) worker, who wanted to stay anonymous, told the BBC that party workers were “depressed and upset’’ over the allegations.

“We were all like an extended family of Mr Deve Gowda," she said.
India’s home prices to rise steadily, affordable housing supply to lag demand: Reuters poll (Reuters)
Reuters [5/29/2024 10:20 PM, Milounee Purohit, 45791K, Neutral]
Average home prices in India are expected to rise steadily over the next few years as the country’s rich drive up demand for luxury housing, according to property experts polled by Reuters who also said there would be a shortage of affordable homes.

Home purchases are increasingly driven by a select few in a country of more than 1.4 billion people, mostly those unaffected by higher interest rates.

Economic growth in Asia’s third-largest economy is expected to continue outpacing its major peers, driving demand for housing, even though economists argue the benefits of that growth are being skewed more towards the upper classes.

Average home prices are forecast to rise around 6% this year and next, slightly below the 7% expected in a March poll, according to the median forecast from a May 10-29 survey of 15 property market experts.

House prices rose 4.3% in 2023, according to Reuters calculations based on the Reserve Bank of India’s House Price Index.

"Property prices are expected to maintain an upward trajectory...because of consistent demand and limited ready supply," said Ankita Sood, director and head of research at REA India. "The demand for high-value properties from investors and high-income individuals fuels this upward trend."

The luxury segment accounted for 15-16% of total sales before the pandemic but has risen to around 28%, Sood said.

Further rises in house prices will worsen affordability for first time buyers who are already struggling to save up the initial down payment.

The RBI, which raised interest rates by 250 basis points between May 2022 and February 2023 to cool inflation, is broadly expected to cut them next quarter, although a stable rupee and a strong economy leaves the central bank with little incentive to act.

That suggests relatively high mortgage rates are here to stay, adding to pressure on first-time buyers.
When asked what would happen to affordability for first-time purchasers over the coming year, seven analysts said it would improve and the remaining six said it would worsen.

CBRE’s Atif Khan expects affordability to improve as income levels rise in tier I cities such as Mumbai and Delhi, but Colliers International’s Ajay Sharma said a "flattening" of the jobs market would cause it to slip.

Finding affordable housing is a major challenge for the millions who flock to cities as India rapidly urbanises.

Despite government initiatives to build affordable homes, a strong majority of respondents, 12 of 15, said demand would not be met over the next two to three years. The other three forecast excess supply.

"Supply of affordable homes is affected by rising land prices (and) developers focusing on bigger ticket-size segments where sales momentum is quite robust," said Rohan Sharma, director at JLL Research.
In India’s polarized election, voters seek a return to normal (Washington Post – opinion)
Washington Post [5/29/2024 5:45 AM, Bharka Dutt, 47820K, Neutral]
In an election in India that many at home and abroad had written off as entirely one-sided, a surprisingly spirited campaign is underway.

In January, when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi presided over the opening of the Ram Mandir, a grand Hindu temple on the site where a mosque once stood, most political observers concluded that this religious moment would define the election.

Modi’s personal ratings were already higher than any of his opponents. Given his cult of personality, targeted welfare schemes, effective messaging on India’s enhanced place in the world and an entirely obsequious broadcast media, he seemed to have won the election before it started. His party, the BJP, is also India’s richest. The temple gave his campaign an added emotional, populist message.

“It’s Hindu Resurgence” writer Neerja Chowdhury said to me at the time, “and Modi is a phenomenon that liberals have not fully understood.” At the time I agreed with her.

But now the country’s voters — across regions, religions, castes and class — are saying they care less about religious matters than they do about everyday issues of governance.

For nearly two months I have been traveling thousands of miles by road, from the southernmost tip of the Indian mainland in Kanyakumari to Kashmir in the north, interviewing hundreds of voters from diverse regions, religions and communities. Modi remains the dominant political force, but I have found healthy pockets of strong pushback against aggressive religious rhetoric that has often characterized his party’s politics.

“Yeh dharam ki rajneeti bekar hai” — “Politics based on religion is worthless,” said a farmer impatiently as we sat under the shade of a giant banyan tree surrounded by wheat, maize and pearl millet fields. “What we want is 24/7 electricity, enough water for irrigation and opportunities for our children.”

This was a small village in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous and hence most electorally significant state.

Next to us children scampered under a scorching sun. One wanted to be a doctor, the other a soldier in the army.

“Don’t talk to us about Hindus and Muslims, they are both good people,” he said. “Talk to us about how our lives can be better.”

As India’s election — the world’s largest — enters its final phase, the Ram Mandir is turning out not to be a salient electoral issue. Everywhere I traveled, the temple was raised by me — it never came up in conversation otherwise. Even in Ayodhya, the pilgrim town where the temple was built, people link it to the elections mostly in the context of increased economic opportunities. Ardent admirers of Modi say it isn’t why they’re voting for him.

In city after city, I asked BJP voters to list what they liked best about the prime minister. They mentioned infrastructure expansion, India’s growing importance in the world, Modi’s 24/7 workaholic image, his forceful persona — and the absence of a compelling alternative. And when I asked what they would like to see him change, invariably I heard two answers — a greater focus on jobs and a toning down of the religious rhetoric.

After a dip in voter turnout in the first two phases of the election (voting has been taking place since mid-April), Modi’s speeches became more aggressively Hindu nationalist. In one, he suggested that the opposing Congress party would take people’s wealth and redistribute it among Muslims. He used words such as “infiltrators” and “those who have more children.”

He seemed to be falling back on formulaic Hindu-Muslim divisiveness in an effort to mobilize Hindu voters.

But in my conversations, Modi’s fans said they’re not comfortable with this kind of religious stridency. In Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh, one BJP voter told me he wished the prime minister would “dial down saffron politics.”

A couple of weeks later, Modi distanced himself from his own remarks and denied that he had been speaking about Muslims at all. He went further. “I am not fit to be in public life, if I do Hindu-Muslim.”

Unlike the previous two elections that catapulted Modi to victory — 2014 was a vote against a Congress government mired in corruption, and 2019 was a national security election held in the aftermath of a terrorist attack and India’s retaliation inside Pakistan — no single national issue is steering the vote this time.

By flagging issues of local importance — agrarian distress, water scarcity, unemployment — voters have opened up space to demand accountability from the Modi government.

Can he lose?

“Modi will definitely be prime minister again,” argues Prashant Kishor, one of India’s best known political strategists who has in the past worked closely with Modi. “But his currency has been devalued, he is a brand in decline.”

In any case, India’s voters appear to be swinging the pendulum away from the Hindu-Muslim divide and back to ordinary political concerns.
NSB
In overheated Bangladesh, social media influencers urge followers to plant more trees (Christian Science Monitor)
Christian Science Monitor [5/29/2024 12:15 PM, Muhammad Tahmid Zami and Mosabber Hossain, 587K, Neutral]
With heat-related deaths mounting, the tarmac on roads melting, and desperate people gathering in mosques to pray for an end to the deadly heatwave ravaging Bangladesh, the call went out from cyberspace: plant more trees.

The worst heatwave in seven decades is particularly unbearable in the capital Dhaka with temperatures reaching as high as 43 degrees Celsius (109 Fahrenheit) in a crowded city that has been steadily stripped of the trees, lakes, and ponds that once offered its residents relief and shelter.

Now social media influencers are urging their followers to plant trees in a bid to make the city, and country, more liveable during heatwaves, which scientists say are becoming more frequent, more severe, and longer because of climate change.

In late April, Peya Jannatul, a model, actress, and lawyer, asked her 1.6 million followers on Facebook to go out and plant 10 trees each.

A student group linked to the ruling Awami League party launched a campaign on April 21 to plant 500,000 trees in just 10 days, while a popular cleric urged his 4.3 million Facebook followers to donate money to plant 300,000 trees.

Green Savers, which allows people to sponsor tree planting across 22 districts, is helping translate the calls for tree planting into action.

“We are seeing a surge of interest in our tree sponsorship program,” said Ahsan Rony, the CEO of Green Savers, which also trains gardeners.

A sponsor donates less than $2 to plant a tree at a poor family’s home and can then digitally track the tree and see how the host family is benefitting. Since 2012, the program has planted 66,000 trees across the country, Mr. Rony said.

Photographer Mahmud Rahman has harnessed social media to encourage others to help him turn a rubbish-filled space near his home beside Dhaka’s Gulshan Lake into a verdant oasis bright with colorful flowers.

Through his Facebook page, Mr. Rahman encourages other residents and visitors to volunteer to help plant 50-60 varieties of plants and herbs along the kilometre-long Gulshan-2 lakeside.

Treena Bishop, a U.S. citizen living in the neighborhood, was one of the volunteers.

“This is a great example of how the community is contributing to tree plantation in Dhaka. ... and I hope everybody should know how it works so that they can follow it,” she said.
The right tree at the right time

The heatwave scorching Bangladesh is taking a heavy toll across the region – tens of people have died in several countries, schools have been closed, and authorities are warning of forest fires, heat stroke, and dehydration.

The U.N. World Meteorological Organization said this month that Asia is warming faster than the global average and was the most disaster-hit region by climate-related hazards last year.

Trees can help mitigate heatwaves by cooling cities but Dhaka is ill-prepared. Rapid, unplanned growth as migrants flocked to the city, sometimes to escape the effects of climate change along the coast and rivers, saw trees being cut down to make space for concrete buildings, and other development.

And environmental activists warn that planting new trees, especially in the searing heat of summer, is not always the best answer in this mega city of 23 million people.

“It does not make sense to plant new saplings every year if we cannot protect mature trees with a large canopy that give shade and shelter to not only heat-stricken people but also to the city’s birds, beasts, and insects,” said Amirul Rajiv, a photographer and activist who organized a movement last year to protect hundreds of trees in the city’s Dhanmondi neighborhood.

It is also important to choose the right trees, said Mohammad Zashim Uddin, professor of botany at the University of Dhaka, noting that non-native trees like eucalyptus or acacia can harm local biodiversity.

City authorities have put forward plans governing land use through to 2035, including proposals for 55 new parks around water bodies and 14 eco-parks to protect biodiversity.

Environmental experts say the authorities should tap the knowledge of specialists to draw up a coordinated approach.

“We need to have clear annual goals [saying] by what percentage we can increase green space in Dhaka, and with what trees,” said botany professor Zashim Uddin.

Muhammad Imran Hosen, a postdoctoral researcher at University of New South Wales, Australia, said the government should use water management to cool the city, while people could also play their part by creating rooftop gardens or installing vertical greening on tall buildings.

“Planting trees to cool cities is common sense, but you need to combine that with many other factors – and we need deeper studies to plan out optimal actions,” he said.
US–Bangladeshi Partnership: Revisiting Historical And Current Dynamics (Eurasia Review – opinion)
Eurasia Review [5/29/2024 12:22 PM, Md. Himel Rahman, 213K, Neutral]
On 14–15 May, the United States (US) Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Donald Lu visited Bangladesh, met with government leaders, representatives of the civil society, social media influencers and other Bangladeshis, and stated that Washington is willing to reset, rebuild and strengthen its decades-old partnership with Dhaka. This presents an appropriate context to revisit some positive dynamics of the US–Bangladeshi relations since the independence of the latter in 1971.

During the Bangladeshi War of Independence, the US opposed the Bangladeshi independence movement owing to geopolitical calculations rooted in the Cold War. However, during the war, more than 9 million refugees from the erstwhile East Pakistan took shelter in India, and the Indian government was hard-pressed to accommodate the refugees. The US accorded $8.9 million ($69 million in 2024 value) for the Bengali refugees in India through the United Nations (UN), and thus, it was the foremost in providing financial aid for the refugees.

After the war, the US was quick to adjust to the new reality and emerged as the primary source of external aid for war-ravaged Bangladesh. By March 1973, the US had provided Bangladesh with $318 million in aid, surpassing the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and India, which were the main backers of Bangladesh during the war. In fact, since 1971, the US and the World Bank (where the US has the most voting power) collectively provided the largest amount of foreign aid to Bangladesh.

Also, the US has assisted Bangladesh in implementing health and economic development programs. For instance, the US Peace Corps deployed its personnel to Bangladesh for assisting the country’s health, education, community development and other sectors. Moreover, the US provided the country with food aid under Public Law 480 (PL 480). In 1984, the provision of US food aid to Bangladesh played a crucial role in averting a serious food crisis in the country. Thus, the US has been a crucial source of economic and food aid for Bangladesh for decades.

However, as Bangladesh steadily built up its economy to emerge as the 35th largest economy of the world, the pattern of US–Bangladeshi economic interactions shifted from aid to trade. At present, the US is the largest export market for Bangladeshi products and the largest source of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Bangladesh. In addition, it has surpassed Saudi Arabia as the largest source of remittances for Bangladesh.

Humanitarian Concord

The US has been one of the leading states in providing Bangladesh with humanitarian assistance, particularly during natural disasters. For instance, on 29–30 April 1991, Bangladesh was struck by a devastating cyclone (named Marian), which killed more than 139,000 people and made millions homeless. Following the cyclone, the US undertook a sea-based disaster relief operation, codenamed Operation Sea Angel, to assist the beleaguered country. During the operation, US troops provided Bangladeshi citizens with approximately 4,021.5 tons of relief supplies and 266,000 gallons of purified water, as well as treated some 15,000 Bangladeshis. Similarly, following the cyclone Sidr on 15 November 2007, US troops conducted a similar disaster response operation in Bangladesh, dubbed Operation Sea Angel II.

In addition, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the US was the largest source of COVID-19 vaccines for Bangladesh. In fact, Bangladesh was the largest recipient of US-donated vaccines under the COVAX program. Under this initiative, the country received more than 114 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines free of cost. This helped the country substantially in implementing one of the world’s largest COVID-19 immunization program.

On its part, Bangladesh, with its limited capability, has been steadfast in providing similar kind of support to the US in dealing with humanitarian crises. For instance, the Eastern US was hit by hurricane Katrina, which killed some 1,392 US citizens and caused material damage worth $190 billion. Following the hurricane, Bangladesh provided the US with $1 million in financial aid and offered to send rescuers. Thus, Dhaka and Washington have always closely cooperated with each other in tackling humanitarian crises.

Technological Cooperation

The US has accorded substantial cooperation to Bangladesh in implementing several high-technological endeavours. For instance, following Bangladesh’s signing and ratification of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1979, Washington promised Dhaka cooperation in the development of civilian nuclear facilities. Under this arrangement, the US helped establish the first nuclear research reactor in Dhaka in 1985. Moreover, the Bangabandhu-1, the first Bangladeshi communications and broadcasting satellite, was launched on 12 May 2018 by the US company SpaceX from the John F. Kennedy Space Center in the US state of Florida. Thus, the US has assisted Bangladesh in making strides towards technological advances.

Security Partnership

Since the 1980s, Bangladesh and the US have gradually built up a comprehensive security partnership in numerous areas, including counterterrorism, maritime security, border security, peacekeeping, defense trade, and defense institution-building. The first visit of the Commander of the US Pacific Command (currently, the US Indo-Pacific Command) to Bangladesh in 1985 was an watershed event in this regard. During the Gulf War (1990–1991), Bangladesh participated in the US-led coalition against Iraq and sent a 2,300-strong military contingent to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. In the ensuing years, 270 Bangladeshi servicemen lost their lives while involved in demining Kuwait. This bolstered the US–Bangladeshi security ties. Since 1992, the two states have regularly held joint military exercises.

In the early 21st century, the US Department of State included Bangladesh in its Anti-terrorism Assistance Program. Bangladesh is one of the top troop-contributing countries (TCCs) to the UN peace operations, and accordingly, the US has provided the country with nearly $44 million since 2005 to enhance its peacekeeping capabilities. The US also provided economic assistance to the Bangladesh Institute of Peace Support Operation Training (BIPSOT), an institution operated by the Bangladesh Armed Forces and aimed at providing standardized training to peacekeepers.

Since 2014, the US has accorded Bangladesh $78.45 million in Foreign Military Financing (FMF) and $14.5 million in International Military Education and Training (IMET) assistance. Moreover, the US has supplied Bangladesh with patrol boats, other patrol vessels, cutters, mine-resistant ambush-protected (MRAP) vehicles, and other military equipment. Furthermore, Dhaka has expressed its willingness to acquire advanced military hardware, including Apache helicopters, from the US.

Meanwhile, Dhaka and Washington have held nine bilateral security dialogues since 2012 in order to further enhance their security partnership. Also, negotiations over the conclusion of the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) between the two countries are at the final phase, and another military cooperation treaty, the Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA), is being negotiated. Hence, Dhaka’s security partnership with Washington is growing at a rapid pace.

Envisioning A Cooperative Future

An overview of the history of the US–Bangladeshi relations demonstrates that Dhaka and Washington have always preferred pragmatic cooperation to mutual antagonism in their bilateral ties. The two countries have cooperated with each other in every sector, ranging from economy to technology to security. Thus, Washington’s willingness to bring about a ‘reset’ in its relations with Dhaka is symptomatic of its traditional positive partnership with Bangladesh, and under the current circumstances, the two states are likely to continue their cooperation in the near future.
Central Asia
Was Zelenskiy Right About Central Asian Leaders ‘Fearing’ The Kremlin? (Radio Free Europe)
Radio Free Europe [5/30/2024 2:52 AM, Chris Rickleton, Neutral]
"I’m not criticizing anyone," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told reporters in Kharkiv on May 24.

Zelenskiy may not have been trying to offend his Central Asian colleagues last week when he suggested that their international positioning remained pro-Russian "out of fear of the Kremlin."

But he was perhaps probing for some kind of response -- including to his public invitation for them to attend a June summit in Switzerland demanding that Russia end its aggression against Kyiv and conclude a peace agreement in accordance with the UN charter.

So far, that request has been met by stony silence.

Does that nonreaction seem to prove Zelenskiy’s point?

"It is mostly pragmatism," argued Temur Umarov, a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.

"But of course, that pragmatism includes some fear, because [the Central Asian states] are aware that there may be backlash for taking actions that anger Russia," he said.

At the same time, Umarov says, the overall picture is more complicated and contradictory than Zelenskiy suggested.

Since the beginning of the Ukraine war, Central Asian diplomacy has seen a boom in diversity, while some leaders and other top officials from the region have on occasion said and done things that appear to stray from Moscow’s line.

"Yet they also understand that ties with Russia matter and that Russia is important for the security of their regimes," Umarov said.

"The evidence for that is the high number of contacts between top Russian and Central Asian officials since the invasion began, as well as President Vladimir Putin’s visits to the region -- most recently Uzbekistan."

Russian Energy Leverage Growing In Uzbekistan...

Putin’s trip to Uzbekistan was indeed an important one for both countries.

The state visit was officially billed for May 26-27, but stretched well into May 28 after the two presidents "spoke until three in the morning" and continued their talks the next day, according to Mirziyoev’s press secretary, Sherzod Azadov.

The main headline of the visit was the long-awaited confirmation that Russian atomic energy giant Rosatom will build a small nuclear power plant in Uzbekistan -- a long-planned but somewhat downsized project Mirziyoev described as "vital."

The agreement for the 350-megawatt plant comes despite the progress of a bill in the U.S. Congress that would seek to impose sanctions on Rosatom -- one of the few major Russian state companies that have not already been targeted by the United States and Kyiv’s other Western allies.

But it also highlights Russia’s growing energy leverage over the region’s most populous country, which is simultaneously ramping up imports of Russian gas, with Putin pledging that Gazprom will increase deliveries to the country fourfold, reaching 11 billion cubic meters next year.

Data points like these show "just how deep a hole Uzbekistan is in," according to Central Asia-focused journalist Peter Leonard, whose review of the visit carried the apt title "Uzbekistan’s energy needs lock it into Russian orbit."

"But the hard reality is that [Mirziyoev] has little choice," Leonard wrote in his newsletter, Havli.

Leonard added that Mirziyoev was the only Central Asian president not to meet British Foreign Secretary David Cameron during his blitz through the region at the end of last month.

The Uzbek president had taken a short holiday just before Cameron’s weeklong regional trip -- a tour received with typical vitriol in pro-Kremlin sections of Russia’s media.

But he did make time to meet with Hungary’s top diplomat, Peter Szijjarto, in Tashkent on May 7.

And, of course, Mirziyoev was in Moscow with his other four Central Asian counterparts and Belarusian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka on May 9, when Putin and Russia staged their annual military parade commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.

And Kazakhstan, Too?

Uzbekistan makes an interesting case study in the debate over Central Asia’s Kremlin "fear," after the mystery-filled aftermath of former Foreign Minister Abdulaziz Komilov’s comments on Ukraine in parliament in 2022.

Komilov reportedly first stepped down on health grounds before being moved to a still-important role as deputy secretary of the Security Council after he spoke in parliament strongly in favor of the "independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity" of Ukraine.

Ruling out any recognition of Russian-controlled entities in Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions and calling for an end to the violence, it was one of the strongest statements on the war by a Central Asian official and deeply uncharacteristic for Uzbekistan.

Observers wondered if his de facto dismissal was a step to appease Moscow. Or was Uzbekistan sending a message to the West while easing a respected but aging regime insider toward retirement?

"Central Asian states may fear Russia, but they fear the idea of [Western economic] sanctions, too," Umarov noted. "Their strategy so far has been to do ‘just enough’ to try and avoid those."

Kazakhstan has gone even further in statements on the war, including from President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev, but never as far as outright criticism of the 2022 invasion.

Zelenskiy’s comments in war-torn Kharkiv last week -- in which he also said Central Asian leaders lacked "a little bit of balance" -- will have been particularly irksome to Kazakh diplomats, since Astana has on several occasions put itself forward as a host for talks on ending the war.

But Kazakhstan, too, is looking vulnerable to Russia’s energy heft.

Not only does the country rely on Russia as a transit country for more than three-quarters of its oil exports -- a route that has suffered several stoppages since the Ukraine invasion -- its own power deficits are looking critical.

Like Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan has been weighing a potential nuclear power plant, with Rosatom openly eager to build it even as officials express a preference for a consortium made up of companies from different countries.

The question of nuclear power -- contentious due to the legacy of Soviet-era nuclear tests in the country -- will be put to a popular referendum before any decision is made, Toqaev has promised.

In the meantime, Kazakh officials are talking up the idea of allowing Russia to send gas to China via Kazakhstan while keeping some for growing domestic needs.

Deputy Energy Minister Alibek Zhamauov said the northeastern region of Kazakhstan alone required about 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year.

China Considerations

If Russia can still extend leverage over the region’s two strongest countries, then the picture is much clearer for others, says Dosym Satpaev, a political scientist based in Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty.

"If for Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan it is the energy deficits, for Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan it is the dependence on remittances sent by migrant workers in Russia, while in Turkmenistan, it is Russian purchases," Satpaev said. "Russia has various levers over all of them."

Then there is the question of a common authoritarian political identity, Satpaev adds.

"Not only do they consider themselves more like Putin than Zelenskiy, they probably consider themselves more like Xi Jinping. So Zelenskiy is right in many respects."

A final factor that is often overlooked when it comes to the region’s so-called Kremlin fear is China’s own outsize role in the region, Satpaev argues.

Some commentators expressed surprise back in 2008 when the Central Asian countries failed to recognize Abkhazia or South Ossetia, two Russian-backed territories that declared independence from Georgia.

But their stance mirrored that of China, which reportedly blocked Russian diplomatic attempts at the time to legitimize the breakaway regions in various multilateral organizations, including the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, where four of the five Central Asian states had membership.

Ditto, their collective nonrecognition of territories in eastern Ukraine that Moscow has declared its own.

Yet China has so far mostly poured cold water on Kyiv’s attempts to engage it over the war as Beijing and Moscow have grown closer.

Earlier this week, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning stressed that Beijing was supportive of "an international peace conference that is recognized by both the Russian and Ukrainian sides" -- in an apparent response to Zelenskiy’s pitch for Beijing to attend the June 15-16 summit in Switzerland.

And given Russia will not be at the table for those talks, Chinese nonparticipation would appear to offer even less room for any Central Asian leaders to attend.

"The fact that China has become closer to Russia since the invasion of Ukraine somewhat deepens the pressure on Central Asian states to become part of a broader anti-Western front," Satpaev told RFE/RL.

"And Ukraine is now strongly connected with the West."
A Trojan Horse? The New Kazakh Gambling Legislation Needs a Closer Look (The Diplomat)
The Diplomat [5/29/2024 8:29 AM, Adilbek Abdulov, 847K, Neutral]
The Kazakh parliament is turning back the clock as it mulls new legislation that would regulate the betting industry in the country. A draft law, which has been framed as a public health bill, will raise the legal age for placing bets to 25 (the highest in the world) and will ban civil servants from partaking.

Yet, oddly, the parliament seems to be going back and forth on one controversial amendment in particular: the creation of the Betting Account Center (known in Kazakh legislation as the “BAC”).

The BAC itself has many functions. One of the powers that will be bestowed upon this entity is the control of the betting market. This is the part that is most worrying. Indeed, if the law passes, the BAC will receive the rights to determine market participants and, crucially, obtain 1.5 percent of all profits from the Kazakh gambling market.

Casinos, betting agencies, and bookmakers have a long history in Kazakhstan. Betting clubs gained a foothold in the region back in the Soviet era when they started off as underground gambling clubs. Legislation against gambling started to come into place around 2017, given the sector’s public unpopularity.

The BAC was first suggested in parliament in January 2020, under legislation that was ostensibly designed to target ludomania, that is, compulsive gambling. The legislation promised to introduce severe advertising restrictions for gambling entities, an increase in the gambling participation age to 25, and access limitations for individuals with financial delinquencies.

Back in 2020 Exirius LLP, an opaque private Kazakh company, and PayBox, a Kazakh payment processing company, won a previous tender to establish and manage all of the functions of the BAC.

But all activities around the BAC came to a halt when the Kazakh vice minister of culture at the time, Saken Musaybekov, was fired for accepting bribes from pro-BAC lobbyists. The lobbyists were found to have represented the interests of Exirius and Paybox. As such the legislation was paused.

Given the checkered history behind the BAC, in 2022 two Kazakh deputy prime ministers, Serik Zhumangarin and Erlen Zhamaubaev, gave directives to the Ministry of Culture and Sport to exclude references to the BAC from all future draft legislation.

However, this seems to have been ignored.

The legislation’s new arrival into parliament has made the industry jumpy once more. There is suspicion that the newly polished legislation, targeted on public health, is just a cover to introduce a BAC that will damage the country once more.

The business community is scared of speaking out. Bookmakers are too afraid to complain without fear of intimidation, harassment, or surveillance. The most notable instance was in 2019, when a Kazakh independent bookmaking company, Olimp, held a press conference against the introduction of the BAC.

Immediately following the press conference, the owners were arrested by the government as members of “organized crime syndicates.”

The pressure has been unrelenting; in 2023 several more employees of the Olimp company were extradited from Germany and Serbia on suspicion that in 2014-2019, they were part of an organized criminal group. But the charges appeared trumped up and motivated by their whistle-blowing. Olimp’s lawyers are working to mitigate the punishment and relatives of those convicted have appealed to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to have the case reconsidered.

Therefore, it is unsurprising that the industry is newly nervous. From their perspective, in a move reminiscent of “Old Kazakhstan,” the new legislation appears to be a Trojan horse for the takeover of the betting industry within the country by certain interested parties.

The betting industry in Kazakhstan is profitable, and is expected to generate about $500 million in turnover by 2025. One of the major ties between gambling and the economy is taxes. Betting houses and institutions pay taxes on their annual revenue, and this generates funds that can be used to improve other sectors of the economy.

According to the latest statistics, the Kazakh Ministry of Finance revealed that in 2020 betting contributed around $94 million to the state budget in the form of taxes and fees. This made up 0.1 percent of the country’s GDP. Further, the International Center Analysis of the Gambling industry reported that in 2020 the turnover generated from online casinos in Kazakhstan amounted to $150 million, which is 25 percent more than in 2019. According to H2 Gambling Capital, Kazakhstan ranked 77th in the world in terms of the volume of the gambling market, with a share of 0.03 percent of global turnover.

The casino and betting industry in Kazakhstan has a long history and has survived different stages of the country’s development. A number of tech entrepreneurs are active and have built legitimate businesses that contribute to the emerging Kazakh economy, with their potential to drive economic growth and job creation.

If the BAC comes into play, it would have sweeping powers to control the industry, and, if placed in the wrong hands like before, could push out all the legitimate and local gambling companies in Kazakhstan. Not only that, it could potentially ensure the dominance of a select few business interests.

There are valid reasons for the oversight of industries such as betting, but it is important that this oversight be fair and transparent – that businesses in this sector are protected from abuse. The BAC’s history in Kazakhstan is concerning, as is the resurrection of the idea. The current legislation must be properly scrutinized to ensure it is not just a Trojan horse for the BAC, and ensure that the BAC isn’t merely a form of market capture.
Uzbekistan, Russia to Start Construction of Small Nuclear Power Plants (The Diplomat)
The Diplomat [5/29/2024 10:28 AM, Catherine Putz, 847K, Positive]
Amid a state visit to Uzbekistan this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev shook hands on an agreement that could see construction of Central Asia’s first nuclear power plant – though at a smaller scale than earlier anticipated – start as soon as this summer.

Mirziyoyev heralded Putin’s visit, one of his first trips abroad (after China and Belarus) following his recent inauguration into an unprecedented fifth term as president, as “historical” and marking “a new age in the comprehensive strategic partnership and alliance relations between our countries,”

Mirziyoyev said an agreement was signed on the implementation of a “low-power nuclear power plant.” The Uzbek president commented, “Almost all leading countries in the world ensure their energy security and sustainable development through nuclear energy.” Mirziyoyev called the project “vital.”

He went on to note Uzbekistan’s large uranium reserves. While Uzbekistan’s reserves are considerably smaller than those of neighboring Kazakhstan, Tashkent remains a major producer.

During Putin’s state visit, Rosatom Director General Alexey Likhachev and UzAtom Director Azim Akhmedkhadzhaev agreed to expand cooperation. A contract was signed between Atomstroyexport, a Rosatom subsidiary that exports nuclear power equipment and services, and the UzAtom subsidiary responsible for the construction of Uzbekistan’s first nuclear power plants.

Six reactors, with a capacity of 55 MW each – 330 MW total – are slated to be built in Jizzakh region.

At the signing, Akhmedkhadzhaev pointed to soaring energy requirements in Uzbekistan, with demand expected to nearly double by 2050.

“All over the world, we are now seeing an increase in interest in the creation of new nuclear capacities, both in terms of the construction of high-power nuclear power plants and in the projects of small modular reactors,” he said.

The new agreement arguably builds off a nearly seven-year nuclear cooperation journey between the two countries.

In late December 2017, the two sides signed a nuclear cooperation agreement. The early discussions focused on two VVER-1200 pressurized water reactors, with a 2.5 GW capacity. In the next year, Uzbekistan shortlisted 10 sites for possible nuclear power plants, many of them in Jizzakh region.

In the summer of 2019, Uzbek officials mentioned ambitions to build four nuclear power units. In October 2019, Likhachev suggested in interviews that contracts for construction would be signed by year’s end – that didn’t happen. For the next few years the project seemed to stall, or at least discussions in public went dormant.

But in December 2022, amid a visit to Uzbekistan, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin resurrected conversation about he project, saying it was “necessary to speed up the implementation of the agreements reached” on the nuclear power plant effort.

At the time, I noted the challenges facing the project, most notably financial questions and geopolitical concerns, and factors influencing Russia’s desire to put it back on track.

And back on track it seems to be, albeit at a more limited scale.

Reporting on the most recent agreement, as mentioned above, cited plans for six small nuclear reactors. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) small modular reactors (SMRs) are “advanced nuclear reactors that have a power capacity of up to 300 MW(e) per unit, which is about one-third of the generating capacity of traditional nuclear power reactors.” The IAEA noted in a September 2023 explainer: “Both public and private institutions are actively participating in efforts to bring SMR technology to fruition within this decade.”

Rosatom’s Likhachev this week boasted that the agreement with Uzbekistan was the “first-ever export contract for the construction of a small nuclear power plant.”

“This is not just a preliminary agreement; we are starting construction this summer,” he said.

Likhachev also said in an interview that plans for large nuclear power plants in Uzbekistan are still on the agenda, though specifics have not been offered.

Russia and Uzbekistan set up a joint fund of $500 million to finance projects in Uzbekistan, with $400 million coming from the Russian side. Putin explained the funding decision thusly: “This is not because we have more money, but because we have great interests in this part of Asia and we see that they can be realized taking into account the stability of the political system and the conditions for investing in the economy of Uzbekistan.”

Uzbekistan has already begun to feel the pressure of its own rising energy demands, with notable gas shortages and electricity outages in recent years. The pressure is most acute on the country’s gas industry, with existing lucrative contracts to export to countries like China and Afghanistan clashing with domestic demands. In the short term, this has motivated Uzbekistan to engage in an unofficial “trilateral gas union” whereby Russian gas is imported into Uzbekistan via Kazakhstan.

Adding nuclear power – even if just a little bit – as soon as possible may help alleviate the pressure, too.
Uzbekistan: Government racing to retool the economy (EurasiaNet)
EurasiaNet [5/29/2024 4:14 PM, Staff, 57.6K, Neutral]
Uzbekistan’s government appears intent on spending its way out of economic trouble. President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s administration is making big bets on infrastructure projects in emerging economic sectors. And to hedge against the considerable risks, Tashkent is looking in all geopolitical directions to open new channels of trade and investment.

Mirziyoyev’s approach seems driven more by necessity than a grand vision. Key pillars of the existing Uzbek economy – cotton and natural gas – are facing uncertain futures. Gas exports have experienced a big decline in recent years, crimping the state treasury’s finances. Not too long ago, gas was a big export earner for Tashkent, but the country is now a net importer. Meanwhile, looming water shortages driven by climate change and other factors are raising questions about the sustainability of Uzbekistan’s water-intensive cotton industry.

In addition, another major revenue source for Uzbeks – remittances from labor migrants – is in a state of flux, due mainly to the Russia-Ukraine war. Russia was the primary destination for most Uzbek migrants for decades, but the war is prompting many to look for opportunities in other countries, including the Gulf States. The government recently expanded its External Labor Migration Agency to help accelerate the diversification trend.

Economic indicators confirm the government is spending prodigiously as it tries to adjust to changing circumstances. The budget deficit totaled over $5 billion (59 trillion soums) in 2023, according to official government data. Statistics for the first fourth months of 2024 indicate that the deficit this year could reach $6 billion.

Official data also shows that Uzbekistan has burned through much of its reserves, which dropped from $31.4 billion in 2022 to $4.9 billion in 2023. The government also guaranteed over $400 million in foreign loans during the first quarter of 2024, more than double the amount registered during the same period the previous year. The Finance Minister additionally announced on May 22 that the government had issued $1.5 billion worth of bonds in three currencies, aimed at both domestic and foreign markets.

In a speech to attendees of the third annual Tashkent International Investors’ Forum in early May, Mirziyoyev outlined his strategy to transform the economy by 2030 by developing new industries, including electric vehicle production, green energy exports and expansion of the mining sector.

“By 2030, our goal is to double the people’s income and join the ranks of the upper-middle income countries,” Mirziyoyev said. “We will continue with deep transformation processes in the economy, creating favorable investment and business environments, and increasing value-added production in industry.”

The president added that accomplishing the government’s goals requires “systemic reforms with big aims,” and, of course, lots of foreign investment. “We understand perfectly well that today there is an unparalleled struggle for investors in the world,” he stated. “However, one immutable fact is becoming ever more clear: no country can solve such problems alone.”

As he moves to liberalize the economy, Mirziyoyev is keeping a tight lid on political life in Uzbekistan. Individual rights and political pluralism are afterthoughts for the government as it pursues reforms. Authorities appear to believe that fostering a more stable economic environment will be sufficient to keep citizens content.

Focusing on economics also makes it easier for Mirziyoyev to talk trade and investment with countries such as Saudi Arabia, Russia and China, states with known allergies to democratic practices. At the same time, the United States and European Union have encouraged Uzbekistan to look westward for new trade opportunities.

So far, Mirziyoyev has managed to keep everyone happy with trade and investment diversification efforts. Uzbekistan is leaning heavily on China to develop production capacity of electric autos and solar power, on Saudi Arabia for energy infrastructure investment and on the EU as a market for green energy exports.

Despite its preoccupation with its war effort in Ukraine, Uzbekistan is also looking to Russia for help in retooling its economy. Russian leader Vladimir Putin paid an extended visit to Tashkent from May 26-28, during which the two countries signed deals with a potential total value of $20 billion. Mirziyoyev appears to be hoping for a fast cash injection: he said Uzbekistan expects $10 billion in Russian investments as soon as 2025.

Reality may not match such expectations, as Russia’s ability to follow through on financial commitments remains open to question. For example, one investment announced at the conclusion of Putin’s recent visit was the construction of a small nuclear power station in Uzbekistan capable of generating 330 Megawatts of power. Though touted in Tashkent, this deal actually represents a significant downgrade of a 2018 agreement that outlined plans for an $11 billion investment to build a nuclear power facility in Uzbekistan with a generating capacity of 2.4 Gigawatts.

An International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission to Uzbekistan that wrapped up in May generally approved of the Uzbek government’s economic strategy, offering praise for achieving a significant reduction in poverty, keeping inflation in check and fostering income growth.

“An expansionary fiscal stance, a surge in fixed investment, and buoyant private consumption propelled real GDP growth to 6 percent in 2023,” the IMF report said. “Growth remained high at 6.2 percent year-over-year in the first quarter of 2024.”

The report also emphasized that Uzbekistan in the coming year is vulnerable to external shocks without much of a fiscal cushion to mitigate any potential blows. It urged vigilance in efforts to reduce the budget deficit.

“Given a highly uncertain external environment, risks are elevated,” the report stated. “External risks include geoeconomic spillovers from an intensification of Russia’s war in Ukraine, commodity price volatility, and an abrupt global slowdown.”
Uzbekistan: Imprisoned for ‘Insulting the President Online’ (Human Rights Watch)
Human Rights Watch [5/30/2024 12:00 AM, Staff, Negative]
Increasing numbers of people in Uzbekistan are being prosecuted and imprisoned for “insulting the president online,” Human Rights Watch said today. The criminal charge carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and violates international human rights law.

“People in Uzbekistan should be able to criticize the president and other authorities openly, without fear of reprisal,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The government should urgently repeal the offense of ‘insulting the president online’ and take immediate steps to release anyone imprisoned on this charge.”

Uzbek authorities should stop prosecuting citizens who have criticized President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and his family and repeal the law that makes it an offense.

Human Rights Watch reviewed one indictment and five verdicts handed down to people in Uzbekistan in the last year on the charge of “public insult or slander against the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, as well as using the press or other media, telecommunications networks, or the Internet,” under article 158, part 3 of the Uzbek Criminal Code, and found that authorities in Uzbekistan are wrongfully prosecuting citizens for nonviolent exercise of their right to freedom of expression.Other reports indicate even higher numbers of prosecutions on this charge.

Otkirbek Sobirov, 27, expressed his frustration on social media in January 2023 with interruptions to the supply of gas and electricity in the city of Kokand. On May 16, 2023, a Fergana court sentenced Sobirov to two years and three months in prison on charges of “insulting the president online,” “attempting to overthrow the Constitutional order of Uzbekistan,” and “mass riots” under articles 158, part 3; 159, part 1; and 244, part 2b of the criminal code.

The verdict says that Sobirov, who admitted he was frustrated about the gas and electricity cuts during the winter months, sent multiple messages in a Telegram group in which he criticized state policies and called on the president to resign. He also called for a rally against gas and electricity shortages in Kokand.

A state-ordered linguistic analysis concluded that Sobirov’s messages contained calls and ideas aimed at overthrowing legitimate representatives of the authorities, as well as signs of a call for riots that threaten public peace.

On October 26, 2023, the Kattakurgan district court convicted Dilshod Iskandarov, 19, of “insulting the president online” and sentenced him to two-and-a-half years in a penal colony. A state-ordered expert analysis concluded that a single comment Iskandarov made on Instagram, in which he cursed the president’s family under a video of the family, was “insulting and discrediting.”

The verdict notes that sometime after he wrote the comment he deleted it, and that he voluntarily returned to Uzbekistan from Russia after he learned a criminal case had been opened against him.

On March 28, 2024, the Namangan city court sentenced D. Tursunov, 27, to five years in prison for “insulting the president online.” According to the verdict, Tursunov, using the Facebook profile “Muhammad Sanjar,” commented about the Uzbek president attending Moscow’s Victory Day parade, saying: “The traitor went [to Russia] to get a white blessing for [his] lifetime rule.”

The prosecution alleged that Tursunov also insulted President Mirziyoyev, saying: “Even if a donkey circumambulates the Kaaba not twice, but a hundred times, he remains a donkey!” Tursunov was additionally found guilty of illegal border crossing because he did not possess an exit visa when he left Uzbekistan in September 2016. According to media reports, Tursunov returned to Uzbekistan in December 2023 and was arrested upon his return. Uzbekistan stopped requiring exit visas for citizens traveling abroad in 2019.

Sitora Bazarova, 24, was sentenced in early 2024 to five years and two months in prison by a Termez court on multiple criminal charges, including “insulting the president online.” According to the indictment, in May 2022, Bazarova posted on her Facebook page a video of two pictures that were set on fire, one of President Mirziyoyev, with the words “cuckold, let your family burn” written across it, and another of Saida Mirziyoyeva, the president’s daughter, who serves as his first assistant, with the word “slut” written across it.

A court in the Samarkand region sentenced Bunyodjon Boboniyazov, 39, to five years and one month on October 19, 2023, with a state-ordered linguistic analysis of comments he had made on Facebook as evidence that Boboniyazov attempted to overthrow the constitutional order and insulted the Uzbek president online.

Sobir Normamatov, 28, from the Samarkand region, was sentenced to two years and six months of corrective labor on April 8, 2024, for comments, including obscenities, he posted under three videos of President Mirziyoyev and one of Saida Mirziyoyeva on Instagram. In the comments, Normamatov referred to President Mirziyoyev as “a clown” and “duplicitous.”

Human Rights Watch has also seen the ruling of an appeals court in the case of a 40-year-old man in Kashkadarya who was sentenced to four years and six months in prison in February 2022 on charges of “insulting the president online” and “insult.” The ruling does not specify what speech served as the basis of the man’s conviction. Also in February 2022, the blogger Sobirjon Babaniyazov was sentenced to three years in prison under article 158 of the criminal code for videos and audio messages on Telegram that allegedly insulted the president.

Laws that penalize criticism of public figures are contrary to international law and the fact that some forms of expression are considered insulting is not sufficient to justify criminal prosecutions, far less imprisonment, Human Rights Watch said. The offense of “insult” against the president or other officials simply turns the criminal justice system into a tool of the government to take revenge against anyone who offends or slights it.

The United Nations Human Rights Committee, the independent expert body that monitors compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), states in its general comment on freedom of expression that “imprisonment is never an appropriate penalty” for defamation and that “all public figures … are legitimately subject to criticism.”

In 2020, President Mirziyoyev pledged to decriminalize defamation but has yet to do so. Instead, in March 2021, Uzbekistan introduced a new provision making insulting the president online—an even broader offense than defamation—a criminal offense.

The first known prosecution on this charge was of Valijon Kalonov, a blogger and government critic, who, in the lead up to the 2021 presidential elections, criticized the president and called for a boycott of the election. In December 2021, a Jizzakh court ruled that Kalonov could not be held criminally liable and sent him for compulsory psychiatric treatment.

For the last two-and-a-half years, Kalonov has been forcibly held in psychiatric detention, with authorities refusing to discharge him, a grave violation of his rights to liberty and security, health, bodily integrity, and freedom from inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. The authorities should immediately release him, Human Rights Watch said.

“These ‘insulting the president’ cases make a mockery of President Mirziyoyev’s reform pledges, demonstrating instead a willingness to resort to tactics used by his strong-arm predecessor, Islam Karimov, to crack down on dissent and muzzle critical voices,” Williamson said. “The practice of locking people up on criminal insult charges has absolutely no place in a rights-respecting country.”
Twitter
Afghanistan
SIGAR
@SIGARHQ
[5/30/2024 3:00 AM, 170.3K followers, 2 retweets, 4 likes]
As of April, United States remains largest donor to Afghan people. Since U.S. forces withdrew from #Afghanistan in Aug 2021, U.S. appropriated or otherwise made available $17.19 billion in assistance to #AFG & to Afghan refugees, as shown in Table I.1 https://sigar.mil/pdf/quarterlyreports/2024-04-30qr-intro-section1.pdf#page=11

Jahanzeb Wesa
@Jahanzi12947158
[5/29/2024 9:45 PM, 2.5K followers]
The UN official specifically referenced her recent visit to Afghanistan, where women are systematically denied basic rights and dignity in various aspects of life, including education and employment: https://kabulnow.com/2024/05/un-official-afghan-women-seek-global-support-in-their-quest-for-equality/

Lynne O’Donnell
@lynnekodonnell
[5/30/2024 12:14 AM, 27.1K followers, 4 retweets, 3 likes]
As UN officials again "express concern" over treatment of women in #Afghanistan, Project Taliban marches on: Terrorists torch girls’ middle school in #Pakistan’s North Waziristan

Bilal Sarwary
@bsarwary
[5/29/2024 6:38 PM, 253.7K followers, 7 retweets, 22 likes]
The anti Taliban group @AfgFreedomAFF says its fighters targeted Taliban interior ministry police convoy in Kabul city. According to AFF “ Taliban interior ministry convoy was targeted between Barak-aay and traffic squares. THREE TALIBS were killed and FIVE TALIBS were wounded.”
Pakistan
Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Pakistan
@ForeignOfficePk
[5/30/2024 1:17 AM, 478.8K followers, 15 retweets, 43 likes]
Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan Jeyhun Bayramov @Bayramov_Jeyhun arrives in Islamabad on a two-day official visit. He was received at the Islamabad International Airport by Additional Foreign Secretary (Afghanistan and West Asia) Ahmed Naseem Warraich and accorded a warm welcome. Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov will call on Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif @CMShehbaz and hold extensive discussions with Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar @MIshaqDar50.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Pakistan
@ForeignOfficePk
[5/29/2024 7:25 AM, 478.8K followers, 13 retweets, 16 likes]
On UN Peacekeeping Day, we salute the courage and dedication of UN peacekeepers worldwide. Pakistan stands proud of its longstanding commitment to peacekeeping missions, contributing to global peace and security. Together, we strive for a more peaceful and just world.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Pakistan
@ForeignOfficePk
[5/29/2024 7:26 AM, 478.8K followers, 6 retweets, 10 likes]
Pakistan serves as a top Troop Contributing Country in UN Peacekeeping and host to one of the oldest missions, UNMOGIP.

Imran Khan
@ImranKhanPTI
[5/29/2024 5:49 AM, 20.7M followers, 16K retweets, 29K likes]
Imran Khan’s message has always been clear: the Armed Forces must stay within their constitutional bounds. Whenever they have chosen to go beyond & act against their own people, the country has paid a heavy price including the break up of Pakistan. Unfortunately, the lessons of history have not been learnt as the same mistakes continue to be repeated with the same disastrous results.

Hamid Mir
@HamidMirPAK
[5/29/2024 1:28 PM, 8.5M followers, 81 retweets, 370 likes]
I informed IHC that a serving Army officer Maj Gen Ubaidullah Khan Khattak appeared before SC in a case of enforced disappearance in 2012 as IG FC Balochistan. PEMRA code of conduct does not restrict reporting of the sub-judice cases of missing persons.

Husain Haqqani
@husainhaqqani
[5/30/2024 12:46 AM, 460.8K followers, 20 retweets, 81 likes]
Supreme Court Judges should speak through their rulings and judgments. The registrar of the Supreme Court of Pakistan should perform his administrative functions. Neither should engage in political correspondence with foreign diplomats.

Husain Haqqani
@husainhaqqani
[5/30/2024 12:40 AM, 460.8K followers, 10 retweets, 30 likes]
Pakistan’s civilian leaders keep disappointing when it comes to human rights and civil liberties. They were supposed to end NAB’s draconian powers, not increase its remand from 14 to 40 days.
India
Narendra Modi
@narendramodi
[5/30/2024 2:18 AM, 98.1M followers, 987 retweets, 3.6K likes]
Across Punjab, there is incredible talent and potential. Our Party accords the highest priority to giving wings to the aspirations of the people of this state. Watch from Hoshiarpur. https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1gqGvQoMwWQKB

Narendra Modi
@narendramodi
[5/29/2024 7:18 AM, 98.1M followers, 3.7K retweets, 13K likes]
My fourth rally today is in Odisha’s Kendrapara. People here are voting for the BJP! https://x.com/i/broadcasts/1ypKdkgWNdjxW

Narendra Modi
@narendramodi
[5/29/2024 4:47 AM, 98.1M followers, 6.7K retweets, 44K likes]
Glimpses from the rally in Mathurapur. All across West Bengal, it’s a clear BJP wave.

Shashi Tharoor
@ShashiTharoor
[5/29/2024 11:51 PM, 8.4M followers, 169 retweets, 971 likes]
While I am in Dharamshala for campaigning purposes, I was shocked to hear of an incident involving a former member of my staff who has been rendering part-time service to me in terms of airport facilitation assistance. He is a 72 year old retiree undergoing frequent dialysis and was retained on a part-time basis on compassionate grounds. I do not condone any alleged wrongdoing and fully support the authorities in their efforts to take any necessary action as may be required to investigate the matter. The law must take its own course.

Shashi Tharoor
@ShashiTharoor
[5/29/2024 6:41 AM, 8.4M followers, 30 retweets, 250 likes]
Spoke to Thiruvananthapuram Collector Geromic George about the situation in the district following reports of heavy pre-monsoon rains. He assured me that matters were in hand and so far under control. Some reports of waterlogging have come in, however. The drainage situation in the city needs to be addressed as an urgent priority. The regular monsoon is also expected on time by June 1. We must not lurch from avoidable crisis to preventable disaster yet again.

Tanvi Madan
@tanvi_madan
[5/29/2024 6:45 PM, 88.9K followers, 1 retweet, 12 likes]
Every Indian election, there’s lots of speculation based on what the following indicate re the result but it’s not clear which, if any, of them end up being great predictors:
- turnout
- rally attendance
- stock markets
- betting markets
- exit polls

Tanvi Madan
@tanvi_madan
[5/29/2024 11:15 AM, 88.9K followers, 33 retweets, 105 likes]
Has been a lot of discussion on Indian twitter about Russia-China ties following an article by @swasrao and responses, including from @sreemoytalukdar @sreeramchaulia & @RRajagopalanJNU. Here are my two cents… https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GOwXPFcXwAAeqkq?format=png&name=medium
NSB
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bangladesh
@BDMOFA
[5/29/2024 1:18 PM, 36.8K followers, 4 retweets, 21 likes]
HFM called for universal access to eye health services at a side event organized by the UN group of Friends of Vision in St. John’s, Antigua & Barbuda on 27 May’ 24. The event addressed inequalities in eye care access, particularly in low & middle-income countries.

Awami League
@albd1971
[5/29/2024 5:08 AM, 638K followers, 26 retweets, 65 likes]
State Minister for Finance Waseqa Ayesha Khan said the next budget for FY 2024-25 will give the highest priority on reining #inflation. She said, "There are problems of inflation across the world, #Bangladesh is not exempt from that." She also said that the govt provides heavy #subsidies to keep the #foodprice in check. https://bssnews.net/business/191745

Awami League
@albd1971
[5/29/2024 7:22 AM, 638K followers, 34 retweets, 83 likes]
#Bangladesh is a dependable name in the efforts to protect peace and safety alongside establishing global peace. We are acknowledged by all and have become a role model on the global stage," - HPM #SheikhHasina at an event marking International Day of UN #Peacekeepers-2024 https://albd.org/articles/news/41427

Sabria Chowdhury Balland
@sabriaballand
[5/29/2024 9:10 PM, 2.3K followers]
The persistent dollar crisis in Bangladesh has exacerbated various economic issues, including inflation, rising business costs, an energy crisis, and mounting government foreign debt payments. Dollar crisis deepens economic woes in #Bangladesh https://newagebd.net/post/economy/236433/dollar-crisis-deepens-economic-woes-in-bangladesh

The President’s Office, Maldives
@presidencymv
[5/29/2024 10:44 AM, 108.4K followers, 129 retweets, 148 likes]
During his statement at the High-Level Meeting on Resource Mobilization for SIDS, President Dr. Muizzu offered three solutions to enable easier access to finance for Small Island Developing States (SIDS), including the Maldives. For the latest on #MaldivesAtSIDS4: https://presidency.gov.mv/SIDS4/ #SIDS4 #MaldivesAtSIDS4 #SmallIslands

MFA SriLanka
@MFA_SriLanka
[5/29/2024 11:17 AM, 38.1K followers, 5 retweets, 3 likes]
Minister Sabry meets Ambassador of Russian Federation regarding Sri Lankans in the Russia – Ukraine conflict More: https://mfa.gov.lk/minister-meets-ambassador-of-russian-federation/ #DiplomacyLK #lka
Central Asia
UNODC Central Asia
@UNODC_ROCA
[5/29/2024 10:30 PM, 2.4K followers, 1 retweet, 3 likes]
Presentation of infosystems took place at Kyrgyzstan General Prosecutor’s Office. W/ support of @EUinKyrgyzstan -funded #JUST4ALL, nationwide systems incl. Unified Register of Crimes, Offences, Penitentiary & Probation are established w/ the aim of enhancing #ruleoflaw & #humanrights.

Yerzhan Ashikbayev
@KZAmbUS
[5/29/2024 8:55 AM, 2.5K followers, 2 retweets, 18 likes]
Read an insightful op-ed by President Tokayev @TokayevKZ on the role of Middle Powers in the global arena. https://www.euronews.com/2024/05/28/middle-powers-have-the-power-to-save-multilateralism

Furqat Sidiqov
@FurqatSidiq
[5/29/2024 1:16 PM, 1.4K followers, 3 likes]
Delighted to host Eric Larsen, Chair of the @WashNatOpera Board, Mrs. Susanne Larsen, Ambassador Nazri Aziz (@MYembassyWDC), & Mrs. Haflin Nazri Aziz. We discussed joint cultural events in #Washington featuring the rich heritage of Uzbekistan, including art and performances.

MFA Tajikistan
@MOFA_Tajikistan
[5/30/2024 12:26 AM, 4.8K followers, 3 retweets, 4 likes]
Meeting of Central Asian Foreign Ministers https://mfa.tj/en/main/view/15131/meeting-of-central-asian-foreign-ministers

{End of Report}
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