Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
NORTH ASIA

Raising awareness of child abuse
Concerned that thousands of families would be left disenfranchised, educators in Hong Kong are calling on authorities to step up outreach efforts to ethnic minority communities to ensure they are aware of a proposed mandatory reporting system for child abuse.
On Nov. 20 – ahead of the government’s plans to enact the Mandatory Reporting of Child Abuse (MRR) Bill by next year – the Federation of Education Workers (FEW) also urged the city government to organize training and seminars tailored for the needs of the nearly 620,000 ethnic minority families that comprise its population.
“In the long run, the government should think about how to gradually instil the concept of child abuse prevention [among families in the city],” she told the South China Morning Post.
The bill, which was gazetted last June, would require certain groups (teachers, doctors, and social workers) that work closely with children to report suspected child abuse cases, both physical and psychological.
The proposed law was filed in the wake of a string of high-profile cases across the city, which soared 29 percent in the first half of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022.
Among these was the case of the Hong Kong Society for the Protection of Children in Mong Kok, where 34 staff were charged with 100 counts of abuse for slapping, hitting, and kicking toddlers under their care. One of the care workers was sentenced to 27 years in jail, the heaviest prison term imposed by the city’s courts so far in relation to the case.
Children’s groups like Save the Children see the passage of the MRR bill as a step in the right direction. Grenville Cross of the Child Protection Institute (Against Child Abuse) said this would also help fill the gaps in Hong Kong’s existing anti-child cruelty law, which “works well enough when children are physically abused, but it falls down when it comes to psychological abuse.”
Anticipating a surge in child abuse cases if and when the law is passed, Save The Children urged the government to provide adequate resources and manpower to ensure the law is fully implemented.
SOUTHEAST ASIA

Still searching for justice for flight victims
Nearly a decade since the ill-fated Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 went missing during a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014, the families of those left behind continue to seek closure and answers for the disappearance of the passengers on board.
On Nov. 27, over 40 Chinese relatives penned an open letter to Malaysia’s prime minister Anwar Ibrahim urging a renewed investigation into the missing aircraft, which so far has not surfaced save for a few pieces of debris.
“Our family members hope to search for flight MH370 on our own,” they said in the letter. “[We] are willing to invest their own money or cooperate with capable individuals and companies.”
The letter comes as a Beijing court hears their appeal for compensation amounting to 10 million yuan (US$1.4 million) to 80 million yuan (US$11.2 million), as well as moral damages of 30 million yuan (US$4.2 million) to 40 million yuan (US$5.6 million).
The damages are sought against Malaysia Airlines, the aircraft manufacturer Boeing, engine maker Rolls Royce, and Allianz insurance group.
It is not clear what enforcement power China has over the cases should its court rule in favor of the plaintiffs. Similar cases filed in the United States by the victims’ families were dismissed by the courts, saying these lawsuits were within the jurisdiction of Malaysia’s legal system.
The 40 families who have filed lawsuits in China have declined a settlement agreement with Malaysian Airlines, which offered the signatories 2.5 million yuan ($350,000) in compensation.
“On our long journey seeking the truth, many families fell into a tough livelihood or even survival situation. They settled as a last resort to ensure their lives,” said one of the plaintiffs, Jiang Hui, whose mother was onboard the flight. “But no matter having settled or not, our ultimate goal remains the same – which is to find the plane and our loved ones.”
SOUTH ASIA

A difficult call
Instead of isolating the Taliban when it comes to climate discussions – given the lack of international recognition for Afghanistan’s de facto government – global bodies, notably the United Nations, and donor governments should “consider whether climate change is an issue where they might work in concert to make progress with Kabul.”
In a commentary for the International Crisis Group, analysts Graeme Smith and Ulrich Eberle urged donor governments to carefully weigh the repercussions of excluding Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers from climate talks against the extreme challenges confronting Afghanistan – ranked 7th in the 2021 Notre Dame Country Index measuring states’ vulnerability to climate change and readiness/resilience.
The article, prompted by the upcoming 28th Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai (Nov. 30-Dec. 12), argued in part why an exclusionary approach to the Taliban – which forcibly took power in 2021 after U.S. troops left Afghanistan – in the face of formidable global climate challenges “is understandable but unrealistic from a humanitarian perspective.”
“If Afghanistan’s rivers dry up and its crops wither, the humanitarian implications will be terrible, and the effects will be felt outside the country’s borders,” they warned. “Mass migration, reduced river flows and conflict fuelled by resource scarcity – these and other scenarios could significantly affect other parts of the world.”
Smith and Eberle said the Taliban appeared to have lost the chance to participate in COP28. Foreign governments hesitate to grant even a semblance of legitimacy to the militant group. Since they took over Kabul in 2021, donors have suspended development aid to Kabul, affecting 32 environmental programs worth over $800 million.
Rising temperatures in the country are also melting the snowpack and glaciers in its mountains, particularly in the Hindu-Kush-Himalayas mountain range, causing dangerous glacial lake outburst flooding in the region.
It is also under the throes of a three-yearlong drought that started in 2020, worsening a water crisis that’s already affected by the conflict and poor water management by the Taliban.
On their exclusion from the COP28, the Taliban said climate change talks needed to be divorced from politics and that Afghanistan should receive international assistance for their own resilience efforts.
GLOBAL/REGIONAL

Bridging the learning gap
Asia and the Pacific’s parliamentarians have urged a united front to tackle the region’s worsening education crisis, in part by establishing new learning tools and recovery systems that are more responsive to the changing times.
In a joint resolution adopted during the 31st Asia-Pacific Parliamentary Forum (APPF) on Nov. 23 to 26, the region’s lawmakers took cognizance of the need to ensure equitable access to education “especially considering the impact of Covid-19” on their learning.
The Forum’s participating countries are: Laos, South Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Fiji, Ecuador, Colombia, China, Chile, Costa Rica, Canada, United States, Thailand, Singapore, Russia, Philippines Peru, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand, Mongolia, Micronesia, Mexico, Marshall Islands and Malaysia.
Their collective call comes amid growing challenges in the region’s education system post-pandemic, as prolonged school closures, disrupted learning, and limited access to technology have collectively contributed to a learning crisis affecting its 1.2 billion children.
As a result, students in developing Asia are believed to have lost 30 percent of their formative learning years. As of 2023, nine out of 10 children in low-income countries do not have basic literacy and numeracy skills.
The crisis is particularly severe in countries like the Philippines, where nine out of 10 Filipino students aged 10 are unable to read and understand age-appropriate reading material, according to a 2023 World Bank (WB) report on the quality of education in the region.
These figures do not bode well for the region’s efforts to achieve the U.N. Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4, which seeks “inclusive and equitable quality education” for children by 2030. In 2021, the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and U.N. Children’s Agency published a report noting that disadvantaged groups like minorities, displaced and disabled children “continue to be left behind due to discrimination, inadequate policies to mitigate exclusion, and inequitable budget allocation.”
The parliamentarians cited the “urgency of implementing effective and responsive learning recovery measures” as well as “building resilient education systems” that are better equipped to handle shocks like the pandemic and climate change.