标签： Asia

The wave of youth-driven mass protests that has roiled India in recent months has inflicted serious damage on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration, according to prominent education reform advocate Sonam Wangchuk, whose 26-day hunger strike became the catalyst for the growing grassroots movement.

In an interview with the BBC, the 59-year-old activist explained that a profound shift in public mood has swept the country following the demonstrations, which ultimately forced the resignation of India’s Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on July 25. Wangchuk, a veteran engineer and education specialist, noted that young Indians have emerged from the protest wave with newfound confidence: they now understand they are capable of driving meaningful change when they organize, and are no longer willing to accept unfair systemic outcomes passively.

The movement that has shaken national politics took its unusual name from a widely criticized comment by India’s Chief Justice, who infamously compared groups of unemployed young jobseekers to “cockroaches” during a public court hearing. What began as public outrage over a widespread exam paper leak quickly escalated into one of the largest displays of public dissent against Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, which has held national power since 2014.

Wangchuk led the protest movement from the front, staging his hunger strike through record-breaking high temperatures in New Delhi between June and July, consuming only salt and water for 26 days. By the end of the fast, he had lost 11 kilograms, six of which he has since regained. For the final six days of his protest, he was forcibly detained by authorities and moved to a hospital, which Wangchuk describes as having functioned “more like a prison” to restrict his activism.

One day after Wangchuk ended his hunger strike, Pradhan stepped down from his cabinet post. In the aftermath of the protests, the Modi administration has announced a series of policy concessions: it has established fast-track courts to prosecute individuals linked to the exam paper leaks, appointed a prominent tech billionaire to lead a national examination system reform effort, and pledged to provide financial compensation to the families of students who died by suicide in the wake of the leak scandal.

But Wangchuk argues that India’s crisis runs far deeper than a broken examination system. For a quarter of a century, graduate unemployment has hovered between 35% and 40%, a systemic failure rooted in an outdated education model that does not align with the needs of the modern job market. Current national exams, he explains, rely heavily on multiple-choice questions designed to efficiently grade millions of test-takers, with no consideration for whether they actually measure practical skills or deep conceptual understanding. This assessment model, in turn, distorts how schools teach students, prioritizing rote memorization over applied learning.

To address the country’s persistent unemployment crisis, Wangchuk says fundamental education reform is non-negotiable. If assessments shifted to prioritize hands-on experience and aptitude for real-world work, he argues, schools would adapt their curricula and teaching methods to match. He also calls for long-term strategic planning that anticipates India’s economic and social needs 15 years from now, to ensure that young people are prepared for future jobs and that growing industries do not face widespread labor shortages. “Changing the way children are taught might help ensure they are not left unemployed and sectors that need people are not left underemployed,” he says.

The Indian government has pushed back against criticism of its economic management, arguing that claims of a widespread unemployment crisis are overstated and that the country’s core macroeconomic fundamentals remain strong. Despite the government’s policy changes after the protests, reports indicate that many activists involved in the “Cockroach” movement still face ongoing retaliation, including pending criminal court cases, routine police harassment, and coordinated abuse on social media. These repercussions continue even after India’s Supreme Court ordered authorities not to take coercive action against protesters with no prior criminal record.

Even so, Wangchuk says the movement has already made tangible progress, and a shift toward change is already underway. He argues that the Modi government has been severely damaged by the public backlash over its slow response to the protests, which in turn gave young activists space to build unity and confidence in their collective power. Wangchuk points to the BJP’s recent poor performance in three key by-elections, where the party lost two seats — including a Bihar constituency it had held for more than 30 years — as evidence that the political fallout is already being felt at the ballot box.

Wangchuk, who is now back in his hometown of Leh in the Himalayan region of Ladakh 12 days after ending his hunger strike, maintains he remains open to the government changing course. “I always believe in people realising their mistakes and amending their ways. So I would give them that chance,” he says. If the administration refuses to address the demands of the movement, however, Wangchuk warns that protests could expand beyond the issue of education reform to challenge broader government policies.

A long-time activist who previously led hunger strikes to demand greater self-rule for Ladakh and oppose development projects in ecologically sensitive Himalayan regions, Wangchuk says he remains committed to Mahatma Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violent resistance. Even when his past campaigns did not immediately achieve their stated goals, he argues that self-inflicted sacrifice through hunger strike changes the government’s calculus in a way that violent confrontation never can: “inflicting pain on ourselves makes the government feel differently, compared to us using sticks and stones.”

When asked if he plans to run for public office to advance his reform goals, Wangchuk says he has no interest in holding office, preferring to support and empower the next generation of young leaders to run for office themselves.

As the high-profile trial of activists linked to Palestine Action over an alleged planned raid on an Israeli-owned arms facility enters its final stages, defense barristers have delivered compelling closing arguments that challenge the prosecution’s core claims, while highlighting severe mental health struggles for one of the defendants. The case centers on allegations of coordinated criminal damage and violent disorder tied to a planned break-in at the Elbit Systems plant in Filton, near Bristol, that was scheduled for August 2024.

Nine people originally faced charges connected to the alleged plot. Of these, 35-year-old William Plastow has already been acquitted of the violent disorder charge, and only faces a single remaining allegation of criminal damage. The eight remaining defendants – 33-year-old Julija Brigadirova, 53-year-old Hannah Davidson, 47-year-old Ian Sanders, 41-year-old Aleksandra Herbich, 30-year-old Teuta Hoxha, 33-year-old Sean Middlebrough, and 31-year-old Madeleine Norman – all deny all charges brought against them. Prosecutors allege the group coordinated the planned break-in by conducting preliminary reconnaissance of the site and purchasing raiding equipment, though none are accused of actually entering the factory premises during the incident.

In his closing address to the jury on Wednesday, Tom Copeland, the barrister representing Julija Brigadirova, outlined that his client was grappling with extreme mental and emotional distress – including a serious suicide attempt – at the time the alleged coordination is said to have occurred. Copeland argued that this profound personal crisis explains why Brigadirova’s involvement is absent from the evidence of pre-raid planning: during that period of her life, she simply was not in a position to participate in any coordinated plot. He pointed out that the prosecution’s characterization of Brigadirova as a “key player” in the operation relies entirely on unproven assumption, not tangible evidence. No records of financial transactions linked to the raid, nor any planning or coordination messages linked to Brigadirova’s Signal accounts, have been presented by the prosecution.

“If the prosecution is correct, you would have to call her the invisible coordinator,” Copeland told the jury. “She is not invisible – you can see her sitting in the dock today, she is a real human being with real struggles. The far more plausible explanation is that the prosecution has simply got this wrong, and that mistake is a serious one that cannot be overlooked.”

Prosecutors have pointed to a single July 24 message sent to Brigadirova from her friend Jasmine Cruickshank that asks, “Are you still up for the Bristol van trip next weekend?” The prosecution claims this message proves Brigadirova knew about the Filton action and planned to travel to the site for the raid. Copeland dismissed this argument as baseless, noting that prosecutors never called Cruickshank to testify to explain the context of the message, even though Cruickshank provided a character statement for Brigadirova that was admitted as agreed evidence. Copeland argued that it is unfair for the prosecution to use the out-of-context message against his client while declining to call its sender to answer questions about what it actually meant.

The jury also heard that Brigadirova traveled to Bristol with Cruickshank on August 4, took a selfie at the home of Cruickshank’s father after arriving, and did not return to Manchester in the van driven back by Cruickshank days later. Copeland further criticized the prosecution for downplaying his client’s mental health crisis, framing it only as “low mood” when in fact Brigadirova was hospitalized for four days following her suicide attempt, which was not the first such crisis she had experienced. Copeland suggested that the evidence is consistent with Brigadirova only accompanying friends to Bristol for emotional support during a difficult period in her life, not to participate in a coordinated raid. The first post-raid mention of Brigadirova in any evidence is a message she sent to a contact on the dating app Feeld, which simply said, “just stayed with friends down south, nothing special.”

Defense arguments for other defendants similarly centered on the prosecution’s lack of concrete evidence tying them to coordinated criminal activity. For Aleksandra Herbich, barrister Emma Fenn argued that her client’s role in the days before the alleged raid was so limited that it cannot amount to criminal participation. Fenn noted that the Palestine Action “Coordinator’s manual” requires all coordinators to remain contactable at all times – but Herbich handed her phone over to another defendant ahead of the action, directly contradicting the claim that she was a coordinator. Fenn told the jury that CCTV footage shows Herbich at Paddington Station on August 4 carrying a sushi-sized box, and that co-defendant Madeline Norman testified that the only activity she saw Herbich engaged in at the Bristol Airbnb where activists stayed was cooking large amounts of pasta.

“There is no evidence linking Herbich to any tools or equipment that could have been used for criminal damage or violent disorder,” Fenn said. “At most, she helped with basic cooking and cleaning. Cooking is not an intentional act that assists or encourages the serious offenses the prosecution has charged.”

For William Plastow, who already defeated the violent disorder charge, barrister Andrew Rose argued that the remaining criminal damage charge should also be thrown out, as it contains a fundamental logical contradiction. The prosecution’s case against Plastow rests on the fact that he purchased a number of items including rucksacks, protective gear and crowbars, then handed them over to another individual connected to the case, Charlotte Head. But Plastow testified that he had no knowledge of the Filton plot before the raid happened, and only first learned of the site from a news report the morning after the incident. Rose told the jury that under the judge’s directions, jurors can only convict if they are certain Plastow provided the equipment with the explicit intention that it be used to damage Elbit’s property as part of the Filton plot.

Rose pointed out that Plastow was never given the detailed, site-specific list of items needed for the Filton action, in line with Palestine Action’s stated “need-to-know” policy for operations. “Mr. Plastow was not someone who needed to know, and he did not want to know,” Rose explained. He further argued that since the judge already acquitted Plastow of violent disorder because there was insufficient evidence he knew violence would occur, it is logically inconsistent to claim he knew about the broader plan for criminal damage at Filton. The prosecution’s own case holds that anyone involved in the plot knew it would include both criminal damage and potential violent disorder. “If he had no knowledge of violent disorder, he could not have had knowledge of the criminal damage plan either,” Rose told the jury. “The acquittal on the first charge should mean the second charge is also dismissed.”

Following the completion of closing arguments from the defense team on Thursday, the judge sent the jury out to begin deliberations on the verdicts. The trial is ongoing.

As a public service note, suicide prevention support is available for those in crisis: people in the UK can contact Samaritans at jo@samaritans.org or 116 123, those in the US can reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255, and people in other countries can find local resources at befrienders.org.

Exclusive reporting from Middle East Eye has uncovered new behind-the-scenes details of a surprising diplomatic gambit by former US President Donald Trump in late May, when he placed an unscheduled call to Lebanon’s ambassador to Washington demanding an immediate direct conversation with leaders of Hezbollah — a request that was ultimately turned down by Lebanese authorities. Multiple independent sources, including two Hezbollah-connected insiders and a senior Lebanese diplomatic official, have confirmed the sequence of events, which unfolded as a fragile ceasefire along the Lebanon-Israel border began to unravel.

Within days of the out-of-the-blue call on Lebanese Ambassador Nada Hamadeh Moawad, Trump took to his Truth Social platform on June 1 to announce that he had already spoken to Hezbollah through unnamed third-party intermediaries, and that the group had committed to halting all cross-border attacks against Israel. “Through highly placed representatives, I had a very good call with Hezbollah, and they agreed that all shooting will stop,” he wrote in the post. But new reporting directly contradicts this claim, laying bare the confusion and panic that gripped Lebanese official circles after Trump’s unexpected demand.

One insider close to Hezbollah described a frantic scramble among low-level Lebanese officials to track down a working contact number for any senior Hezbollah figure, even placing cold calls to random Shia religious leaders in a desperate attempt to fulfill the US president’s request. That account is disputed by a senior Lebanese diplomatic source, who confirms the core details of Trump’s call but denies any such frantic search took place. According to the diplomatic source, when Trump angrily demanded that Ambassador Moawad connect him to a Hezbollah representative, she immediately informed him that she lacked the authority to arrange that kind of contact.

Middle East Eye has reached out to the White House for official comment on the incident, and as of publication has not received a response. Following the exchange with Trump, Ambassador Moawad immediately notified Lebanon’s presidency of the request and sought guidance on how to proceed. Sources confirm that the presidential palace issued a clear directive: take no action and ignore Trump’s demand. Lebanese leaders feared that facilitating direct contact between the US president and Hezbollah would put the country’s presidency in a politically precarious position, as the Lebanese government had been working since April to position itself as the sole legitimate representative of Lebanon in all international negotiations tied to the border crisis.

The current crisis along the Lebanon-Israel border erupted in March, when the broader conflict between the US and Israel and Iran spilled over northward. Hezbollah launched rocket strikes into Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, and fighting has continued in fits and starts ever since. A ceasefire brokered in April as part of a US-Iran deal required an end to devastating Israeli airstrikes on Lebanese territory, and while the Lebanese state welcomed the truce, it moved quickly to assert its central role in negotiations, decouple its own border dispute from the broader US-Iran conflict, and launch direct talks with Israel under US mediation. For Lebanese leaders, a direct conversation between Trump and Hezbollah would undermine the presidency’s claim to be the sole representative of Lebanese interests, sources confirm.

A senior Lebanese security official added new context to the incident, confirming that Trump’s unsolicited request was just the latest in a long string of failed US attempts to open a direct communication channel with Hezbollah. “There have been many repeated offers from the United States, both previously and under the current administration, to open channels of communication with Hezbollah,” the official said. “They were all rejected. The political decision within the group has been not to open direct communication with the Americans.”

The most recent attempt before Trump’s call came through the CIA’s station in Beirut, where US officials asked a senior Lebanese security figure to mediate contact with the group. That request was rejected, as was an earlier attempt to open a channel through a former senior Lebanese security official prior to Trump’s public announcement. The US government officially designates Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, and has maintained a long-standing formal policy barring direct political engagement with the group.

Even more revealing, a senior Lebanese official confirmed that the US Embassy in Beirut had no advance knowledge of Trump’s plan to reach out directly to Hezbollah before he placed the call to Ambassador Moawad. After Trump’s public announcement, the embassy scrambled to contact its own informal intermediaries with ties to Hezbollah to verify whether any contact had actually taken place — and received a clear confirmation that no such communication had occurred.

After Trump’s announcement, unconfirmed circulating reports claimed that the contact had been arranged through Abdallah Safieddine, Hezbollah’s senior representative in Tehran, during US-Iran negotiations held in Islamabad. But a source familiar with the matter told Middle East Eye that Safieddine never even traveled to Islamabad for the talks, debunking that version of events entirely.

In a seismic upset that has sent shockwaves through U.S. Democratic politics, progressive public health advocate Abdul El-Sayed has claimed the Democratic Party’s U.S. Senate nomination for Michigan, defeating centrist incumbent Congresswoman Haley Stevens in one of the costliest and most closely watched primary contests in modern American history.

NBC News projected El-Sayed’s victory late Tuesday, following a months-long bruising campaign that saw outside interest groups pour more than $60 million into the race — the bulk of that sum directed at blocking El-Sayed from advancing to the general election. With 92.9 percent of expected ballots counted by 8:30 a.m. BST Wednesday, the progressive challenger held a narrow but decisive lead, capturing 48.7 percent of the vote compared to Stevens’ 47.3 percent.

Within moments of the projection, former primary candidate Mallory McMorrow, a state legislator who dropped out of the race weeks before election day, threw her full support behind El-Sayed, unifying progressive factions ahead of the November general election.

The outcome stands as a major political defeat for high-profile pro-Israel lobbying groups, most notably the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which poured more than $30 million into independent expenditure campaigns to boost Stevens and defeat El-Sayed, one of the Democratic Party’s most prominent and vocal pro-Palestinian voices.

As preliminary vote counts began trickling in early Wednesday, El-Sayed addressed cheering supporters at a Detroit watch party, framing the moment as a stepping stone rather than a final victory. “I wish I could tell you that I was declaring victory right about now,” he told the crowd, while already turning his attention to the general election matchup against former Republican Congressman Mike Rogers.

The 41-year-old former Detroit health director will now face Rogers in November, in a competitive general election race that could decide which party controls the U.S. Senate for the final two years of Donald Trump’s second presidential term. Directing his message to his November opponent, El-Sayed declared: “I know you’re listening, Mike. Mike, we are coming for you.”

El-Sayed’s projected primary win marks a defining watershed moment for both the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and Michigan’s large Arab American electorate. Voters from both groups coalesced around El-Sayed over months of grassroots organizing rooted in widespread opposition to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and deep frustration with the Democratic Party’s longstanding alignment with pro-Israel advocacy groups.

Throughout the primary, El-Sayed repeatedly criticized AIPAC and its affiliated political action committees for attempting to “buy” the election through unprecedented levels of outside spending. Stevens, for her part, pushed back against claims that she was overly influenced by out-of-state interest groups, arguing that her long record of delivering policy results for Michigan voters made her the stronger candidate.

El-Sayed has repeatedly described Israel’s military operations in Gaza as a genocide — a framing that aligns with positions held by dozens of international human rights organizations and Palestinian advocates, but one that has been rejected by both Israeli officials and every recent U.S. presidential administration. The progressive candidate has also argued that the billions of dollars in annual U.S. military aid sent to Israel should instead be redirected to domestic priorities including expanding healthcare access, building more affordable housing, funding public education, and upgrading crumbling national infrastructure.

His policy positions on the Gaza conflict have resonated deeply with Michigan voters, many of whom organized grassroots opposition to former President Joe Biden during the 2024 Democratic primaries over his unwavering support for Israel’s military campaign.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Early official results from the first two phases of legislative assembly elections in Pakistan-administered Kashmir show Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s ruling Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) holding an overwhelming early lead, defying weeks of destabilizing protests and organized boycott calls from a recently banned opposition group.

Raja Shakeel, spokesperson for the region’s independent election commission, confirmed Wednesday that candidates backed by PML-N have secured 24 of the 34 seats decided in the first two rounds of voting. Even with 11 remaining seats set to go to the polls on August 10, election observers already project the party is on an unassailable path to form the next regional government — marking PML-N’s return to power in the territory after a 10-year absence.

Election officials extended voting across three phases to address two overlapping challenges: persistent security threats from unrest and severe disruption from annual monsoon rains, which made large-scale outdoor campaign rallies logistically unfeasible and dangerous. Despite these headwinds and the boycott campaign, voter turnout has outperformed many expectations: regional data shows turnout surpassed 50% across most voting areas, hitting 56% in the regional capital of Muzaffarabad.

The electoral process was overshadowed for weeks by demonstrations led by the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), an opposition group that was formally banned by the regional government over public order and national security concerns shortly before voting began. The JAAC has centered its protest on 12 legislative seats reserved for refugees displaced from Indian-controlled Kashmir following the 1947 partition of British India. The group argues these seats give unfair disproportionate political influence to people residing outside Pakistan-administered Kashmir and has repeatedly called for the reserved seats to be eliminated entirely. The controversy escalated in June when the region’s Supreme Court ruled that the reserved seats are constitutionally protected, and can only be altered through a formal constitutional amendment, a process that requires approval from the elected legislative assembly.

The reserved seats were first established to guarantee political representation for displaced families who settled across mainland Pakistan after partition, when Pakistan-administered Kashmir lacked the infrastructure and resources to accommodate a large influx of new residents. Decades later, many descendants of these displaced families still reside across Pakistan, while others have since relocated to the Pakistan-administered Kashmir region.

In the lead-up to voting, repeated clashes broke out between JAAC supporters and local police. Regional authorities have further alleged that members of the Pakistani Taliban have infiltrated JAAC protests to disrupt the democratic process, claims the JAAC has not issued any formal response to. Despite these threats of violence, the majority of registered voters turned out to cast their ballots, exercising their democratic right amid widespread insecurity.

Political analysts note that the strong turnout and rejection of the boycott campaign signals broad public confidence in the regional democratic process, even amid longstanding political tension. In a formal statement following the release of early results, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif offered congratulations to all winning candidates for their successful campaigns.

The Kashmir region has remained one of the world’s longest-running territorial disputes: both nuclear-armed neighbors India and Pakistan administer separate portions of the Himalayan territory, while each claims full sovereignty over the entire region. Since both states gained independence from British rule in 1947, two of the three full-scale wars fought between the two nations have been over control of Kashmir.

On a Wednesday marked by overlapping symbolic events tied to Bangladesh’s 2024 political upheaval, ousted former prime minister Sheikh Hasina made a defiant declaration from her exile in India: she intends to return to her homeland this December, even as a capital punishment sentence hangs over her head for the deadly 2024 crackdown on anti-government protesters.

Hasina delivered the announcement via an audio address at a New Delhi event commemorating the second anniversary of the student-led uprising that forced her from power. The 15-year incumbent prime minister fled to India in 2024 as mass protests swept across Bangladesh, and has remained in exile outside her country ever since. In 2025, a Bangladeshi court convicted her in absentia of crimes against humanity for ordering the violent response to the uprising, sentencing her to death. A United Nations report on the unrest recorded that nearly 1,400 people lost their lives during the crackdown, charges that Hasina has repeatedly and vehemently denied.

Facing legal jeopardy that could cost her life, Hasina framed her planned return as a non-negotiable responsibility to the people of Bangladesh. “I know that they may put me in jail, or they may kill me, or anything may happen, but still I have to go back,” she stated. “Fear cannot decide my duty to the people.” She also used the address to push for two key political demands: the lifting of the current ban on her Awami League party, and the release of all political detainees being held under the current administration.

Bangladesh’s current government has repeatedly requested India extradite Hasina to face her sentence, but New Delhi has thus far refused to hand the former leader over. The status of that extradition request remains unchanged as of Hasina’s latest announcement.

Half a world away in Dhaka, the same day brought a separate event that cemented the legacy of the uprising that ended Hasina’s rule: Bangladeshi Prime Minister Tarique Rahman officially opened the July Mass Uprising Memorial Museum, installed in Hasina’s former official residence. The memorial initiative was first launched by the interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, who took office just three days after Hasina fled the country in 2024. Yunus joined Rahman for the inauguration ceremony.

The museum preserves the story of the 2024 uprising through immersive exhibits, including audio and video footage of the unrest, personal effects of protesters killed during the crackdown, contemporaneous newspaper clippings, and documentation of alleged systemic political repression that occurred during Hasina’s 15 years in power.

Rahman, the son of former prime minister Khaleda Zia and Hasina’s long-standing political archrival, won a landslide election victory in February 2025, in a vote administered by Yunus’ interim government. Hasina’s Awami League was blocked from participating in that electoral contest. The report on Hasina’s announcement was filed by contributing journalist Alam based in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Pakistan’s federal government has introduced sweeping new regulations governing international media reporting across most of the country, triggering fierce condemnation from journalist groups and press freedom advocates who warn the rules will further erode independent coverage and create fertile ground for disinformation.

Announced on Sunday under the official title of the *Foreign Media Facilitation Guidelines, 2026*, the new requirements mandate that every individual working for international media outlets — including Pakistani citizens, freelance contributors and local fixers — must obtain a government-issued No Objection Certificate (NOC) to report from any location outside of Pakistan’s three largest cities: Islamabad, Karachi, and Lahore. The policy leaves all on-the-ground reporting outside these major urban centers completely at the discretion of federal authorities.

The move comes as Pakistan already ranks 153rd out of 180 countries in the 2025 World Press Freedom Index, reflecting long-standing challenges to open journalism in the nation of 240 million people. Critics note that while media restrictions have a long history in Pakistan, domestic outlets have traditionally faced greater pressure than their international counterparts, which many Pakistanis rely on for unfiltered reporting on sensitive issues.

“These guidelines are tantamount to choking international media in an increasingly shrinking space,” said Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar, a prominent Pakistani political commentator. “The public looks at the international media for independent reporting. Placing restrictions simply creates more room for disinformation and spread of fake news.”

The regulations do not include any clear timeline for processing NOC applications, a gap that mirrors existing approval processes for foreign journalists. Many international correspondents have previously reported waiting months for NOC approval, or receiving no response at all — a delay that effectively blocks coverage of breaking news events from outside the three permitted cities. To avoid these bottlenecks, international outlets have long relied on Pakistani contributors based in or able to travel freely to regions like Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Pakistan-administered Kashmir; under the new rules, all of these contributors will now require official approval to work on stories.

Zaffar Abbas, veteran editor of Pakistan’s leading English-language newspaper *Dawn*, called the new rules “ridiculous restrictions and are totally unacceptable.” With more than four decades of journalistic experience in Pakistan spanning military dictatorships and authoritarian civilian governments, Abbas noted he has never encountered such sweeping limits on reporting. “To ask journalists to get an NOC for travelling outside the three major cities not just undermines freedom of movement but also freedom of the press,” he added.

In its official defense of the policy, the Pakistani government has rejected claims that the guidelines are intended to restrict reporting, framing the rules instead as a neutral “administrative mechanism” to verify media credentials, coordinate reporting requests, and facilitate access to restricted regions. Government officials further argue that any accreditation system must retain the authority to revoke credentials for journalists who engage in activity that threatens national security or public order.

The guidelines include a provision allowing authorities to revoke a journalist’s accreditation for “acts against ideology, sovereignty, security or public order of Pakistan” — a broadly worded clause that Khokhar has called “vague,” warning it opens the door to arbitrary enforcement against critical reporting.

Legal experts have also raised red flags about the policy’s legal foundation. Salhuddin Ahmed, a lawyer practicing before the Supreme Court of Pakistan, says the guidelines have no basis in statutory law. “These ‘guidelines’ are merely an executive order and lack any legal backing from statute,” Ahmed explained. “They refer to the rules of business; those rules are only meant to regulate the internal functioning of government, not create legal obligations on others. Quite clearly, these guidelines are a hastily and ill-thought-out attempt to further curb independent reporting in Pakistan.”
The government counters that the rules are a valid regulation of the Information Ministry’s External Publicity wing’s administrative relationship with foreign media, falling within the scope of existing government business rules.

Press freedom advocates, including a coalition of international journalists and the president of Pakistan’s Federal Union of Journalists, are currently working to arrange a meeting with Pakistan’s information minister to formally raise their objections to the new policy.

Observers have pointed to ongoing unrest in Pakistan-administered Kashmir (PAK) as a key trigger for the new restrictions. The region has seen two months of violent clashes between anti-government protesters and security forces that have left dozens dead, amid a local election boycott and sweeping internet shutdowns that have made independent verification of events extremely difficult.

Just one day after the new guidelines were announced, the External Publicity wing sent an urgent WhatsApp message to international media outlets ordering all journalists currently in PAK to “return back IMMEDIATELY” and apply for an NOC if they wish to report from the region. The message was sent after multiple major international outlets, including the BBC, published on-the-ground reports from the disputed territory.

Earlier this week, the Qatari news network Al Jazeera’s website became inaccessible to users within Pakistan after the Information Ministry labeled a correspondent’s report from PAK’s regional capital “yellow journalism” — a term referring to sensationalized, inaccurate reporting. No formal public ban on the outlet has been announced, however.

Kashmir is one of the world’s most long-standing disputed territories, with both India and Pakistan claiming full sovereignty over the region while each controls only a portion of it. Coverage of unrest in Pakistan-administered Kashmir has long been an extremely politically sensitive topic for the Pakistani government. Two local Pakistani journalists speaking to the BBC confirmed they had been explicitly warned by their editors to avoid covering the ongoing unrest.

BANGKOK, Associated Press – As diplomatic tensions simmer between the world’s two largest economies ahead of a planned high-level summit, China unveiled a suite of targeted countermeasures against the United States on Wednesday, responding directly to a series of recent restrictive actions rolled out by the Biden administration. The retaliatory package includes new export controls on drone technology and a formal trade ban targeting six U.S.-based entities, marking a sharp escalation in the ongoing bilateral economic and geopolitical standoff.

The rising friction comes even after earlier signs of detente: during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s May meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump in Beijing, the two leaders reached tentative consensus that was meant to ease strained ties, ahead of Xi’s expected official visit to the U.S. this September. Even so, recent unilateral actions from Washington have pushed Beijing to respond in kind, Chinese officials confirmed.

According to a statement released by China’s Ministry of Commerce, the latest countermeasures are a direct response to two recent U.S. actions: first, a ban on imports of Chinese drones issued by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, and second, the addition of 43 Chinese firms to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, a move that blocks imports of goods produced by those companies into the U.S.

The Commerce Ministry emphasized in its statement that Washington’s recent steps “seriously violate the important consensus reached by the two heads of state and severely damage China’s legitimate rights and interests.” The statement added that “China has no choice but to take necessary countermeasures in response,” while noting that Beijing has exercised deliberate restraint throughout the escalation. Beijing has called on Washington to immediately reverse its restrictive measures against Chinese entities and abandon what it calls its “erroneous practices.” The ministry also issued a clear warning: further retaliatory steps will be implemented if the U.S. rolls out any new restrictive policies targeting China.

Under the new drone export rules, Beijing now requires case-by-case security reviews for all exports of unmanned aerial vehicles, their core components, and related dual-use technologies that can be adapted for both civilian and military applications.

Six U.S. entities are barred from all trade and commercial dealings with Chinese entities, including New York-based biotechnology firm Applied DNA Sciences, Inc. and the non-governmental organization Human Rights in China. A seventh U.S.-based firm, Compliance Testing LLC, was also banned from operating in China; the Commerce Ministry stated that the company collaborated with the FCC on actions that “harm China’s sovereignty and security.”

In a separate regulatory move, China’s State Administration for Market Regulation announced that U.S.-based firms that conduct on-site factory inspections for China’s mandatory CCC (China Compulsory Certificate) safety certification will no longer be authorized to provide these services. CCC certification is required for all electronic products sold in the Chinese market to confirm they meet national safety standards, meaning U.S. electronics manufacturers seeking access to the Chinese market will now be required to hire third-party auditors based outside the U.S., or work with non-U.S. designated certification bodies.

The Commerce Ministry also revealed it has launched a national security probe into imported printing software and office equipment, though it declined to name specific companies affected by the investigation.

The latest escalation follows a series of recent U.S. restrictions targeting Chinese tech imports: In December 2024, the U.S. FCC implemented a ban on new Chinese drone imports, later revising the rule to allow a small number of specific models to enter the country. Just last week, the FCC also issued new import bans on foreign-made humanoid robots and power inverters, citing unaddressed national security risks – a policy that is widely understood to primarily target Chinese manufacturing exports.

The report was contributed by Leung from Hong Kong.