标签： Asia

What started as a throwaway online joke has snowballed into a viral youth-driven movement that is set to take its first step from digital feeds to physical streets in India’s capital this weekend. The Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), which has collected millions of young followers across social media platforms in just three weeks, will hold its first public demonstration Saturday at New Delhi’s iconic Jantar Mantar, a historic site long favored for political protests. The gathering marks the movement’s first major test: whether its explosive online popularity can translate into tangible on-the-ground grassroots mobilization around widespread youth frustration over stagnant economic prospects, scarce jobs, and a failing education system.

The unexpected origins of the movement trace back to a controversial comment from India’s Chief Justice Surya Kant back in May. During a public hearing, the justice compared unemployed youth and government critics to cockroaches, sparking immediate backlash from young Indians already frustrated by limited opportunity. Abhijeet Dipke, a political communications strategist and Boston University student originally from India, seized on the insulting label to launch a parody political party, rebranding the cockroach as a badge of resilience rather than an insult.

The movement’s growth has been staggering. Within just seven days of launching its website and social media profiles, CJP’s Instagram page alone amassed more than 15 million followers, and the movement’s reach has only expanded since. Its supporters proudly call themselves “cockroaches,” leaning into self-deprecating, satirical humor that masks sharp political criticism. Content shared across CJP channels — from memes to short videos — skewers widespread corruption, systemic unemployment, and long-standing political dysfunction in India. Supporters lean into the joke: they openly describe themselves as unemployed, chronically online, and locked out of meaningful political power, but beneath the punchlines lies a serious critique of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling government. CJP supporters argue that ordinary young Indians have been left with far fewer economic and social opportunities than promised by current leadership.

Young people make up more than 25% of India’s total population, and many have grown increasingly disillusioned with traditional political institutions. Critics of Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) point to rising religious polarization, widening economic inequality, and mounting cost-of-living pressures as core sources of discontent that have fueled CJP’s rapid rise.

Dipke, the movement’s founder, is set to return to New Delhi from the United States Saturday morning to lead the demonstration, with local authorities already preparing for his arrival: steel barricades have been installed at the arrivals area of New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport ahead of his landing.

Organizers have rallied supporters online for weeks ahead of the protest, with a core demand that Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan step down. The call for his resignation grew out of a May exam irregularity scandal that quickly expanded into a broader reckoning with India’s underfunded, unequal education system and its connection to persistent youth unemployment. Participants have been instructed to bring only two items: India’s national flag, and a book, which CJP says symbolizes the universal right to education and equal opportunity for all. Organizers have also repeatedly stressed that the demonstration must remain peaceful, and urged attendees to avoid any confrontation with law enforcement. On Friday, the official CJP account on X posted a defiant call to action: “Time to turn this tiny joke into a revolution.”

Skeptics, most notably supporters of the ruling BJP, have dismissed CJP as nothing more than a fleeting social media gimmick. They argue that the movement’s massive online following will not translate to large street turnout, and that its viral rise will fade as quickly as it began.

Even beyond questions of turnout, the movement faces significant structural barriers. Over the decade that Modi has held office, Indian authorities have repeatedly moved to suppress anti-government dissent, cracking down on high-profile protests ranging from demonstrations against a controversial citizenship law to the year-long farmers’ protests that brought parts of north India to a standstill. Many protest organizers and activists have faced legal action, and hundreds have been arrested on vague or politically motivated charges, part of what critics call a broader campaign to eliminate opposition to the Modi government.

CJP’s rapid ascent is not an isolated incident: it mirrors a growing regional trend across South Asia, where social media-born youth movements have increasingly led large-scale anti-government uprisings. In recent years, similar movements have powered the overthrow of sitting governments in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, and fueled sustained unrest in Nepal, signaling a shifting landscape of political dissent led by young, digitally native populations.

While it remains unclear how many demonstrators will turn out for Saturday’s protest, the gathering will serve as a critical early indicator of whether what began as an online joke can grow into a sustained political force that challenges the status quo in the world’s largest democracy.

Within hours of being sworn in for his fourth term as Slovenia’s prime minister, Janez Jansa has upended the small European nation’s Middle East policy, starting with the immediate removal of the Palestinian flag that had flown outside Ljubljana’s central government building for two years.

The swift, symbolic action immediately telegraphed a dramatic pro-Israel reversal for Slovenia, under a new leader long known for his close alignment with former U.S. President Donald Trump and hardline Israeli leadership. In a post to the social platform X on Friday, Jansa framed his administration’s approach as a “responsible” foreign policy “rooted in facts” — language widely interpreted as a deliberate rebuke of the previous government’s outspoken condemnation of Israeli actions in Gaza and commitment to upholding international law.

Jansa’s pro-Israel stance is no new development. He has spent months criticizing his center-left predecessor Robert Golob, labeling the previous government’s formal recognition of Palestinian statehood illegal, openly endorsing Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, and repeating the unwavering mantra: “We stand with Israel”. He has also repeatedly called for relocating Slovenia’s Israeli embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a step that would directly contradict longstanding international consensus and international legal rulings that designate East Jerusalem as occupied Palestinian territory.

The policy shift has been met with swift celebration from Israeli officials. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar personally thanked Jansa for the move and announced that Israel would open its first resident embassy in Ljubljana “without delay”.

The reversal marks a stark break from the previous Golob administration, which held office for four years and emerged as one of the most outspoken European critics of Israel’s military actions in Gaza. Over 73,500 Palestinians have been killed in the besieged enclave since the escalation of conflict in October 2023, according to local health authorities. Golob repeatedly accused Israel of violating international law and perpetrating “clear genocidal acts” against Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Under his leadership, Slovenia became the first European Union member state to implement a full ban on all weapons trade with Israel, a move Golob defended as a moral obligation for responsible global powers.

“People in Gaza are dying because humanitarian aid is systematically denied to them. They are dying under the rubble, without access to drinking water, food and basic medical care,” Golob stated when announcing the ban. “This is a complete denial of humanitarian access and a deliberate prevention of basic conditions for survival. In such circumstances, it is the duty of every responsible state to take action, even if it means taking a step ahead of others.”

In May 2024, Slovenia joined Spain, Ireland and Norway to formally recognize Palestinian statehood, becoming one of the few Western European nations to take the step. The Golob administration went further in July 2025, imposing targeted sanctions on far-right Israeli government ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich, and putting in place a travel ban on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces an active arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Reacting to the removal of the Palestinian flag, Golob told Slovenian daily newspaper Dnevnik that the new government’s very first official action “says more than a thousand words”. He argued the flag had stood not only as a symbol of solidarity with the Palestinian people, but as a representation of core values: justice, human dignity, compassion, humanity and peace. Golob condemned the policy reversal, saying it would write Slovenia onto a “shameful page of history”.

Analysts expect Jansa to roll back nearly all of the previous government’s pro-Palestine policies in the coming weeks, with the formal revocation of Slovenia’s recognition of Palestinian statehood high on the new administration’s agenda.

In a high-profile display of advancing military ambitions just days before Chinese President Xi Jinping’s scheduled visit to Pyongyang, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has overseen sea trials of a recently repaired 5,000-ton guided-missile destroyer and doubled down on pledges to build out a nuclear-capable navy, according to state-run media reports released Saturday.

The vessel in question, the Kang Kon, underwent operational capability tests on Thursday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) confirmed. Kim was joined during his inspection by his teenage daughter Kim Ju Ae, whose growing public presence has reinforced widespread speculation among South Korean intelligence officials that she is being prepared as Kim Jong Un’s eventual successor.

During his remarks to military personnel and shipbuilders, Kim emphasized an urgent push to accelerate naval modernization, framing a robust nuclear-armed maritime force as a core pillar of North Korea’s overall nuclear deterrence strategy. He stressed that the country’s navy must be equipped to deliver a lethal, unpredictable strike against rival forces both on and beneath the sea at any time. The expansion of naval capabilities, Kim noted, is a central priority outlined in the five-year defense development plan adopted by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea at its congress earlier this year. That blueprint, he added, calls for constructing larger 10,000-ton-class destroyers and advancing development of classified underwater weapons systems.

Notably, the KCNA report did not include direct commentary from Kim on North Korea’s longstanding regional rivals, the United States and South Korea, even as tensions over Pyongyang’s nuclear program remain high and inter-Korean diplomatic engagement remains frozen.

The reveal of the warship trials comes on the heels of two linked developments that have underscored shifting regional geopolitics: the official confirmation of Xi Jinping’s Monday visit to North Korea, and the recent unveiling of what South Korea’s military assesses is a new uranium enrichment facility for nuclear weapons production. During his visit to that undisclosed site, Kim pledged to grow North Korea’s nuclear arsenal “at an exponential rate,” a declaration that experts interpret as a deliberate move to solidify Pyongyang’s status as a recognized nuclear weapons state ahead of high-level talks with Beijing. Xi’s upcoming trip marks a key step in China’s efforts to strengthen diplomatic and economic ties with its isolated, nuclear-armed neighbor, at a time when Kim has increasingly deepened his military and political alignment with Russia, including the provision of troops and military hardware to support Moscow’s campaign in Ukraine.

The Kang Kon is the second 5,000-ton-class destroyer North Korea has unveiled since 2023, following the launch of the Choe Hyon. Kim previously celebrated the Choe Hyon’s development as a transformative step that extends the operational range and preemptive strike capacity of North Korea’s nuclear force. State media says both vessels are engineered to carry a full suite of weaponry, including anti-aircraft systems, anti-ship missiles, and nuclear-capable ballistic and cruise missiles. However, independent defense analysts have raised persistent questions about the ships’ actual operational effectiveness.

The Kang Kon’s journey to sea trials has been marked by setback: the vessel suffered significant damage during a botched launch ceremony at the northeastern port of Chongjin in May 2023, a failure Kim publicly condemned as “criminal.” Pyongyang announced the ship had been repaired and relaunched in June 2023, but outside experts continue to cast doubt on whether it is fully combat-ready. Despite the setback, Kim has already ordered the construction of two additional 5,000-ton-class destroyers to expand the navy’s conventional and nuclear strike capacity.

Aboard Air Force One, U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed Friday that a potential phone conversation with Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te remains on the table, pushing back against explicit public pressure from Beijing to scrap any direct high-level engagement between the two leaders. China has long claimed the self-governing, democratic island of Taiwan as an inalienable part of its territory, and has repeatedly warned Washington against formal interactions with Taipei’s leadership.

The possibility of a call first emerged last month, shortly after Trump concluded his summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. At that time, Trump tied the potential dialogue to his ongoing deliberation over whether to approve a $14 billion arms sales package to Taiwan, which was greenlit by the U.S. Congress earlier in the year. When pressed by reporters Friday on whether he still planned to connect with Lai, Trump responded definitively: “I’ll always talk to him.”

A direct call between sitting U.S. and Taiwanese presidents would break a decades-long diplomatic precedent, making it a highly provocative step in the eyes of Beijing. This week, the Chinese Embassy in Washington issued a formal statement to the Associated Press warning that such a conversation would erode hard-won progress in fragile U.S.-China bilateral ties. The embassy urged the Trump administration to “handle the Taiwan question with utmost prudence” and avoid sending what it called “wrong signals” to Taipei.

This is not the first time Trump has drawn sharp condemnation from Beijing over cross-strait interactions. Immediately after his 2016 presidential election victory and before his inauguration, Trump accepted a congratulatory phone call from Taiwan’s then-President Tsai Ing-wen, a move that immediately upended decades of unspoken diplomatic protocol around cross-strait relations.

Today, Trump’s open discussion of a call with Lai comes amid lingering uncertainty over the fate of the pending arms deal. During his Beijing summit, Xi Jinping emphasized to Trump that the Taiwan question is the single most sensitive core issue in U.S.-China relations, warning that mismanagement of the dispute could lead to direct clashes and open conflict between the two global powers, per Chinese official readouts of the meeting. Trump has previously framed the approved arms sales as a “negotiating chip” in the administration’s broader Indo-Pacific policy strategy, leaving unclear whether he will ultimately greenlight the transfer.

Analysts note that Trump’s willingness to consult China on the Taiwan arms sale marks a departure from longstanding U.S. policy guidelines known as the Six Assurances, first established under the Reagan administration in 1982. The second of these nonbinding principles explicitly states that the U.S. would not agree to consult the People’s Republic of China on arms sales to Taiwan. While Secretary of State Marco Rubio reaffirmed during congressional hearings earlier this week that official U.S. policy toward Taiwan remains unchanged, experts say Trump’s public rhetoric has injected unprecedented uncertainty into cross-strait dynamics.

“Trump’s comments about framing Taiwan arms sales as a negotiating chip, combined with the uncertainty around a possible call with Lai, have created far more ambiguity than Taipei is comfortable with,” explained Craig Singleton, a China specialist at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “The real test will not be rhetoric — it will be whether the pending arms package moves forward, and on what timeline.”

For his part, Lai has made clear he is prepared to take the call if it happens. The Taiwanese leader has stated that he would use the conversation to stress that cross-strait peace and stability is a critical pillar of global security, and would argue that China’s increasingly aggressive military and diplomatic moves around the island are the primary threat to regional calm. Lai would also note that Taiwan’s growing defense budget and planned purchase of U.S. arms are defensive measures designed to deter aggression and maintain cross-strait stability, he has said.

Diplomatic context for the current standoff dates back to 1979, when the U.S. switched formal diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing under the One China policy, which acknowledges Beijing’s position that Taiwan is part of Chinese territory. The U.S. maintains informal non-diplomatic relations with Taiwan, and has committed through the Taiwan Relations Act to provide Taipei with the defensive arms needed to maintain its security, while deliberately keeping ambiguous the question of whether it would intervene militarily if China launched an invasion of the island. Past high-level U.S. engagements with Taiwanese leaders have drawn fierce pushback from Beijing: after then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi led a congressional delegation to Taipei in 2022, China responded with large-scale military exercises that included launching short-range ballistic missiles over the island.

After Trump’s Friday comments, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office — Taiwan’s de facto embassy in Washington — reaffirmed its commitment to maintaining close ongoing coordination with the U.S. on arms sales and other key issues. “We will leave it up to the U.S. to announce if there’s any arrangements for President Trump to speak with President Lai,” the office said in a formal statement.

Edgard Kagan, a former senior State Department East Asia policy official and U.S. ambassador to Malaysia who now holds the China Studies chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, noted that Beijing views a potential Trump-Lai call as even more provocative than moving forward with the proposed arms sale. Kagan added that it is notable Trump continues to publicly float the possibility of a call even after receiving explicit warnings from Chinese leaders.

Kagan laid out a potential strategic path forward for the administration: if Trump chooses to forgo the call, it could create diplomatic space to approve the arms sales while minimizing backlash from Beijing. “This could give him the room to announce an arms sale, defuse criticism that the U.S. is turning its back on Taiwan, and do it in a way that leaves the Chinese feeling there was some respect for their views,” Kagan explained.

Reporter Madhani contributed reporting from Washington.