SEOUL // Behind some of the anonymous online appeals for pro-democracy protests in China that have worried the authoritarian government is a group of 20 mostly highly educated, internet savvy Chinese scattered inside and outside the country.
The online calls urging Chinese to stage peaceful protests to get the ruling Communist Party to move towards democracy have spooked the government into launching one of its broadest campaigns of repression in years to keep the protests from catching on, as they have in the Middle East and North Africa. Amid tight security, there have been few actual protests.
One group putting out the calls over the past seven weeks is a network of 20 mostly young Chinese, with eight members inside China and 12 in more than half a dozen other countries.
Calling itself "The Initiators and Organisers of the Chinese Jasmine Revolution" after a phrase used in the Tunisian uprising, the group is not the sole source of the protest calls; at least four others have sprung up. "The Initiators" group appears well-organised, with members assigned to recruit, manage social networking sites and gather feedback.
Interviews with four members show similar evolutions: they grew to resent the government's autocratic rule and China's widespread inequality and injustice. The uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt made change look possible.
One member, a lean, soft-spoken 22-year-old computer science student who goes by the online alias "Forest Intelligence" said during an interview at a cafe in Seoul: "People born in the late 1980s and the 1990s have basically decided that in their generation one-party rule cannot possibly outlive them, cannot possibly even continue in their lifetimes. This is for certain." While the calls for demonstrations every Sunday in dozens of cities have attracted many onlookers and few outright protesters, their impact is clear. The government has responded with more police on the streets, more intrusive internet monitoring and the detention, disappearance or arrest of more than 200 people. The group said none of those detained has been involved with their protest calls.
Members of the group requested anonymity out of concern that they or their families might be targeted for retribution by the government, which maintains an extensive network of informants among student groups overseas. Most members know each other only by their online nicknames.
They also are concerned that, with more than half their members outside China, their movement might be seen as a foreign-backed, anti-China plot rather than a response to real domestic problems.
"Hua Ge," a Columbia University graduate in classics who lives in New York and, at 27 years old, is one of the group's older members, and who recruited the others, said: "The revolution was started purely because of the failure of domestic affairs, not because of overseas forces."
The first online calls for a Chinese "Jasmine Revolution" - a Twitter post on February 17 and a longer appeal on the US-based Chinese news site Boxun.com on February 19 - remain anonymous. Soon after they appeared, "Hua Ge" said that he, together with a man in China he refused to identify, started the website Molihuaxingdong.blogspot.com.
"Molihuaxingdong" is Chinese for "Jasmine Movement" and it has evolved to include a Facebook page, a Twitter feed, and Google groups for every Chinese province or territory. Many of the sites are blocked in China, but remain effective because so many Chinese know how to elude government blocks, "Hua Ge" said.
"People need to have some change in their thinking," said "Hua Ge", a native of the city of Wuhan. "They don't really understand what rights they have, or what kind of political future they can choose."
Their main Google group has more than 1,200 users, although how many are inside China is unclear. An online survey posted in February received 300 responses, mostly from people in China, members said, and the group gets 50 to 100 e-mails daily from participants in the country. Outside China, members are in France, Australia, Canada, South Korea and Japan, among other countries. "Forest Intelligence" oversees the recruitment of volunteers and maintains the website. "Xiaomo," 24, a university student in Paris, collates comments from surveys. The Boston-based student "Pamela Wang", 18, translates news articles into Chinese and is one of eight administrators of the group's Facebook page.
The eight members in China include an expert in online search engines, a former government employee who writes articles and someone who works on the website's layout, said "Hua Ge".
He refused to provide their contact information or reveal details about them out of concern for their safety.
"Hua Ge" said the group has also consulted Wang Juntao, a dissident sentenced to 13 years in prison for advising students during the 1989 pro-democracy protests. Freed on medical parole in 1993, Mr Wang now lives in New York and confirmed his assistance. Collectively, the group's postings are often clever with a touch of sarcasm. People are urged to "stroll" and "smile" rather than protest. "We are making a new history of revolution by a unique way: we use the sound of laughter, singing and salutations instead of the sound of guns, cannons and warplanes!" a notice dated March 1 said.
The group has no illusions that change will come soon, but is willing to wait years to gather momentum.
"Some people say this movement is going to die and this movement is not going to be successful like that in Tunisia or Egypt, but in those countries, it took three or four years for the people to make preparations and finally, there was a peaceful transition," "Hua Ge" said. "It may take a period of time for the people to wake up, so the longer we continue our efforts the more people will know about the situation and join us."
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Ms Yang's top tips for parents new to the UAE
- Join parent networks
- Look beyond school fees
- Keep an open mind
Election pledges on migration
CDU: "Now is the time to control the German borders and enforce strict border rejections"
SPD: "Border closures and blanket rejections at internal borders contradict the spirit of a common area of freedom"
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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Cricket World Cup League 2
UAE squad
Rahul Chopra (captain), Aayan Afzal Khan, Ali Naseer, Aryansh Sharma, Basil Hameed, Dhruv Parashar, Junaid Siddique, Muhammad Farooq, Muhammad Jawadullah, Muhammad Waseem, Omid Rahman, Rahul Bhatia, Tanish Suri, Vishnu Sukumaran, Vriitya Aravind
Fixtures
Friday, November 1 – Oman v UAE
Sunday, November 3 – UAE v Netherlands
Thursday, November 7 – UAE v Oman
Saturday, November 9 – Netherlands v UAE
Plan to boost public schools
A major shake-up of government-run schools was rolled out across the country in 2017. Known as the Emirati School Model, it placed more emphasis on maths and science while also adding practical skills to the curriculum.
It was accompanied by the promise of a Dh5 billion investment, over six years, to pay for state-of-the-art infrastructure improvements.
Aspects of the school model will be extended to international private schools, the education minister has previously suggested.
Recent developments have also included the introduction of moral education - which public and private schools both must teach - along with reform of the exams system and tougher teacher licensing requirements.
More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Electoral College Victory
Trump has so far secured 295 Electoral College votes, according to the Associated Press, exceeding the 270 needed to win. Only Nevada and Arizona remain to be called, and both swing states are leaning Republican. Trump swept all five remaining swing states, North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, sealing his path to victory and giving him a strong mandate.
Popular Vote Tally
The count is ongoing, but Trump currently leads with nearly 51 per cent of the popular vote to Harris’s 47.6 per cent. Trump has over 72.2 million votes, while Harris trails with approximately 67.4 million.
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-final, first leg
Tottenham 0-1 Ajax, Tuesday
Second leg
Ajax v Tottenham, Wednesday, May 8, 11pm
Game is on BeIN Sports
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Company: Instabug
Founded: 2013
Based: Egypt, Cairo
Sector: IT
Employees: 100
Stage: Series A
Investors: Flat6Labs, Accel, Y Combinator and angel investors
The bio
His favourite book - 1984 by George Orwell
His favourite quote - 'If you think education is expensive, try ignorance' by Derek Bok, Former President of Harvard
Favourite place to travel to - Peloponnese, Southern Greece
Favourite movie - The Last Emperor
Favourite personality from history - Alexander the Great
Role Model - My father, Yiannis Davos
The specs
Engine: 0.8-litre four cylinder
Power: 70bhp
Torque: 66Nm
Transmission: four-speed manual
Price: $1,075 new in 1967, now valued at $40,000
On sale: Models from 1966 to 1970
Sam Smith
Where: du Arena, Abu Dhabi
When: Saturday November 24
Rating: 4/5
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The cost of Covid testing around the world
Egypt
Dh514 for citizens; Dh865 for tourists
Information can be found through VFS Global.
Jordan
Dh212
Centres include the Speciality Hospital, which now offers drive-through testing.
Cambodia
Dh478
Travel tests are managed by the Ministry of Health and National Institute of Public Health.
Zanzibar
AED 295
Zanzibar Public Health Emergency Operations Centre, located within the Lumumba Secondary School compound.
Abu Dhabi
Dh85
Abu Dhabi’s Seha has test centres throughout the UAE.
UK
From Dh400
Heathrow Airport now offers drive through and clinic-based testing, starting from Dh400 and up to Dh500 for the PCR test.
The biog
Age: 23
Occupation: Founder of the Studio, formerly an analyst at Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi
Education: Bachelor of science in industrial engineering
Favourite hobby: playing the piano
Favourite quote: "There is a key to every door and a dawn to every dark night"
Family: Married and with a daughter
How green is the expo nursery?
Some 400,000 shrubs and 13,000 trees in the on-site nursery
An additional 450,000 shrubs and 4,000 trees to be delivered in the months leading up to the expo
Ghaf, date palm, acacia arabica, acacia tortilis, vitex or sage, techoma and the salvadora are just some heat tolerant native plants in the nursery
Approximately 340 species of shrubs and trees selected for diverse landscape
The nursery team works exclusively with organic fertilisers and pesticides
All shrubs and trees supplied by Dubai Municipality
Most sourced from farms, nurseries across the country
Plants and trees are re-potted when they arrive at nursery to give them room to grow
Some mature trees are in open areas or planted within the expo site
Green waste is recycled as compost
Treated sewage effluent supplied by Dubai Municipality is used to meet the majority of the nursery’s irrigation needs
Construction workforce peaked at 40,000 workers
About 65,000 people have signed up to volunteer
Main themes of expo is ‘Connecting Minds, Creating the Future’ and three subthemes of opportunity, mobility and sustainability.
Expo 2020 Dubai to open in October 2020 and run for six months
More on Quran memorisation:
HIV on the rise in the region
A 2019 United Nations special analysis on Aids reveals 37 per cent of new HIV infections in the Mena region are from people injecting drugs.
New HIV infections have also risen by 29 per cent in western Europe and Asia, and by 7 per cent in Latin America, but declined elsewhere.
Egypt has shown the highest increase in recorded cases of HIV since 2010, up by 196 per cent.
Access to HIV testing, treatment and care in the region is well below the global average.
Few statistics have been published on the number of cases in the UAE, although a UNAIDS report said 1.5 per cent of the prison population has the virus.
Three tips from La Perle's performers
1 The kind of water athletes drink is important. Gwilym Hooson, a 28-year-old British performer who is currently recovering from knee surgery, found that out when the company was still in Studio City, training for 12 hours a day. “The physio team was like: ‘Why is everyone getting cramps?’ And then they realised we had to add salt and sugar to the water,” he says.
2 A little chocolate is a good thing. “It’s emergency energy,” says Craig Paul Smith, La Perle’s head coach and former Cirque du Soleil performer, gesturing to an almost-empty open box of mini chocolate bars on his desk backstage.
3 Take chances, says Young, who has worked all over the world, including most recently at Dragone’s show in China. “Every time we go out of our comfort zone, we learn a lot about ourselves,” she says.
World ranking (at month’s end)
Jan - 257
Feb - 198
Mar - 159
Apr - 161
May - 159
Jun – 162
Currently: 88
Year-end rank since turning pro
2016 - 279
2015 - 185
2014 - 143
2013 - 63
2012 - 384
2011 - 883
Specs
Engine: 51.5kW electric motor
Range: 400km
Power: 134bhp
Torque: 175Nm
Price: From Dh98,800
Available: Now
The specs
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo
Power: 398hp from 5,250rpm
Torque: 580Nm at 1,900-4,800rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto
Fuel economy, combined: 6.5L/100km
On sale: December
Price: From Dh330,000 (estimate)
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UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
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How to apply for a drone permit
- Individuals must register on UAE Drone app or website using their UAE Pass
- Add all their personal details, including name, nationality, passport number, Emiratis ID, email and phone number
- Upload the training certificate from a centre accredited by the GCAA
- Submit their request
What are the regulations?
- Fly it within visual line of sight
- Never over populated areas
- Ensure maximum flying height of 400 feet (122 metres) above ground level is not crossed
- Users must avoid flying over restricted areas listed on the UAE Drone app
- Only fly the drone during the day, and never at night
- Should have a live feed of the drone flight
- Drones must weigh 5 kg or less
FIXTURES
All games 6pm UAE on Sunday:
Arsenal v Watford
Burnley v Brighton
Chelsea v Wolves
Crystal Palace v Tottenham
Everton v Bournemouth
Leicester v Man United
Man City v Norwich
Newcastle v Liverpool
Southampton v Sheffield United
West Ham v Aston Villa
MATCH INFO
Borussia Dortmund 0
Bayern Munich 1 (Kimmich 43')
Man of the match: Joshua Kimmich (Bayern Munich)
Kill%20
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