Spotlight On Asia

In this week's Spotlight on Asia, RFI's Rosslyn Hyams looks at the potential knock-on effects in South Asia and in the Indian diaspora, of the Indian Supreme Court ruling to decriminalise homosexual consensual sexual relations. The ink was only just dry on the Indian Supreme Court's decision to scrap the Section 377 which made sex between homosexual consenting adults a crime, and already more ink was being poured into comments about how this move will help the Indian economy.According to one of the petitioners in the case and cited by the French news agency AFP. "It can bring billions of dollars to the Indian economy if they can activate the spending of gay people in India," Keshav Suri, a hotelier said, adding that 'there is business to be done, real estate to be bought and sold, holidays and all the services that go with that."The so-called pink economy is evaluated cent by cent, and in India's case rupee by rupee by a marketing agency in Australia.Out Now has counted more than 55 million Lesbian, Gay, Bise

In Spotlight on Asia, RFI's Rosslyn Hyams turns to some of the main news in Asia this week, including the murder of Shujaat Bukhari, leading Kashmiri journalist and former RFI English correspondent, the UN's first report on human rights violations in Kashmir, and whither nuclear disarmement of the Korean peninsula after Kim Jung-un and Donald Trump give an historic handshake.

Opinion is divided for now about whether or not China's one-trillion dollar economic corridor project known as One Belt, One Road will be a plus for the countries it passes through, as Rosslyn Hyams reports. In the meantime, Sri Lanka which has been trying to recover economically, politically and socially from its drawn-out, three-decade-long civil war, owes China billions of dollars.The International Monetary fund chief Christine Lagarde has alerted China and countries potentially benefitting from the Chinese One Belt infrastructure development, to possible increased debt in the process.Spotlight on Asia considers why some countries may be more vulnerable to such unwanted possible side-effects of China's plan to harness the region's economic potential.

Spotlight on Asia, focuses on the jailing of South Korea's former president 66 year-old Park Geun Hye. Produced and presented by RFi's Rosslyn Hyams with guests John Nilsson-Wright and Noh Jung-sun. South Korea's first woman president Park Geun-hye, was found guilty of 16 counts of corruption and abuse of power, and fined her close to 100 million euros.The people of South Korea, more than 50 per cent of who in February 2013 elected the daughter of former late South Korean dictator Park Chung-hee, are divided over the unprecedented sentence, and noisy supporters protested outside the court after her sentence on 6 April 2018.John Nilsson-Wright, a senior lecturer at Cambridge University in the UK and Senior Research Fellow for Northeast Asia at the Asia Programme at Chatham House, notes that "there's certainly a will and a desire on the part of the current government of president Moon Jae-in, to change the political and economic culture of South Korea.He was a beneficiary of the candle-lit protests against Pres

In this week's Spotlight on Asia, RFI's Jan van der Made is looking at the Hmong, a minority people that's fled, for the largest part, from their home lands to find safety and happiness in France and the United States. But some were left behind, and no one knows about their fate.

Sharp and harsh, contradictions in Iranian urban society seen through the life of four characters living in Tehran, are made larger than life in a recently-released animated fiction feature film. RFI's Rosslyn Hyams meets Zahra Amir Ebrahimi, one of the actresses in Tehran Taboo, who plays a tragic, dynamic young woman who resorts to extreme action to maintain some sense of independence.

In this week’s look at Asia, we hear about a film which had its release delayed in India for six months by the censorship board. It’s called Lipstick Under My Burkha and it screened in Paris this month at the South Asian Film Festival. Rosslyn Hyams has been talking to the film's director. Lipstick Under My Burkha is a feminist film of the most watchable kind.Director Alankrita Shrivastava says "the title is a metaphor for women's hidden desires, hidden dreams".Her Hindi-language film shot in Bhopal opened the fifth South Asian Film Festival in Paris in October.It had previously been shown in France at the Créteil Womens' Film Festival.She struggled for more than six months before getting approval for release in India after a screening at the Bombay Festival in November 2016."They said it was too much from the female perspective," she explains. "It may have threatened the patriarchal norm. But India is still a functioning democracy. So we were able to have the ban lifted."Related issues were raised by one or

In Spotlight on Asia this week, RFI's Rosslyn Hyams meets Jean-Joseph Boillot who spends his time as an academic researcher travelling between France and India. Boillot's latest book -  soon to be published in English in India - is called L'Inde Ancienne au chevet des Politiques (literally Ancient India on the Politicians' Bedside Table) takes parts of an ancient Indian treatise on how to rule, and what leaders should do to attain prosperity for all.He says that Narendra Modi, apparently a fan of the Arthashashtra represents a new generation of Indian leaders who refer to their own culture's teachings and experiences rather than borrowing from foreign sources.Boillot suggests that European politicians today take a leaf out of the book of Kautilya, the right-hand man of the Indian Maurya Empire's Ashoka who reigned some 2300 years ago.Under the headings such as "on discipline", "on good behaviour of counsellors and ministers", "on safety of assets and persons" , "on the kingdom's vices and calamities", it soun

This week the US Department of Defense released a report on Enhancing Security and Stability in Afghanistan, a week after President Donald Trump set the number of US troops deployed in the country at 8400, down from 9600 in 2016. Last Sunday, a suicide attack on a police headquarters, claimed by the Taliban, killed at least twenty people and at the end of May a massive suicide attack in the diplomatic quarters of Kabul cost the lives to over 150 people, wounding many more.Smaller attacks take place on a near daily basis,leading many lawmakers to believe that more US support is necessary.In an exclusive interview, RFI talked to the vice president of the Afghanistan parliament, Fawzia Koofi, after US authorities indicated that the Pentagon may increase troop numbers by as many as 4000 soldiers and advisors.

On May 19, Iran held presidential elections after a month of campaign frenzy. RFI's Jan van der Made was there and and saw how democracy Iranian style put people in election frenzy, but does Rouhani's celebrated victory really mean profound change?

Spotlight on Asia takes us to Indonesia where Jakarta's outgoing Christian governor was found guilty of blasphemy against Islam. Indonesian President Jokowi, a longtime ally of Ahok, has - wisely - avoided to making any comment on Ahok’s conviction. For observers, this insulates Jokowi somewhat from accusations that he is protecting a blasphemer, a claim that radical organizations would surely have seized on, especially ahead of the 2019 presidential election. 

This week’s Spotlight Asia brings us to Asia Pacific. Jan van der Made looks at how US president Donald Trump is getting back into the mold when it comes to Taiwan and how Vietnam is being blacklisted by an American human rights watchdog that may have ulterior motives.

In this week's Spotlight on Asia, RFi's Rosslyn Hyams talks to a documentary film maker who has co-directed a feature length work that highlights transgender issues in Vietnam.

The Korean peninsula made headline news all over the world this week. South Korea's president Park Geun-hye, now former president, was sacked and will most likely face corruption charges. North Korea's muscle flexing is testing the new US administration as well as its neighbour China, believed to be an ally, and challenging Malaysia over the assassination of Kim Jong-nam, the North Korean leader's half-brother. In this week's Spotlight on Asia, RFI's Rosslyn Hyams speaks to Jonthan Holslag, specialist on security issues in East Asia, about the current brinkmanship in the region. He warns, "we have to be careful that this tiny little power on the doorstep of China doesn't become the Serbia of the 21st century."      

Now it is time for Spotlight Asia and we will highlight three different countries in the region: Myanmar, South Korea, and Iran. Both South Korea and Iran are already suffering at the hands of the new American president's latest decisions. RFI's Jan van der Made has this report.   

In this week's Spotlight on Asia, RFI's Rosslyn Hyams focuses on political change in Sri Lanka. The European Union is preparing to reward the government with an economic push, if it pursues efforts in good governance and human rights.

The South Korean president's future hangs in the balance. She is suspected of involvement in a potentially far-reaching corruption scandal, linked to a close friend. Discontented Koreans have been protesting in the street. Crucial deadlines loom as the parliamentary session ends on 9 December.  South Korea's internal political troubles are the focus of this week's Spotlight on Asia with RFI's Rosslyn Hyams.   

This week's Spotlight on Asia takes a look at the potential impacts newly elected US president Donald Trump could have on countries in Asia. Analysts have argued that his election could be a disaster for anyone who cares about human rights, U.S. global leadership, and media freedom. Which they say, could imply that Trump's victory was also a win for China, making several other countries in the region uneasyTrump's election raises several questions as to what might come next in US-Asia relations, in terms of economic ties, foreign policies, security and human rights issues.Uncertainty remains the key word - what Trump's policies will be won't be clear until he takes office in just over two months.

A scandal over alleged abuse of power engulfing the South Korean president deepened on Tuesday after the embattled leader was forced to withdraw her nominee for prime minister and give up control of the cabinet. Her close friendship with shadowy figure Choi Soon-sil, which has plunged the country into its worst political crisis in decades. The woman at the centre of the growing political scandal surrounding President Park Guen-hye is businesswoman Choi Soon-sil.She has been charged with abuse of power and fraud for using her political connections to force large companies, including Samsung and Hyundai, to donate about 60 million euros to two government-linked foundations.The affair has hurt Park.Since reports emerged in October about Choi’s influence at the heart of the government, thousands of South Koreans have been taking to the streets of the capital Seoul to call on her to step down."One of the reasons why the South Korean public is so up in arms about all this right now is because they thought with Pres

At an underreported meeting  at the end of August in Chechnya, in the Russian Federation, hundreds of Islamic scholars discussed the definition of Sunni Islam and declared Wahabbism, the strict Saud-based school, beyond the pale. But not everybody was invited and critics say politics may overshadow religion in the fierce debate that erupted in the Muslim world after the meeting.