The Cambodian government reported the signing Thursday of a public-private partnership contract with China worth $1.15 billion to fund Cambodia’s Funan Techo Canal project.

The ambitious project was launched last year but work stopped soon after groundbreaking amid questions over funding for the 151 kilometer (94 mile)-long canal that would link a branch of the Mekong River to a port on the Gulf of Thailand.

Prime Minister Hun Manet posted on Facebook that he met with Wang Tong Zhou, president of the China Communications Construction Company to discuss the construction of the canal. Senate President Hun Sen also posted that in his meeting with the Chinese president, Xi voiced support for the project.

Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chanthol said on Facebook that the two sides signed five agreements, including the public-private partnership contract, a shareholder agreement, an investment agreement, an engineering, procurement and construction contract, and an operation and maintenance contract.

Cambodia’s state-run Agence Kampuchea Presse said Cambodia investors hold a 51% stake and Chinese investors 49%. The participating companies include Cambodia’s Overseas Cambodia Investment Corporation, Phnom Penh Autonomous Port, Sihanoukville Autonomous Port and China Road and Bridge Corporation. It said the project would support 50,000 direct and indirect jobs, and planned completion is by 2028.

Groundbreaking for the canal on Aug. 5, 2024 – longtime leader Hun Sen’s birthday – but the project appears to have made little headway since then.

The canal, which would run from near the capital Phnom Penh to the Gulf of Thailand coast, would reduce Cambodian dependence on Vietnamese ports for sea trade. But the project has raised concerns in Vietnam where the rice-growing Mekong delta is vulnerable to sea water incursions if the flow of fresh water down the Mekong and into the delta is reduced because of the canal.

Kim Sok, a spokesperson for the Cambodian National Resistance Council, a group formed by prominent exiled opponents of Hun Sen, told RFA the government is trying to get China to help complete the Funan Canal before the 2028 general elections in Cambodia.

The Chinese president left Cambodia on Friday, returning to Beijing after a five-day regional swing with earlier stops in Vietnam and Malaysia.

On the trip, Xi sought to present China as a dependable trading partner for Southeast Asia at a time when governments there are worried about the impact of increased U.S. tariffs on their exports.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Khmer.

The Panama Canal has become a focal point of geopolitical tension, as China’s involvement in its ports raises U.S. concerns over control and influence in a key global trade route.

U.S. President Donald Trump repeatedly said that the United States is being overcharged to use the Panama Canal and that China has influence over its operations.

Speaking at a ribbon cutting for a new U.S.-funded dock at the Vasco Nuñez de Balboa Naval Base after a meeting with Panama’s President José Raúl Mulino, Hegseth said the U.S. will not allow China or any other country to threaten the canal’s operations.

“To this end, the United States and Panama have done more in recent weeks to strengthen our defence and security cooperation than we have in decades,” he said.

China-based companies, Hegseth said, continue to control critical infrastructure in the canal area.

“That gives China the potential to conduct surveillance activities across Panama. This makes Panama and the United States less secure, less prosperous and less sovereign. And as President Donald Trump has pointed out, that situation is not acceptable.”

In response to Hegseth’s remarks, the Chinese embassy in Panama slammed the U.S. government in a statement on X.

It said the U.S. has used “blackmail” to further its own interests and that who Panama carries out business with is a “sovereign decision of Panama … and something the U.S. doesn’t have the right to interfere in.”

“The US has carried out a sensationalistic campaign about the ‘theoretical Chinese threat’ in an attempt to sabotage Chinese-Panamanian cooperation, which is all just rooted in the United States’ own geopolitical interests,” the embassy said.

(Matias Delacroix/AP)

There have been growing calls in Washington for action to loosen Beijing’s influence stemming from Chinese and Hong Kong companies’ control over ports in Panama and elsewhere in the Western hemisphere.

China and the U.S. are also waging a tit-for-tat trade battle, which threatens to stunt the global economy. The U.S. now imposes a 104% tariff on Chinese imports after a series of tariff hikes this year.

On Feb. 3, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio threatened the Panamanian leader with potential American retaliation if his country didn’t immediately reduce Chinese influence over the canal.

The Panamanian government said that it was auditing the lease held by the Hong Kong consortium, which operates ports at both ends of the canal, and late on Monday concluded that there were irregularities.

The Hong Kong consortium, however, had already announced that CK Hutchison Holdings would be selling its controlling stake in the ports to a consortium including BlackRock Inc., effectively putting the ports under American control once the sale is complete.

​CK Hutchison Holdings, a Hong Kong-based conglomerate, has operated the Balboa and Cristóbal ports at the Pacific and Atlantic ends of the Panama Canal through its subsidiary, Panama Ports Company, since the late 1990s.

In March 2025, CK Hutchison agreed to sell a 90% stake in Panama Ports Company to a consortium led by U.S. investment firm BlackRock Inc., as part of a US$22.8 billion deal that includes control over 43 ports in 23 countries.

At that time, Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee said concerns about the deal “deserve serious attention,” possibly hinting at some form of legal action.

“We oppose the abusive use of coercion or bullying tactics in international, economic and trade relations,” Lee told journalists in Hong Kong. The Chinese territory would handle any commercial transaction “according to the law,” he said.

“The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government urges foreign governments to provide a fair and just environment for enterprises, including enterprises from Hong Kong,” Lee said.

Edited by Mike Firn and Stephen Wright.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Taejun Kang for RFA.

In his first speech to a joint session of Congress in his second term, Trump once again threatened to annex the Panama Canal. Juan González, co-host of Democracy Now!, fact-checks some of the lies that Trump used to justify U.S. control of the Panama Canal. In his address, Trump claimed 38,000 Americans were killed during the creation of the Panama Canal. In reality, the vast majority of the labor force that built the canal was from the West Indies, largely Barbados. Over 5,600 laborers died, but only about 300 U.S.-born workers died. “No matter how many times you repeat a lie, it still doesn’t make it true,” says González.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is visiting Latin America on his first foreign trip in his new post. One of his stops is Panama, where President Trump has threatened to invade and take over control of the critical trade route of the Panama Canal in response to its growing ties to China. It is a deeply unpopular proposition in Panama, seen as a “reversion to the mid-20th century imperial encroachment that Panama so intentionally confronted over the course of the Canal transition.” It is also, “on a logistical level,” essentially “impossible,” according to Panama City-based scholar Miriam Pensack. In what Pensack calls a “troubling” development, Panama has announced it will more closely cooperate with Trump’s policing of migration from Central America to the United States as a diplomatic concession to his threats.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

After touring the canal and meeting with Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino, Rubio called China’s influence in the Panama Canal a “violation” of the treaty under which the United States handed over control of the waterway to Panama.

“Absent immediate changes, it would require the United States to take measures necessary to protect its rights,” Rubio said according to a State Department statement.

What have Trump and Mulino said?

During his inaugural address on Jan. 20, Trump said that “China is operating the Panama Canal. And we didn’t give it to China. We gave it to Panama, and we’re taking it back.”

In response, Mulino said on Jan. 22 that the canal is “is and will continue to be Panama’s.”

“Panama is moving forward. Panama is not distracted by these kinds of statements,” Mulino said at the Davos Forum in Switzerland. “Over time, we have been an ally and friend of the United States; partners in large part in important benefits, not only through the Canal, but also participants, being the main user of the Canal, transporting goods to and from the United States.”

“One cannot ignore public international law,” he said. “So, I think that does not concern me, because that is strictly impossible in law.”

Does China control the Panama Canal?

The United States invaded Panama in 1989, overthrowing then-President Manuel Noriega –- a one-time U.S. ally who was later targeted for his role as an international drug kingpin. The canal was handed over to Panama in 1999 under a treaty signed by President Jimmy Carter in 1977.

Any nation is allowed to use the transoceanic waterway, which lifts massive cargo vessels above sea level through a series of interconnected locks and back down again, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

Beijing says it has no control over the running of the canal, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told journalists on Jan. 22.

“We agree with Panamanian President Mulino that Panama’s sovereignty and independence are not negotiable and the canal is not directly or indirectly controlled by any major power,” Mao told a regular news conference in Beijing.

“China does not participate in the management and operation of the canal and never interferes in canal affairs,” she said. “We always respect Panama’s sovereignty over the canal and recognize the canal as a permanently neutral international waterway.”

However, Panama granted a concession to operate the ports of Balboa and Cristobal, on the Pacific and Atlantic sides of the Canal, to Hutchison-Whampoa in 1996, which is owned by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing and has since been merged into his CK Hutchison Holdings.

The U.S. government has previously said it does not believe that the concession represented a threat to the canal.

“Several entities of the U.S. Government, including the Federal Maritime Commission and the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, have researched this issue extensively and have not uncovered any evidence to support a conclusion that the People’s Republic of China will be in a position to control Canal operations,” according to the Department of State FAQ on the canal.

The neutrality of the Canal and its operations are guaranteed by the Neutrality Treaty and associated protocols, to which 36 other countries are party, it said.

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What is the extent of Chinese influence in Panama?

While attempts by Chinese state-owned enterprises to acquire ports in Latin America have been largely unsuccessful, Li Ka-shing’s expansion in the region has been unimpeded.

In 2017, Panama severed diplomatic ties with democratic Taiwan and established relations with the People’s Republic of China, becoming the first Latin American country to join President Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road global supply chain and infrastructure program.

The move paved the way for Chinese companies -- both private and state-owned -- to plow hundreds of millions of dollars into a new cruise terminal and a bridge across the canal.

Li, probably Hong Kong’s most famous businessman, has been courted by Beijing since the 1997 handover of Hong Kong to Chinese rule. He has close connections to the highest levels of leadership, and has been received by past Presidents Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao.

The U.S. investigation into Li’s Panama Canal concession in 1999 concluded that it was largely safe from Chinese influence because of Hong Kong’s status as a separate trading jurisdiction from the rest of China.

That separate status -- called into question as China stepped up its political control over the city in the wake of mass popular protests -- was officially revoked under the last Trump administration through an executive order in July 2020, which said the city was “no longer sufficiently autonomous to justify differential treatment in relation to the People’s Republic of China.”

So what is Li Ka-shing’s international role?

In 1991, when Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing’s CK Hutchison acquired Britain’s biggest seaport at Felixstowe, the city’s rags-to-riches tycoon was just getting started.

Now, he heads a multinational cargo port empire with operations in 53 ports in 24 countries in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Latin America.

(ANTHONY WALLACE, Anthony Wallac/AFP)

Experts say Li is trusted both by Beijing and the wider international community, and that his ventures are seen as a way for China to bring influence to bear, but without making it too obvious.

While not all of Li’s corporate investments can be seen as a disguised form of Chinese diplomacy, many of his Latin American ventures are ports in highly strategic locations, often in countries that initially lacked diplomatic ties with Beijing, according to Hong Kong political scientist Simon Shen.

Many of the countries Li invests in once recognized the Republic of China on Taiwan rather than the People’s Republic of China. Yet the pace of his investments slowed once Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou -- who advocates warm ties with Beijing -- took power.

Investments made by Li haven’t typically set off many alarm bells in the corridors of Western governments; CK Hutchison has won contracts that a Chinese state-owned enterprise could only dream of.

But according to Shen, complaints were emerging in U.S. right-wing media of Chinese influence in the Panama Canal as early as 2011.

Those concerns have now become mainstream under the Trump administration.

What does this mean for Hong Kong?

Hong Kong’s shift from an international free port to a city that is increasingly run along mainland Chinese lines has led to a change in attitudes to the activities of its business community.

“Hong Kong isn’t the city it was back in the day -- it is a Chinese port,” Taiwanese national security research Shih Chien-yu told RFA Cantonese in a recent interview. “Naturally, other countries are going to have doubts.”

According to Hong Kong entrepreneur Herbert Chow, the ongoing crackdown on political dissent in Hong Kong is coming back to bite its companies, which are now more likely to be viewed as Chinese.

He said China should consider making some concessions, including releasing jailed media tycoon Jimmy Lai, to boost the city’s international image.

“So many Hong Kong businesses have gone to Southeast Asia now to put down roots and break away from the politically sensitive connection to China,” Chow said.

CK Hutchison was invited to respond to this article, but hadn’t replied by the time of writing.

Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Ha Syut.

It was a cold day in Washington, DC, on Tuesday when Donald Trump was sworn in for his second stint as President of the United States of America.

On account of freezing temperatures, the inauguration ceremony was moved indoors to the Capitol Rotunda, and the weather became a primary focus of much pre-inauguration media commentary.

The Reuters news agency reported that this was “one of the coldest inauguration days the US has experienced in the past few decades”, while also providing other crucial ceremony updates such as that “Mike Tyson snacked on a banana in the overflow room”.

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I, myself, watched the event on my computer in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, where it is precisely the opposite of cold and where I have spent the past several days battling the scorpion population that has taken up residence in my house.

By the end of Trump’s swearing-in, however, I was undecided as to what was less pleasant: killing scorpions or watching the next episode of American dystopia unfold.

I tuned in at 11am, meaning I had a full hour before Trump took centre stage; for much of this time, the audience in the rotunda was treated to musical selections befitting a carousel or a circus.

The frigid weather outside was, meanwhile, at least probably good practice for life on Mars, a territory Trump would soon claim for the United States during his inaugural speech: “And we will pursue our manifest destiny into the stars, launching American astronauts to plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.”

Not the only territorial conquest
This, to be sure, was not the only territorial conquest Trump promised. He also reiterated his determination to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” as well as to seize control of the Panama Canal because “American ships are being severely overcharged and not treated fairly in any way, shape, or form”.

But the Mars comments earned a maniacal grin from one person in the audience: the gazillionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk, known for such ideas as that the “next really big thing is to build a self-sustaining city on Mars and bring the animals and creatures of Earth there”.

Musk was one of various representatives of the earthly super-elite who — unlike poor Mike Tyson — made the cut for a spot in the rotunda. Also present were Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, and Shou Zi Chew, the CEO of TikTok.

As Al Jazeera noted the day prior to the inauguration, Apple CEO Tim Cook reportedly donated $1 million to the ceremony, while “Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta have said they would donate $1 million, along with Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, who donated $1 million”.

As of January 8, Trump’s inauguration fund had already racked up a record $170 million.

Anyway, what better way to “Make America Great Again” than by supercharging the plutocracy?

Declaring at the start of his speech that “the golden age of America begins right now”, Trump went on to express numerous other hallucinations, including that “national unity is now returning to America”. Never mind that the tyranny of an astronomically wealthy minority is not exactly, um, unifying.

Luckily on Planet Trump, reality is whatever he says it is. And Trump says that “sunlight is pouring over the entire world”.

‘Historic executive orders’
In his speech, Trump announced a “series of historic executive orders” that according to him, will jumpstart the “complete restoration of America and the revolution of common sense”.

Among these executive orders was the declaration of “a national emergency at our southern border”, paving the way for the deportation of “millions and millions of criminal aliens” and entailing the deployment of the US military “to repel the disastrous invasion of our country”.

Under Trump’s command, the US “will also be designating the cartels as foreign terrorist organisations”. Then there’s the new “official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female”.

And of course, the more emergencies, the better: “[T]oday I will also declare a national energy emergency. We will drill, baby, drill.”

Recoiling at the very thought of environmentalism, Trump proclaimed: “We will be a rich nation again, and it is that liquid gold under our feet that will help to do it.”

And if we happen to destroy Earth in the process, well, there’s always Mars.

As usual, the continuous invocation of God during the inauguration ceremony made a fine mockery of the ostensible separation of church and state in the US, and Trump revealed the reason he had survived a July assassination attempt in the state of Pennsylvania: “I was saved by God to make America great again.”

Overlap with Martin Luther King Jr Day
Last but not least, Trump took advantage of the overlap of his inauguration with Martin Luther King Jr Day, celebrated annually in the US on the third Monday of January, to pledge that “we will make his dream come true” — which would probably be easier if Trump himself weren’t a bona fide racist.

Indeed, Trump’s notion that “our power will stop all wars and bring a new spirit of unity to a world that has been angry, violent and totally unpredictable” would seem to be distinctly at odds with King’s assessment of the US as the “greatest purveyor of violence in the world”.

None of this is to imply that the Democrats have not done their part in terms of purveying global violence or upholding plutocracy, perpetuating brutal inequality, terrorising refuge seekers, and so on.

But Tuesday’s inaugural charade was an exercise in nihilism — and, as I return to my scorpions and Trump goes about making dystopia great again, I think I’ll take Mars over the “golden age of America” any day.

Belén Fernández is the author of Inside Siglo XXI: Locked Up in Mexico’s Largest Immigration Detention Center (OR Books, 2022), Checkpoint Zipolite: Quarantine in a Small Place (OR Books, 2021), and Martyrs Never Die: Travels through South Lebanon (Warscapes, 2016). She writes for numerous publications and this article was first published by Al Jazeera.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Donald Trump has set his sights on the Americas, threatening to retake the Panama Canal if Panama doesn’t lower fees for U.S. ships. The United States controlled the waterway until 1977, when President Jimmy Carter signed a landmark treaty to give Panama control of the canal. Trump has also recently floated the idea of annexing Canada, and even a possible “soft invasion” of Mexico. Pulitzer Prize-winning Yale historian Greg Grandin explains the practical impossibilities of such plans but analyzes the political impacts of Trump’s statements. “There’s no way the United States is going to fill out greater America. This is red meat for the Trump base,” says Grandin. “It’s classic Trump.”

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Reuters reported last week that China’s financial contribution remained in doubt after it “expressed misgivings about the project and has not made definitive commitments on its funding.”

Beijing seems to be drastically downsizing its overseas investments as its domestic economy struggles, even in countries it considers strategic partners, such as Cambodia, the news agency reported.

Hun Manet said in his speech at an event on Saturday that there was nothing to hinder the project’s implementation, according to a video clip of the speech posted on his Facebook page.

The prime minister said at the closing ceremony of a National Assembly of Buddhist Monks that his government was “implementing the project carefully, following clear instructions to reduce impacts on the people at the grassroots level.”

Phnom Penh “has a clear master plan with several backup development partners,” Hun Manet said, turning to China’s ambassador, Wang Wenbin, who was at the event.

The canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, was proposed and approved when his father Hun Sen was prime minister, and is being publicly acclaimed as one of the veteran leader’s great legacies.

The construction of the 180-kilometer (112-mile) waterway that will connect the capital, Phnom Penh, with the Gulf of Thailand began in early August. Cambodia hopes the canal will end its dependence on Vietnamese ports to the south.

Instead of being a foreign-invested project – a Chinese state company was initially reported to be the main investor under the Belt and Road Initiative – the canal is now being built mostly with domestic funding, with Cambodian sources expected to make up a controlling 51% share of the US$1.7-billion investment needed.

Radio Free Asia has reported on questions about the viability of the project.

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Little progress

More than three months after groundbreaking, there are no signs of progress across the project.

RFA Khmer reported that there was no machinery or workers at the ceremony site in Prek Takeo village, Kandal province, in late November.

Villagers told RFA that they were worried about their relocation and compensation as they had heard little from the government.

Hun Manet said government officials “need to clearly define the procedure, review the location and address its impacts on citizens, before permitting the excavators to dig the canal.”

He added that as it is the rainy season now, the water level in the rivers and lowlands is high, making it difficult to dig.

The Ministry of Public Works and Transport also released a statement saying its technical team had completed detailed research and in-depth assessment of the project’s impact in close collaboration with relevant institutions, both Cambodian and international.

The ministry accused media outlets of “spreading false and unfounded information with the intention of undermining the construction process.”

Seng Vanly, a Cambodian political analyst, told RFA Khmer that the government should not accuse the media of inciting discontent but should instead expedite the construction of the project as soon as possible to maintain its image.

Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Khmer.

In early 2023, the weather pattern known as El Niño ushered in a drought that choked traffic through the canal, dropping water levels in Lake Gatun, the canal’s main reservoir, to record lows and revealing the tops of trees drowned when the canal was created at the start of the last century. It takes 52 million gallons of water to get a cargo ship through the canal’s locks, and by December, only 22 of the usual 36 ships were allowed to make the passage each day. Some vessels opted for lengthy routes around Africa instead, while others bid as much as $4 million to skip the queue that had grown to more than a hundred ships.

Over a year later, the water is rising and the logjam has cleared, thanks to increased rainfall as well the Panama Canal Authority’s water management and a recently installed third-set of water-recycling locks. But the problems are sure to reappear: El Niño returns every 2 to 7 years, and when it does, climate change will continue kicking it into higher gear. Panama’s growing urban population also needs drinking water – much of it sourced from the same Lake Gatun that feeds the canal’s locks. 

“This means that if we do not increase water capacity in about a decade, we will not be able to provide water to the citizens,” said Óscar Ramírez, the president of the canal authority’s water resources committee, during a press conference this summer, according to the newspaper La Estrella de Panamá. 

With a future crisis seeming inevitable, the canal authority is turning to a long-contemplated solution: Dam the neighboring Río Indio to create a new reservoir, which could be tapped to replenish the canal when the water levels drop, and dig a 5-mile-long tunnel to connect it to the canal. The idea effectively got the greenlight this summer when the Supreme Court struck down an old law, and in doing so, expanded the canal authority’s jurisdiction to include the Río Indio basin. In total, the project would likely take six more years and $1.6 billion. Once the reservoir is built, Ramírez told reporters, both locals and the canal will have all the water they need for another 50 years. 

Filling the reservoir would submerge about 17.7 square miles of land, currently home to more than 2,000 Panamanians, according to La Estrella de Panamá. Building the dam will require relocating schools, health centers, and churches that serve them. An additional 12,000 people, many of them farmers, live in the surrounding area.

Humans have been building dams for thousands of years, but such mega dam projects are a hallmark of economic development in modern times. According to the International Displacement Monitoring Centre, dams displaced an estimated 80 million people worldwide during the 20th century, and information about their fate is scarce. The canal authority acknowledges the hardship that moving would impose on people, and has said that they won’t begin construction until they’ve consulted with these residents and heard their concerns.

“I think there’s often a better alternative than building a new dam, but obviously dams are still going to be built,” said Heather Randell, an assistant professor of global policy at the University of Minnesota who has studied the impact of dam projects on communities. In her research, she found that people forced to move often lose their social networks and livelihoods, and wind up in poverty. In Vietnam, construction of the Son La Hydropower dam in the mid 2000s displaced 90,000 people and moved them to smaller plots of farmland. On average, incomes fell by 65 percent.

Those living nearby are often disrupted, too. As the diverted water upsets the ecosystem, neighboring areas might have trouble finding food, or see diseases spread more quickly. In Africa, for instance, decades of research shows multiple instances of schistosomiasis, a chronic disease caused by parasitic worms, spiking near dam projects and man-made reservoirs. In many regions, climate change is amplifying these problems.

Although there is no harm-free way to displace people, Randell says, compensating them fairly for their lost livelihoods and land can help. In the 1970s, the government of Panama promised to make such payments to thousands of Indigenous people from the Kuna and Emberá communities who had to relocate for a large hydroelectric dam in Panama’s Darién Province. In 2014, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights found that the government never made these payments and failed to provide titles to protect their new lands, leaving them vulnerable to invasion by illegal settlers. Nowadays, Randell says, there’s “definitely been improvements in recognizing that if you’re going to displace a bunch of people you should be fairly compensating them.”

The canal authority says it plans to compensate residents, with the aim of improving or maintaining their quality of life. “If a person has livestock, we must preserve that livestock even if they are displaced, because it is their livelihood,” said Ricaurte Vásquez Morales, the Panama Canal Authority’s administrator, according to Estrella de Panama’s reporting. According to El Siglo, another national newspaper, the authority has held meetings with more than 1,600 people living in the area that would be flooded.

Randell says that community activism can also help mitigate the risks to people and the environment. In Brazil, decades of protests against the Belo Monte dam project, which began in 1979, drew international attention and put pressure on developers – resulting in the cancellation of the original project in 2002. When it was relaunched shortly after, the plans were scaled back significantly. Before the dam could be opened in 2016, at least 20,000 people had to move to make way for its construction. “Although it might not stop the project outright, it can still make some positive impact on how bad the project is going to be for people or for the environment,” Randell said.

Panama has recently seen a surge of such environmental activism. Last year, hundreds of protesters marched through cities and blocked roads after Panama’s legislature extended Minera Panamá’s operating contract for Cobre Panama, the largest open-pit copper mine in Central America. Panama’s Supreme Court declared the contract unconstitutional in November 2023 and the mine has since ceased operations. According to La Prensa, the canal authorities are actively trying to avoid a repeat of these protests as they negotiate with the towns affected by the proposed Río Indio reservoir.  (The Panama Canal Authority did not respond to Grist’s repeated requests for comment.)

People from dozens of these towns in the provinces of West Panama, Colón, and Coclé have been protesting against damming the Rio Indo since the environmental impact study for the project was conducted between 2017 and 2020. Last year, a coalition of farmers representing districts from these provinces — some of whom were already uprooted by the copper mine —  signed a community agreement to reject the reservoir, while also calling for the closure of Minera Panamá. Since the Supreme Court’s decision to expand the canal authority’s jurisdiction in July, leaders of the same groups have continued organizing meetings and voicing their concerns to media outlets. Last month, a poll of families living on the banks of the Río Indio, conducted by a University of Panama sociology professor, found 90 percent are opposed to the dam. Meanwhile, the canal authority began a census to count the number of families in the river’s basin, and set up a hotline for their questions.

The last time work on the Panama Canal required upending entire towns was when it was first constructed, more than a century ago. A treaty ratified in 1904 gave the United States eminent domain over the Canal Zone — the power to seize any property within a parcel of land that encompassed the entire 50-mile length of the canal’s future waterways and 5 miles on either side of it. Some 40,000 people were displaced from the Zone to create the canal and the lakes attached to it.

“The flooding became the only story, and it’s not the complete story,” said Marixa Lasso, a historian at the Panama Center for Historical, Anthropological and Cultural Research in Panama City. “It was used as an excuse to expel people that did not need to be expelled.” Instead, she says, many towns were displaced to create exclusively American towns, where families of expatriates who worked on the canal, known as Zonians, lived for generations.

U.S. control of the region continued until a 1977 treaty, signed by President Jimmy Carter and the Panamanian military dictator Omar Torrijos, relinquished the canal to Panama at the end of 1999. Lasso said what separates the present-day from the past is that the decision over how to handle the canal now rests with the Panamanian government, giving citizens a greater say over their own fate. She says it’s important to consider alternatives, and if the only solution requires displacing people, history shows the importance of keeping communities intact and close to their original lands. 

“Last time, we were not able to have a say in what happened,” Lasso said. 

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The Panama Canal needs more water. The solution could displace thousands. on Oct 2, 2024.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Sachi Kitajima Mulkey.

In the second part of the report, RFA examines the possible impact of the planned Funan Techo canal on the Vietnam-Cambodia relationship.

Veteran Cambodian leader Hun Sen and his son, Prime Minister Hun Manet, have waged a campaign to rally support for the Funan Techo canal project that they say embodies the spirit of the Cambodian nation and has stirred a surge of national pride.

But it has also exposed some underlying cracks between neighbors Vietnam and Cambodia, whose fates have been intertwined since the earliest days of their history, particularly since Vietnam defeated Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge in early 1979.

Between the 1st and 6th centuries, Angkor Borei, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) south of Phnom Penh, was the capital of Funan – a kingdom that covered parts of what are now Vietnam, Thailand, and Cambodia.

Adopting the ancient kingdom’s name for the Funan Techo canal invokes a Khmer culture and prosperity that, during its heyday, was far superior to that of its neighbors.

‘Their land, their rules’

Just 10 minutes by boat from the modern Angkor Borei, in the middle of a swamp, is a tiny settlement of about 10 simple dwellings of Vietnamese fishing folk. One of them, Nguyen Chi Cuong, hails from An Giang province less than 10 kilometers (six miles) away over the border in Vietnam. 

Cuong said he had heard of the canal but didn’t know much about it.

“I was told we may have to pack up and go back to An Giang, leaving this area for the canal construction, but we’re not sure when,” the man said. “This is Cambodia: their land, their rules. We can’t do anything but comply.”

“We’re thankful enough they let us stay here to fish, the Cambodians treat us very kindly and we can go back and forth without any problem,” Cuong added.

But away from the relaxed border, the Funan Techo canal has stirred the sort of animosity between Cambodia and Vietnam that has not been seen in years, with China looking likely to be the main beneficiary of the strife.

Vietnam complained about a lack of information from Cambodia about the US$1.7 billion canal, which will link Cambodia’s capital to planned ports on its coast and end dependence on Vietnamese ports to the south. 

The Vietnamese foreign ministry repeatedly urged Cambodia to provide an impact assessment on water flows and ecological balance of the Mekong River delta. Cambodian officials responded in an uncharacteristically offhand way, saying they didn’t have to. 

They said that Cambodia was only required to notify the Mekong River Commission – a four-country intergovernmental organization in charge of jointly managing the river – as the project does not connect directly to the Mekong but to the Bassac River, which is considered by Cambodian planners a tributary rather than the mainstream of the Mekong.

The Bassac branches off the Mekong just south of Phnom Penh and then meanders south, alongside the Mekong, into the delta and the South China Sea. The canal will link the Mekong to the Bassac, then run from the Bassac west to the Cambodian coast. 

Cambodia insists the canal will not reduce the flow of the Mekong into Vietnam’s main rice-growing delta region and the impact downstream will be negligible.

The Washington-based Stimson Center, in a report on the canal, rejected the Cambodian position, saying the project’s designation of the affected stretch of river should be changed from “tributary” to “mainstream” in order to initiate a consultation process mandated for mainstream projects.

‘Ambitious plan’

Vietnamese scientists disagree about the extent of disruption the canal may cause to the Mekong’s flow.

Some, like Le Anh Tuan from Can Tho University, reckon the flow could be reduced by as much as 50% during the dry season. 

Others, like independent specialist To Van Truong, say Tuan’s estimate is “overblown” and give a much lower estimate of just 4%.

One thing they seem to agree on is the need for more consultation and information to protect the delta, home to 17.4 million people and already suffering from saltwater incursions.

While the media has focused largely on the environmental impact and financial viability of the project, Vietnamese analysts weigh the geopolitical ramifications, especially in light of China’s looming presence over the region.  

Cambodia’s Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chanthol met Zheng Shanjie, a high-ranking official in charge of development policies, in Beijing on Sept. 9 to discuss Chinese projects in the kingdom, including the Funan Techo canal, and “ensure their timely completion,” the Khmer Times reported. 

State-owned China Road and Bridge Corporation is one of the main investors in the canal.

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Nguyen Minh Quang, a lecturer at Can Tho University, said that the canal was aimed at transforming southern Cambodia, where China already has military interests, both economically and strategically.

“Early evidence reveals that the Funan Techo canal is only phase one of an ambitious plan,” the Vietnamese lecturer said in a recent analysis that he co-authored.

“Urbanization, agricultural modernization, mining activities, and infrastructure investment, including the construction of a deep seaport in Kep, will follow the canal, which will likely make way for Chinese-backed economic enclaves and military logistic supporting nodes in southern Cambodia.” 

The analyst argues that if those development hubs were to be realized, it would give the Chinese navy perfect access at the Ream naval base, nearby in Cambodia’s Sihanoukville province, to localized military supply chains and resources. 

“This, in turn, would essentially translate as a unique advance for China’s alleged de facto military outpost in the Gulf of Thailand,” Quang added.

Nationalist sentiments

Most coverage of the canal in Vietnam’s media has been factual, reflecting the official, measured call for information and transparency.

The picture is quite different in Vietnam’s social media sphere, however, where patriots in May launched barbs at Hun Sen on his TikTok posts with a blizzard of rude comments.

“Vietnam sacrificed its blood for peace in Cambodia,” one social media user said, referring to a Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in late 1978 to oust the notorious Khmer Rouge and install a breakaway faction of the Cambodian communist party that included Hun Sen.

Vietnam forces remained in Cambodia for the next decade, battling the Khmer Rouge and other guerrillas and securing the foundations of a Cambodian administration that remains in charge today.

“Don’t forget tens of thousands of Vietnamese volunteers who were killed in Cambodia,” read another social media post, reflecting Vietnamese anger about the way Hun Sen dismissed Vietnamese concerns about his pet project.

“Ungrateful,” “China’s puppet,” and “traitor” were among the terms Vietnam’s social media critics leveled at Hun Sen. 

Relations between Vietnam and Cambodia can become politically charged, especially in Cambodia where a legacy of resentment over perceived injustices and conquests can be whipped up, at times into violence.

Cambodia’s political parties have all used the anti-Vietnam card to bolster legitimacy and support, and Hun Sen is particularly vulnerable to such politicking as he rose through the ranks of a government installed by Vietnam, analysts say.  

Vietnam and the Phnom Penh government were implacable foes of China through the 1980s but that has changed radically. 

In 2015, the Cambodian foreign ministry sent stern diplomatic notes calling on Vietnam to halt all encroachment in disputed areas between the two countries.

Now Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People’s Party are unwavering Chinese allies and the canal controversy has revealed a surprisingly hard line on Vietnam. 

In almost unprecedented criticism of his old ally, Hun Sen, responding to Vietnam’s questioning of the canal, said in a speech in April that Vietnam was “building a lot of dams to protect their crops and these have an impact on Cambodia.”

Cambodia was “not inferior to Vietnam,” he said. “Cambodia knows how to protect its interests, Vietnam doesn’t need to care.”

‘Cambodia’s responsibility’

Older folk on the Vietnamese side of the border remember the war that forged ties between the neighbors along a river that has bound their fates.

“We share one river, of course we care,” said farmer Le Van An, 63, in Vietnam’s An Giang province. “It’s Cambodia’s responsibility to let us know what they will be doing.”

The former soldier said a reduced flow of water would be disastrous.

“I hope the Vietnamese party and government will prevent that from happening,” he said.

In Ba Chuc village, a memorial stands as a reminder of the horror of nearly 50 years ago when Khmer Rouge forces attacked deep into Vietnam in 1978 massacring more than 3,000 villagers.

An, who fought in the Vietnam-Cambodia border war triggered by the massacre, said he held no grudge against Cambodians.

“They’re just like us,” he said, though adding that he didn’t trust the Cambodian government.

“Especially now that it has China’s backing.”

Edited by Taejun Kang. 

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Luna Pham for RFA.

An RFA reporter traveled the proposed route of the waterway and spoke to residents who will be relocated. First in a two-part series.

Mot Yen’s ramshackle kitchen is nestled under an old mango tree. It’s near the end of the season and there’s no fruit on the branches. Part of the kitchen wall has fallen off but the family doesn’t plan to fix it. “We’re moving anyway,” the 56-year-old farmer said.

Just a couple of hundred meters (yards) away from her house in Chey Oudom 2 village in Kien Svay District, Kandal Province, is a construction site where the Cambodian government held a groundbreaking ceremony for former leader Hun Sen’s monumental project – the Funan Techo Canal – on Aug. 5.

Hundreds of people were invited to the launch of the US$1.7 billion project, waving flags and floating balloons as celebratory drums beat and Buddhist monks chanted blessings. 

The 180-kilometer (112-mile) waterway will connect the Mekong River at the capital, Phnom Penh, and the inland provinces of Kandal and Takeo with the province of Kep on the Gulf of Thailand. 

Crucially, it will cut reliance on neighboring Vietnam to the south as Cambodia’s gateway to world markets.

Prime Minister Hun Manet promised in his speech that the canal – his father’s brainchild – will boost the economy, strengthen independence, promote trade, industry, agriculture and logistics and ensure efficient water management.

But it will also displace an estimated 10,000 homes and swallow up chunks of farmland along the canal – and residents say they haven’t been given clear terms of compensation.

Vietnam, meanwhile, is alarmed by the prospect of the China-backed canal reducing the flow of water down the Mekong to its vital rice-growing delta but the Cambodian government has given its old ally short-shrift, dismissing its worries.

‘Really frustrating’

Weeks after the groundbreaking there was no sign of progress on the project. A sluggish brown creek off the Mekong skirts a Chinese-built fertilizer plant adorned with a big banner declaring “We all support Funan Techo Canal.”

“We all support the canal project,” confirmed village chief Thong Naren.

The government has mounted a spirited campaign to promote the canal to the public, about how it will bring water to parched rice fields, change people’s lives and cut transport costs.

“Ships will travel back and forth every day,” said Thong Naren, adding that tourists might come to watch the splendid sight. “As a citizen of Cambodia, I am very proud of the project.”

However, Thong Naren and others are concerned about what they feel is a lack of information about compensation the government will give for them for relocating, as well as the impact on the environment and the river, which underpin their livelihoods.

“There’s nothing good about relocating,” the farmer Mot Yen said. “When we go to a new place we’ll have to replant all our crops. Worse still, we don’t know where we’ll be moving to.”

The villagers are adamant that they will only agree to move after getting proper compensation but nobody knows when that might happen.

“It’s really frustrating for us,” she added.

‘A lot of fanfare’

Many farmers share the frustration, an RFA reporter learned on a trip along the canal's proposed course from Kandal and Takeo to Kep.

Takeo farmer Kean Ya, 62, said that although he had heard that the canal would run through his land there had been no word on compensation.

“Not only me, but more than 100 households in this area will be affected but no one has come to see us, no one has spoken to us at all,” he said. “I don’t even want compensation, I just wish they wouldn’t build the canal here.”

The government has acknowledged that the compensation process needs to speed up and has called for patience. Authorities have yet to announce compensation rates and have also revised estimates of the extent of the project’s impact.

First vice-chairman of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, Sun Chanthol, told media in July that the project would affect 1,585 households, nearly 370 acres (150 hectares) of residential land and 7,200 acres (2,910 hectares) of rice fields and plantations.

But just weeks later that projection was revised up sharply to about 10,000 homes, 30 bridges, 36 roads, 600 dams and smaller canals and more than 7,000 hectares of farmland.

While villagers are in the dark, it seems government planners are still finalizing details of the canal’s route. Some settlements, told to prepare to move, were later told to stay put, residents said.

The government has yet to announce the name of the company that will oversee the construction.

“This is so typical Hun Sen,” said a Cambodian analyst, who declined to be identified, expressing skepticism about the project in a country where dissenting voices have for years been threatened or worse.

“A lot of fanfare for something just half-ready.”

Radio Free Asia contacted authorities overseeing the project to ask about progress but they declined to respond.

'Techo'

Cambodian researchers and analysts were reluctant to discuss the possibility of any problems with the Funan Techo canal and the domestic media only focused on the much-trumpeted benefits.

The canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, was proposed and approved when Hun Sen was prime minister, and is being publicly acclaimed as one of the veteran leader’s great legacies.

The word “techo” in the canal’s title -- meaning “powerful” in Khmer -- is an echo of Hun Sen’s honorary title, Samdech Techo, which is evoked in many other Cambodian projects. This project was officially launched on his birthday, Aug. 5.

“Hun Manet as his father’s chosen heir had no choice but to announce that the government and the people of Cambodia will build the canal at any cost,” the Phnom Penh-based Cambodian analyst said.

Political activist Lim Kimsor said that essentially the canal is a “trade deal” between Cambodian government officials and foreign businesses, in particular Chinese.

“First of all, it’s a business project,” Lim said from self-exile in an undisclosed location. 

“Hun Manet says it will help Cambodian people but it will not,” said the former activist from the Mother Nature Cambodia environmental group. “Our agricultural sector is not performing well and we don’t have much to export.”

She accused the government of selling out “our trees and natural resources to China and Vietnam.”

“The future canal may be good for that purpose, but not to benefit the people.”

Questions on timeframe, budget

Foreign observers question the viability of the project - one of the largest infrastructure projects in Cambodia - and say the timeframe of four-to-six years to build it is unrealistic.

In comparison, planners looking into the possibility of a 100-kilometer (60-mile) canal across southern Thailand’s Kra Isthmus said it would take 10 years to complete at a cost of about US$28 billion. 

Brian Eyler, Southeast Asia program director at the Washington-based Stimson Center think tank, told RFA that the Cambodian project “appears to be on shaky financial grounds.”

“The ownership and financing details change on this project from month to month,” said Eyler.

Hun Manet said at the ground-breaking ceremony that instead of being a foreign-invested project – a Chinese state company was initially reported to be the main investor under the Belt and Road Initiative – the canal was now being built mostly with Cambodian money. 

Cambodians will make up a controlling 51% share of the investment needed, he said.

The prime minister’s announcement was aimed at dispelling concerns about China’s control over the canal but it raised a new question about financing. Cambodia is still one of the poorest countries in Southeast Asia, and it remains unclear where the money will come from.

Another Cambodian analyst, Vannarith Chheang, said that the government’s estimated cost of construction of US$1.7 billion may be too low.

“It might be challenging to realize the project with the current budget estimate,” Vannarith told a webinar held by a Singaporean think tank – the ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute. 

Some economists say it would still be cheaper to transship Cambodian exports via Vietnamese ports instead of going along  the canal to a yet-to-be-upgraded port in Kampot.

At a depth of 5.4 meters (18 feet), the canal will only be able to accommodate ships of up to 5,000 tons. Larger vessels would still have to use the Vietnam route.

Hun Sen’s arch enemy and a former finance minister, veteran opposition leader Sam Rainsy, argued that the government’s projections on the canal’s profitability were “not credible.” 

The self-exiled interim leader of the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party accused Hun Manet’s government of deliberately ignoring the possibilities provided by the Cambodian port of Sihanoukville, “if it was better managed in conjunction with a functioning railway line.” 

“It’s inconceivable that the canal can play a role in Cambodia’s international maritime trade without relying on the country’s only deep-water port at Sihanoukville,” Sam Rainsy wrote in a blog.

Blaming “Hun Sen’s vanity” for the project, Sam Rainsy noted that the real reasons for the canal project were not economic, but geostrategic and political.

Eyler said how quickly the canal progressed was a major question.

“It’s common though for projects to have a groundbreaking ceremony and then there is no further progress on the project for a long period,” he said.

“I’m willing to bet the Funan Techo canal will be one of them.”

Edited by Taejun Kang and Malcolm Foster.

FOOTNOTE: The project has also had diplomatic repercussions on the decades-old alliance between Cambodia and Vietnam with China looking likely to emerge as the winner from their feud. The second part of the series will explore the impact of Vietnam-Cambodia relations.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Luna Pham for RFA.

When Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet broke ground last Tuesday on a controversial, $1.7 billion canal that will eventually link the capital to the coast, he proudly announced that the investment for the first portion of the canal was “100 percent Cambodian.”

Once completed, the 180 km-long (110 miles) Funan Techo canal will allow ships to move from Phnom Penh to the Gulf of Thailand, bypassing the need to go through Vietnam and lowering transport costs — though experts have warned the environmental costs are steep. 

Despite the ambition of the project, which was first publicized barely a year ago, scant information exists on the funding. Hun Manet’s comments represented a rare official statement regarding the investors behind the first part, a 20 kilometer stretch that will link the Mekong and Tonle Bassac rivers. 

As the prime minister explained, 51% of the capital would be provided by the state-owned Sihanoukville Autonomous Port and Phnom Penh Autonomous Port. The rest would come from a single private company called the Overseas Cambodian Investment Corporation, or OCIC. 

Owned by a powerful and well-connected tycoon, Pung Kheav Se, OCIC in recent years has become Cambodia’s developer of choice. 

The company is the primary funder of the Techo International Airport, a 2600-hectare, $1.5 billion airport on the outskirts of Phnom Penh expected to open next year and replace the capital’s current airport. 

In the mid-2000s, OCIC turned Koh Pich, or Diamond Island, from a sparsely populated sandbar into one of Phnom Penh’s most valuable parcels of real estate. Four years ago, the company broke ground on another landfill project: a $2.5 billion satellite city just across from Koh Pich. 

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But if such projects have been lucrative for OCIC’s shareholders, they’ve been devastating for many Cambodians who happened to be living on the coveted land. Collectively, the projects have resulted in at least hundreds of evictions and numerous land disputes — many of them lasting years and some turning violent. Those living along the canal’s purported path are now bracing themselves for what may soon come. 

Less than 20 miles from central Phnom Penh, Chey Udom village in Kandal’s Kien Svay district looks like most of Cambodia’s countryside, with dirt roads leading toward sprawling paddy fields. Though the ground-breaking was barely a kilometer away — so close that the sounds of the ceremony could be heard during interviews here — the estimated 100 people in this village who will have to move have yet to be given any notice about compensation, resident Heng Chong Yan told Radio Free Asia. 

“It takes a long time for us as farmers to build a house because we do not have a large income like others,” he said. “People’s concerns are common and everyone’s concerns need to be heard. We urge the government to provide adequate compensation in exchange for a suitable place to live.”

A new airport raises concerns

On June 20, 2021, a small group of residents in Kandal province’s Boeng Khyang commune held a ceremony to curse the developer that was pushing them from their land, VOD news agency reported at the time.

Despite the hundreds of millions of dollars that OCIC was sinking into its airport project, residents had been offered just $8 per square meter in compensation for their land — about one-tenth of market rate, according to villagers. 

Years of negotiations and protests had yielded scant progress and frequent arrests by police. And so residents asked instead for the developers to suffer like they had. 

“If you come on the road, the car will overturn in a traffic accident,” VOD quoted a curser. “If you come through the air, the plane will crash and disappear. If you come on the waterway, the ship will disappear.”

Years on, OCIC’s airport, roads and waterways are moving ahead as smoothly as ever. The villagers pushed out or still threatened the Techo International Airport (named, like the canal, for an honorific used by former Prime Minister Hun Sen) remain as cursed as ever. 

One day after construction on the canal launched, Sun Sambo explained how years of fighting OCIC for proper compensation had exhausted him and those living in five villages affected by the project. An estimated 500 families were affected by the project, with an unknown number of holdouts still locked in compensation disputes. 

As he waits for compensation that would be enough for him to buy land elsewhere in proximity to Phnom Penh, Sun Sambo tries to get on with his life, though he knows he will likely be forced to leave soon enough. 

“We are not allowed to build on our land or fix our houses, so even if we have dilapidated houses we want to repair we cannot. The airport security company has the authority to prohibit us,”  he Sambo told RFA.

He said he feared those living along the would-be canal would soon face the same situation as he. 

“Some are poor and when it comes to problems, they are getting poorer. So I want a solution, people do not object or oppose the [development] but want a good solution for us,” he said.

When contacted by RFA last week and asked about compensation negotiations related to the airport, OCIC deputy director general Touch Samnang said that he is not in charge of the project. Follow-up calls to learn more about OCIC’s plans regarding those impacted by the canal went unanswered.

Am Sam Ath, director general for public affairs at local rights group Licadho, told RFA that both the government and company should be transparent about their plans and any potential impacts. 

“People support development, especially the digging of the canal, but what is important is how to compensate them according to the principles of the Royal Government,” said Am Sam Ath. 

While the airport has been the most high-profile of OCIC projects in recent years, it is far from the only one. 

In 2011, the company OCIC received the right to invest in the expansion of the satellite city of Chroy Changvar on 387 hectares of land, which was planned to cost about $1.6 billion. At the time, more than 100 families protested inadequate compensation offers. In 2005, an estimated 300 families lost their homes when pushed off the island of Koh Pich in exchange for a low $10-$12 per square meter, according to a UN Special Rapporteur report from the time.  

While the disputes have often made news headlines, the head of OCIC rarely does. 

Unlike many of Cambodia’s oknhas (an honorific granted by royal decree to anyone who contributes at least U.S. $500,000 to the government) Pung Kheav Se keeps a low profile. A savvy businessman who created one of the country’s first private banks following the fall of the Khmer Rouge, Pung Kheav Se is considered to be a close associate of Hun Sen and of his wife, Bun Rany. A leaked U.S. diplomatic cable listed him in 2007 as one of Cambodia’s “top 10 tycoons.”

“The tycoons help to finance the CPP, contribute greatly to economic growth, and undertake important charitable work such as the construction of schools and hospitals, while reaping the benefits of close government ties,” the cable noted. “However, Hun Sen’s very reliance on his tycoon network may hinder progress in battling corruption, illegal logging, and other sensitive issues that he claims are priorities.” 

‘I still would not believe it’

The lengthy list of land disputes tied to OCIC may have residents concerned, but the government has repeatedly stressed all is well. 

At last week’s groundbreaking ceremony, Deputy Prime Minister and First Vice President of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, Sun Chanthol, stressed that they would provide reasonable compensation.

“I would like to confirm to you that the Royal Government of Cambodia, with the Ministry of Economy and Finance will study in detail to solve the problem. This effect aims to ensure the provision of appropriate compensation to the people. Therefore, people should trust the government and not worry about this issue,” said Sun Chanthol.
But with few concrete details provided even as construction begins, those living along the canal’s pathway can’t help but worry. 

Prek Thmey commune sits on the banks of the Tonle Bassac river, on an underdeveloped stretch of the Phnom Penh peninsula that will soon be severed by the canal. 

Once construction proceeds, about 100 families in Prek Ta Hing village will have to move, according to Sran Panha, a local resident. Ever since learning her village would likely be impacted by the canal, she has struggled to sleep. 

“I do not dare to believe, I do not dare to say, because what is important is seeing with my eyes,” she said, when asked if she thought she would receive adequate compensation. Though the plans make it clear the village would be impacted, she said, no one has yet come to speak with them about their options.

“Even if the Royal Government says [we would get compensation], I still would not believe it. Only when I see it clearly, then I would dare to believe.”  

Translated by Sum Sok Ry. Edited by Abby Seiff. 

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Khmer.

The canal, proposed and approved when Hun Sen was head of the government, is increasingly portrayed in Cambodia as one of the veteran leader’s great legacies.

Hun Manet was quoted by the pro-government Fresh News as saying  that the canal was no longer a foreign invested project but was now primarily owned by Cambodian companies, with a  51% stake.

The main stakeholders are the Sihanoukville Autonomous Port and the Phnom Penh Autonomous Port, he said at an event at the Kampot port, adding that the canal would still be developed as a build-operate-transfer (BOT) project.

The prime minister did not mention China or a Chinese company in his speech, though the Cambodian government last October signed an agreement with the China Bridge and Road Corporation (CBRC) allowing it to develop the canal.

The 180-km (112 mile) canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, will connect the Cambodian coastal province of Kep on the Gulf of Thailand with the inland provinces of Kandal and Takeo and the capital Phnom Penh via a tributary of the Mekong River.

It has caused a rift with neighboring Vietnam, which is worried about the  ecological impact on its rice-growing Mekong  delta, as well as the overall influence of China in the region. The delta is already at risk of encroaching seawater, partly due to lower flows of fresh water down the Mekong.

Questionable viability?

Hun Manet was quoted as saying that the canal would benefit the Cambodian people and not foreign interests. He called for unity and support for the project that would take four to six years to complete at a cost of US$1.7 billion.

An analyst told RFA that the project “appears to be on shaky financial grounds.”

“The ownership and financing details change on this project from month to month it seems,” said Brian Eyler, Southeast Asia program director at the Washington-based Stimson Center.

“First the project was to be financed by a Chinese entity and then built and owned for 40-50 years by CBRC. Now Khmer investors will pay for 51% and no construction company has been named by the prime minister,” Eyler said.

“It’s common though for projects to have a groundbreaking ceremony and then there is no further progress on the project for a long period,” the analyst said.  “I’m willing to bet the Funan Techo canal will be one of them.”

Experts also question the timing of the launch of construction as the project area sits in an active floodplain that is inundated during the monsoon season which generally runs from June to October, making it expensive and risky to dig a canal.

Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

Vietnam respected the legitimate interests of Cambodia in connection with the US$1.7-billion project and always treasures and gives top priority to their fine neighborliness and traditional friendship, the state Vietnam News Agency reported on Sunday, citing a foreign ministry spokeswoman.

The spokeswoman, Pham Thu Hang, said that Vietnam was highly interested in the project and expressed the wish that Cambodia would continue working closely with Vietnam and other countries on the Mekong to share information and fully assess the impacts of the project on the river’s water resources and ecological environment.

She reiterated what she called Vietnam’s consistent support, joy, and high regard for the achievements made by Cambodia in recent years.

Cambodia says the canal, which will be built by a state-owned Chinese company and will connect its southern coast with the capital, Phnom Penh, will reduce its dependence on Vietnamese ports and make significant savings.  

Vietnam is worried about the impact of the waterway on flows down into its Mekong delta rice-growing region.

Cambodia has insisted the canal will go ahead despite Vietnam’s concerns, and the neighbors have engaged in some blunt exchanges in recent weeks. 

Huynh Tam Sang, a lecturer at Vietnam National University, said the latest comments showed Vietnam was adopting a more gentle approach.

“The Vietnamese government’s phrasing ‘much interested’ instead of ‘concerns’ demonstrates its desire to communicate its worries in a way that does not infuriate Cambodia,” the Vietnamese analyst said. “This is vastly different from the language used to describe other security issues, notably the South China Sea … Additionally, this subtle tone suggests that Vietnam is receptive to dialogue aimed at fostering shared interests.”

‘Sore spot in relationship’

It was the second time in less than a month the Vietnamese government has asked for more information about the proposed 180-km (112-mile) canal project which, according to some Vietnamese experts, would reduce the flow of the Mekong river into Vietnam by up to 50%.

The Mekong delta is home to 17.4 million people and is Vietnam’s main rice-producing area.

Vietnamese experts have suggested that their government  should ask Phnom Penh to delay the project for further discussions.

The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh has also called for more information about the canal. 

There are also concerns that the canal will open access to Vietnam’s western border, making it vulnerable, especially as China’s navy appears to have secured a semi-permanent presence in Ream nearby on the Cambodian coast.

“The canal could allow the Chinese navy to travel upstream from the Gulf of Thailand and the Ream Naval Base to Vietnam’s western border,” wrote Khang Vu, a political scientist at Boston College in the U.S., who warned about “the revival of the land threat” to Vietnam.

“As China expands its influence in Cambodia in addition to Vietnam’s weakening leverage over Laos, the Chinese encirclement of Vietnam is growing more comprehensive.” 

A major China-Cambodia joint military exercise –  Golden Dragon 2024 – is to take place later this month, according to the Chinese defense ministry.

Cambodia’s former prime minister Hun Sen has said Cambodia “will not negotiate” with Vietnam.

“Hanoi should compile a comprehensive report indicating potential impacts of the canal project and share it with Phnom Penh and the Mekong River Commission (MRC),” said the Vietnamese analyst, Sang, adding however that he was “not confident about Cambodia’s willing reception.”

The MRC is an intergovernmental organization formed by Cambodia, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam to jointly manage the shared river’s water resources and ensure its sustainable development.

“The Cambodian government’s resolve to move on with the project, despite Vietnam’s concerns, suggests that this matter may persist as a sore spot in the bilateral relationship,” Sang told RFA.

The construction of the canal is set to begin later this year and is being heralded by Cambodia’s leadership as a national interest. Hun Sen’s son – Prime Minister Hun Manet – stated on Friday that the canal project “has sparked a significant nationalist movement.”

Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

So far, only Vietnam has said that it opposes the 180 km (112 mile) Chinese-built project, said Sun Chanthol, a deputy prime minister and the former minister of public works.

“There is nothing to worry about, but they keep raising it,” he told reporters after the meeting in Phnom Penh, referring to Vietnam. “I have already explained to them. We studied it in detail. Do not worry. Do not worry.”

The Funan Techo canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, will connect the Cambodian coastal province of Kep on the Gulf of Thailand with the inland provinces of Kandal and Takeo and the capital of Phnom Penh via a tributary of the Mekong River.

The Cambodian government has said it would cut transport costs and reduce dependence on Vietnamese ports. Construction is scheduled to begin later this year and could be completed within four years.

A group of Vietnamese experts suggested last week that Hanoi should push for a delay to allow further discussions about the project’s environmental and geopolitical impacts on the Mekong delta, which is home to 17.4 million people.

The experts said the canal could “reduce the flow of the river by up to 50%” in the delta, leaving it vulnerable to sea water incursions.

Senior Vietnamese officials have also asked that the Mekong River Commission be allowed to evaluate the project. The commission works with Cambodia, Thailand and Laos and Vietnam to “manage the shared water resources and the sustainable development of the Mekong River.”

10,000 jobs

Sun Chanthol, who also serves as the first vice president of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, met with representatives from several embassies, including the United States, the United Kingdom and France.

He told reporters afterward that the project will create jobs for at least 10,000 people, most of them Cambodian.

“Only a few Chinese will be technical advisers,” he said. “China can’t spend money to send their thousands of workers here.” 

Cambodia plans to allow a Chinese state-owned company, the China Road and Bridge Corporation, to build the canal under a 50-year construction, operation and transfer agreement. 

The U.S. Embassy has said that while it respects “Cambodia’s sovereignty in internal governance and development decisions,” the Cambodian people as well as people in neighboring countries “would benefit from transparency on any major undertaking with potential implications for regional water and agricultural sustainability.”

Former Prime Minister Hun Sen, now the president of the Senate and still retains much power, told a business banquet last week that construction of the canal will go ahead as planned, emphasizing the project was of national interest.

Sun Chanthol is scheduled to give a public presentation on the project at the Institute of Technology of Cambodia in Phnom Penh on Saturday.

Translated by Yun Samean. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Khmer.

A group of Vietnamese experts suggested last week that Hanoi should ask Phnom Penh to delay the project for further discussions.

Former prime minister Hun Sen, who is now the president of the Senate and still retains much power, told a business banquet  that construction of the 180-kilometer (112 mile) canal will go ahead as planned  this year,  emphasizing the project was of national interest.

The Funan Techo canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, will connect the Cambodian coastal province of Kep on the Gulf of Thailand with the inland provinces of Kandal and Takeo, and the capital Phnom Penh via a tributary of the Mekong River.

It will be developed by a Chinese company at a cost of US$1.7 billion and, when operational in 2028,  will help reduce Cambodia’s dependence on Vietnam’s sea ports for its international trade. .

But the project has raised concerns in Vietnam where the rice-growing Mekong delta is vulnerable to sea water incursions if the Mekong’s flow is reduced. A series of dams on the river in China to the north has already raised fears about flows downstream. 

Some Vietnamese experts said the Cambodian canal could “reduce the flow of the river by up to 50%” in Vietnam’s delta, home to 17.4 million people.

Hun Sen dismissed the concern, saying any loss of water would affect Cambodia first.

No mistake in 47 years

The Funan Techo canal project was proposed and approved when Hun Sen was head of the government and analysts say it is being seen as one of his great legacies.

“Hun Sen has never made a wrong decision in the past 47 years,” the veteran leader, referring to himself, told a  dinner hosted by the Cambodian Oknha Association. Oknha is a title bestowed on Cambodians who are committed to charity or generous with  donations to the government.

Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge soldier who defected to fight alongside Vietnamese forces, and who first became prime minister in a government set up by Vietnam after it invaded Cambodia,   said his country “is not inferior to Vietnam.”

“Cambodia knows how to protect its interests, Vietnam does not need to care,” the Senate president was quoted in Cambodian media as saying.

While calling for Vietnam’s understanding, Hun Sen said Cambodia’s eastern neighbor also “built a lot of dams to protect their crops and these have an impact on Cambodia.”

He  said he was not pushing Cambodians to hate Vietnamese people and the Vietnamese side must do the same, the Khmer Times quoted him as saying.

Vietnamese analysts say the canal could also have security implications by allowing naval forces to operate on inland waterways near the Vietnamese border. Vietnam’s foreign ministry this month urged Cambodia to provide information and an impact assessment on the water resources and ecological balance of the delta region.

The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh has also called for more information, saying that while the U.S. respects “Cambodia’s sovereignty in internal governance and development decisions,” the Cambodian people as well as people in neighboring countries “would benefit from transparency on any major undertaking with potential implications for regional water and agricultural sustainability.”

“We urge authorities to coordinate closely with the Mekong River Commission (MRC) to provide additional project details and to participate fully in any appropriate environmental impact studies to help the MRC and member countries fully understand, assess, and prepare for any possible impacts of the project,” an embassy spokesperson said last week.

Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

Construction of the 180 km (112 mile) Funan Techo canal, connecting the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, with the Gulf of Thailand, is planned to begin later this year and to be completed within four years.

The proposed canal will include a section of the Mekong River, raising concern in Vietnam about the impact downstream, especially in Vietnam's rice-growing Mekong Delta. The canal could “reduce the flow of the river by up to 50% by the time it comes to Vietnam,” said Le Anh Tuan, a prominent Vietnamese scientist. 

Vietnam needs more time for consultation in order to protect the river’s delta, home to 17.4 million people, Tuan told the meeting in the town delta of Can Tho.

Another expert, Dang Thanh Lam from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said Vietnam must ask for an environment impact report from Cambodia.

The U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh also called for more information, saying that the Cambodian people as well as people in neighboring countries “would benefit from transparency on any major undertaking with potential implications for regional water and agricultural sustainability.”

“We urge authorities to coordinate closely with the Mekong River Commission (MRC) to provide additional project details and to participate fully in any appropriate environmental impact studies to help the MRC and member countries fully understand, assess, and prepare for any possible impacts of the project,” an embassy spokesperson said.

For its part, Cambodia said it had secured endorsement for the project from the MRC chairman – Lao President Thongloun Sisoulith.

Sisoulith has just visited Phnom Penh and, during a meeting with Cambodian Senate leader and former prime minister Hun Sen, he was asked to show his support for the canal. 

“In response, the Laotian president, without hesitation, announced his support,” Cambodia’s Fresh News media outlet, which is supportive of the government, reported.

No obligation 

Laos and Cambodia are both long-term allies of Vietnam but both have in recent years leaned more towards China.

Vietnam has repeatedly expressed concerns about the possible environmental and economic impacts of the project.

This month, a Vietnamese foreign ministry spokesperson urged Cambodia to provide information and an impact assessment on the water resources and ecological balance of the delta region.

In response, a senior Cambodian official said that Phnom Penh was not obliged to do so.

Cambodia’s Minister Delegate attached to the Prime Minister in charge of ASEAN affairs, So Naro, told the Khmer Times that Cambodia was not legally required to submit any document to Vietnam  regarding the studies and construction of the Funan Techo canal.

Cambodia had submitted “all documents of the studies on the canal related to the impacts on the environment and the water resources” to the MRC, So Naro said. The MRC is an intergovernmental organisation in charge of the sustainable management of the Mekong basin.

“The Vietnamese authorities can request access to those files,” So Naro said.

Cambodia has insisted that the canal  would not disrupt the flow of the Mekong. 

Officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, the Funan Techo canal will be developed by a Chinese company at a cost of US$1.7 billion.

It will mean that more trade can flow directly to Cambodian  ports, bypassing Vietnam. The Cambodian government said it would cut the transport costs and reduce dependence on Vietnamese ports.

It also said that the project will bring great social and economic benefits to 1.6 million Cambodians living along the canal.

Security questions

Besides the environment and economic impacts, analysts say Vietnam is also worried about the security implications of the canal.

There have been suggestions that the canal could allow Chinese navy ships to travel upstream from the Gulf of Thailand and the Chinese-developed Ream naval base on the Cambodian coast close to the border with Vietnam. 

Cambodia has rejected such speculation with Hun Sen insisting that Cambodia and Vietnam “are good neighbors and have good cooperation in all fields.”

But Vietnam has been in dispute with China over some island chains in the South China Sea and it eyes China’s involvement in the region with suspicion.

Vietnam shares a long land border with Cambodia. Between 1977-1978 there was fighting between Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge and Vietnamese troops during the so-called southwest border war, which led to a Vietnamese invasion and the establishment of a pro-Hanoi government in Cambodia.

The situation on Vietnam’s western border should get more attention because of “threats of untraditional security challenges, mostly over the Mekong delta,” said Nguyen The Phuong, a Vietnamese political scientist at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

“A loss of the Mekong's ability to sustain large scale food production will have tremendous impact on Vietnam's security in the south,” Phuong said.

“From my point of view, the western front is becoming more critical day by day but Vietnam is too distracted by maritime issues at the eastern front, or the South China Sea.”

Edited by Mike Firn and Taejun Kang.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

According to an April 5 post on X, formerly Twitter, by the Association of Argentine Press Companies (ADEPA), a professional association, and a complaint López filed with the SpecialProsecutor’s Unit for the Investigation of Cybercrimes in Buenos Aires, which CPJ reviewed, the journalist received death threats after the April 4 broadcast on Canal Trece’s “Telenoche” program of an investigative report on the illegal selling of controlled medications.

“Argentine authorities must immediately investigate the death threats against Argentine journalist Julio Ernesto López,” said CPJ’s Latin America program coordinator, Cristina Zahar. “Journalists should not be persecuted for providing a service of public interest to society, as was the case with his report.”  

The WhatsApp messages displayed on his father’s cell phone, which CPJ reviewed, said: “I’m going to shoot you,” and, “One-eyed guy, you work for the cops.” López, who wears a shaded lens over his left eye, believes the threats were sent to his father’s phone because they have the same name.

López’s story explained how criminals access the online system of National Institute of Social Services for Retirees and Pensioners (PAMI), the country’s public health insurance agency for retired people, to issue prescriptions for medicines that are subsidized by an average of 80% by the government. López is shown negotiating a payment with a criminal to get access to the system.

“Since it doesn’t have two-factor authentication, anyone with a login and password from a registered physician can access and issue prescriptions,” the journalist told CPJ in a phone interview.

An expert in security, López works in banking cybercrime and is also a columnist for Radio Mitre and for Grupo Clarín’s cable news station TN. His X profile has 62,100 followers.

The prosecutor’s office informed CPJ in a voice message that it used geotagging to get the location of the phone number that sent the threats and has asked WhatsApp owner Meta to provide the person’s profile information, which should happen within 20 days. 

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Arlene Getz/CPJ Editorial Director.

The former prime minister, who remains a powerful political figure, vehemently rejected suggestions that “the canal will further facilitate the Chinese navy near the Vietnamese border” in a post on social media platform X.

The Funan Techo canal, officially known as the Tonle Bassac Navigation Road and Logistics System Project, will connect the Cambodian coastal province of Kep on the Gulf of Thailand with the inland provinces of Kandal and Takeo, and the capital Phnom Penh via a tributary of the Mekong River.

The 180 kilometer (112 mile) canal is expected to be developed by a Chinese company as a build-operate-transfer (BOT) project at a cost of US$1.7 billion and become operational in 2028. It will see a large amount of Cambodian goods bypass Vietnam’s ports, creating some independence for the country’s foreign trade.

Vietnam has expressed concerns about the potential environmental and economic impacts of the project, which Phnom Penh sought to dismiss during a visit by Prime Minister Hun Manet to Hanoi in December. 

Hun Manet, Hun Sen’s second son, reportedly reassured Vietnamese leaders that the project would not impact the Mekong river water system.

Some analysts were quoted in international media as saying that the Funan Techo canal marks a decoupling effort by Cambodia from Vietnam. Hanoi is Phnom Penh’s traditional ally and helped install Hun Sen in power in the 1980s but Cambodia has leaned more towards China in recent years. 

There were also suggestions that the canal could have a dual use that would allow Chinese naval ships to travel upstream from the Gulf of Thailand to near the border with Vietnam. Kep province is just kilometers from Vietnam’s Kien Giang province and the two countries share 1,258 km (781 miles) of land border.

Anti-constitution

In his post on X, Hun Sen wrote that he “would like to remind friends or non-friends” that the presence of Chinese troops on Cambodian soil is unconstitutional. 

“Cambodia needs Chinese troops for what?” he asked. 

Hun Sen and other Cambodian officials have also previously rejected allegations that China is developing a military base at Ream, Sihanoukville province, calling them “slanderous.”

"I don't think he [Hun Sen] is wrong,” said Virak Ou, president of Future Forum, a Cambodian NGO.

Ou said he doesn’t think the canal would be useful for the Chinese military as “any conflict between China and Vietnam will be played out in the seas and airs.”

“Hun Sen's statement seems to be an indirect assurance to Vietnamese leaders that the Funan Techo canal will not be used for military purposes,” said Huynh Tam Sang, a lecturer at Vietnam National University, “This statement is made at the time when Vietnam is concerned that Cambodia could help set up a Chinese military base in the region.”

“Hun Sen has been adept at walking a tightrope between China and Vietnam,” the political analyst told Radio Free Asia.

“Because of its modest influence, Cambodia relies on China for political and economic support. But if Cambodia and Vietnam can keep their relations stable, Cambodia will be able to retain agency while responding to China's demands,” Sang added.

Another Vietnamese analyst – Nguyen Khac Giang, visiting fellow at Singapore’s Yusof Ishak Institute – said that in his opinion, the apprehension surrounding the Funan Techo canal’s potential “dual” use primarily stems from concerns over the possibility of a Chinese military presence in Cambodia rather than concrete projections of how it could be used for military purposes.

“I don't see how the canal – if its announced capacity is true – can pose a serious military threat to Vietnam,” Giang said, adding “Hanoi might be more worried about developments in the Ream Naval Base.”

Geopolitical chessboard

According to the Vietnamese analyst, there should be bigger concerns about the environmental impacts on Vietnam's Mekong Delta and the possibility of Cambodia moving further away from Vietnam's economic influence as Hanoi has invested considerable effort to maintain close economic ties with Cambodia and Laos. 

Meanwhile Brian Eyler, director of the Stimson Center's Southeast Asia Program in Washington D.C. told RFA, “One only has to look at a map to see how the Funan Techo canal alters the regional geopolitical chessboard.”

The best way to reduce anxieties, Eyler suggested, is to let the Mekong River Commission – the intergovernmental body in charge of sustainable management of the river – carry out regional consultation as well as a third party technical review of the canal “as required for all projects that touch the mainstream.”

Vietnamese authorities should also be careful to “avoid inflaming Cambodia” over the Chinese military presence narrative, warned Huynh Tam Sang from Vietnam National University.

“Vietnam has valid worries, but the Hun Manet government has authority over its infrastructure projects, including the planned Funan Techo canal,” Sang said. “Hyperbolizing this problem could backfire as Vietnam could be seen as a troublemaker in the eyes of Cambodian leaders.” 

Translated by Mike Firn and Elaine Chan.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Staff.

According to news reports, on April 6, police arrested Tizol, who reports for the La Jefa radio station, various local TV stations, and from his Canal Noti Retalteco Facebook page, near Retalhuleu in southwest Guatemala. In a phone interview with CPJ, Tizol said he was covering a police raid on a ranch at approximately 9 a.m. when the operation’s lead prosecutor ordered his arrest on grounds of trespassing at the private property. Tizol was live-streaming the raid on Facebook, and CPJ confirmed via video review that an officer instructed him to leave, prompting Tizol to comply by walking away from the property and toward the street before he was arrested.

“The prosecutor did not give me time to leave,” Tizol told CPJ. “She immediately and aggressively ordered the police to arrest me and seize my phones and motorcycle without a warrant or anything.” 

Tizol was then transferred to a local hospital after experiencing a blood pressure related health complication. There, he was notified by a local judge that prosecutors accused him of trespassing. A judge released Tizol on bail, pending trial, and set an April 17 hearing date. 

“Guatemalan authorities must drop any criminal proceedings and thoroughly investigate the prosecutor and the police officers responsible for Jorge Tizol’s detention,” said Cristina Zahar, CPJ’s Latin America program coordinator in São Paulo. “Journalists have the right to report on matters relevant to their communities, and local authorities should not punish them for that.” 

In the official document shared by Tizol with CPJ, police officers alleged that the journalist unlawfully accessed the property and justified the seizure of his phones and motorcycle as “evidence.” According to the document, prosecutors were raiding the ranch as part of a cattle theft investigation.

Tizol is a veteran Retalhuleu journalist with over 20 years of professional experience. On his Facebook page, Canal Noti Retalteco, he covers local news, including politics, crime, and corruption. He has served as a correspondent for major Guatemalan media outlets, including Prensa Libre, Guatevisión, Emisoras Unidas, and Canal Antigua.

In a social media post on February 16, 2024, Tizol accused local politicians of doxxing him after his private information, including phone number and residential address, was posted online.

CPJ called the Retalhuleu prosecutor’s office for comment but did not receive a response after several attempts. CPJ also emailed the main prosecutor’s office in Guatemala City for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

The proposed Ben Gurion Canal would create an alternative to the Suez Canal. Its proximity to Gaza has raised questions about whether it is one of the motivations for the Israeli invasion. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

In the past several years, interest has revived in the Ben Gurion Canal, a proposed alternative to the Suez Canal named after Israel’s founding father running through Israel close to Gaza. Creating an incentive for removal of Palestinians from Gaza, particularly the north end, it has raised suspicions that Israel had foreknowledge of Hamas’ October 7 attacks and let them happen.

It has now been documented that Israel received multiple warnings something was about to occur. The New York Times reported that Israeli officials obtained detailed knowledge of attack plans a year before. (Link not paywalled.) Egyptian intelligence made repeated warnings as October 7 approached that a major event was about to take place.

Whether or not these facts offer definitive proof that elements of Israel’s government knew something was on the way, the new interest in creating an alternative to one of the world’s most important east-west transit points has raised questions. As the accompanying map shows, the Mediterranean end of the canal would run close to the northern boundary of Gaza. Obviously, a situation where shipping was subject to rocket attacks would make that untenable, as Houthi attacks at the southern entrance of the Red Sea have proved.

To obtain the investment capital necessary to build the canal, a secure situation would have to be established. The only options for that would be a peace settlement with the Palestinians, or their removal. An Israeli government dead set against the first option would have to exercise the second.

The concept of building a transoceanic canal through Israel dates to 1963, when the U.S. Lawrence Livermore Laboratory developed a scenario that would have used nuclear explosions to dig the canal. The classified document was not made public until 1993. That was part of a particular insanity of the time when both the U.S. and Soviet Union considered using nukes in massive excavation projects. The U.S. version was Operation Plowshare.

The idea for a new canal had been spurred by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956, taking it over from British and French interests. That resulted in a war involving both those countries and Israel against Egypt. Intervention by U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower forced them to concede, but the canal was blocked to Israeli traffic for a year.

The Ben Gurion Canal concept went into abeyance for decades due to concern about radioactive releases and Arab opposition. But new prospects for cooperation between Arab nations and Israel emerged with the Abraham Accords under the Trump Administration, which saw the normalization of relations between Israel and Arab countries including the United Arab Emirates. Almost immediately after normalization in 2020, a deal was made to ship UAE oil via a pipeline from Eliat on an arm of the Red Sea to the Mediterranean, but it was later blocked by Israeli environmental authorities based on concerns about oil spills.

At the September 2023 G20 meeting shortly before the Hamas attack, the India-Middle East Corridor was announced. It would create a transportation link from India to Europe across the Arabian Peninsula via Dubai in the UAE to the Israeli port of Haifa. In December 2023, even after Israel launched its invasion of Gaza, UAE and Israeli interests made a deal to create a land bridge between Dubai and Haifa.

Suez blockage leads to announcement

With the Abraham Accords in the background, an event in 2021 brought new attention to the Ben Gurion Canal, this time excavated by more conventional means. In March of that year, a massive container ship suffered a steering malfunction and grounded in the Suez Canal, shutting off traffic. The Ever Given blockage raised concerns about how this vital artery of global shipping could become a choke point. (See: Suez Crisis Highlights Fragility of Globalization.)

In April Israel announced it would begin construction of a dual-channel canal that could handle 2-way traffic in June. At 50 meters deep, 10 more than the Suez, and 200 wide, it would be capable of accommodating the world’s biggest ships, an advantage over the more limited Suez Canal. Unlike Suez with its sandy shores, rock walls would reduce maintenance requirements to a minimum. Its 181 miles in length would exceed Suez by about one-third. Around 300,000 workers would be needed to complete the project, with a wide range of estimated costs from $16 billion to $55 billion. Israel would expect to earn around $6 billion annually in transit fees, deeply cutting in Egypt’s revenues, which reached a record $9.4 billion in fiscal year 2022-23.

Despite the announcement, construction did not start. “Many analysts interpret the current Israeli re-occupation of the Gaza Strip as something that many Israeli politicians have been waiting for in order to revive an old project,” the Eurasia Review reports.  “Although it was not the original idea, according to the wishes of some Israeli politicians, the last port of the canal could be in Gaza. If Gaza were to be razed to the ground and the Palestinians displaced, a scenario that is happening this fall, it would help planners cut costs and shorten the route of the canal by diverting it into the Gaza Strip.”

The new focus on the Ben Gurion Canal coincides with a revival of interest in another Gaza-related project, the exploitation of gas reserves off the Gaza Coast. This was detailed in a recent post. The Gaza Marine field was first discovered in 1999, but proposals to tap it were blocked for many years by Israel. Then in March 2021 the Palestinian Investment Fund, a branch of the Palestinian Authority (PA), and the Egyptian government signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at developing the field. But Hamas representatives raised objections.

On June 18 2023, a little under 4 months before the attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced plans to move forward on development in conjunction with the PA and Egypt. It had been reported that secret talks on development took place between Israel and the PA the prior month.

The PA is widely seen as complicit in Israeli occupation of the West Bank, and is a political rival to Hamas. Striking a deal to exploit Gaza Marine would further buy off the PA and strengthen it vis-à-vis Hamas. As with the revival of the canal proposal, this has also stirred suspicions that Israeli authorities deliberately ignored warnings about the October 7 Hamas attack. For development would entail getting Hamas out of the way in Gaza. Hamas would not agree to drilling unless it received a share of the earnings, something unacceptable to Israel.

Providing Israel with global shipping leverage

The Ben Gurion Canal would provide Israel with leverage over one of the world’s most important shipping points. Around 22,000 ships transited the Suez Canal in 2022, representing 12% of world trade. It is a crucial artery for shipments of manufactured goods, grain and fossil fuels. The International Energy Agency reports, “About 5% of the world’s crude oil, 10% of oil products and 8% of LNG seaborne flows transit the canal.” Though the flow from east to west is still important, increasingly fossil products move from the Atlantic basin to feed Asia’s growing economies.

Suez was closed to Israel from 1948-50 during and immediately after the first Arab-Israeli War and then again in 1956-57 as an outcome of the second conflict. After the 1967 war, when Israel occupied the Sinai Peninsula up to the canal, it was closed to all traffic until a 1975 settlement when Israel pulled back. Since the 1979 peace treaty between Israel and Egypt, traffic has remained unrestricted.

But the 2021 closure raised concerns by the U.S. military, for which Suez remains a vital transit point. As well, the increasing alignment of Egypt with Russia and China through its new membership in BRICS and participation in China’s Belt and Road Initiative gives pause to the U.S. national security establishment. All this would provide motivation to Israel’s closest ally to see an alternative waterway created.

Did revived interest in the Ben Gurion Canal cause Israeli authorities to look the other way when they had clear warnings of a Hamas attack? When analyzing the forensics of a case, one looks at means, motive and opportunity. Between the new focus on the canal as well as offshore gas reserves that both date to around 2021, Israel clearly had motives to clear Gaza, or a large part of it, of its Palestinian population, even beyond the drive-by rightist elements to create an exclusive Jewish state throughout historic Palestine. With its military power, it had the means. The Hamas attacks of October 7 gave it the opportunity.

The actions since fortify the case. With the vast destruction of Gaza beyond any rational necessity to fight Hamas, making the strip virtually uninhabitable, it is hard to argue the goal isn’t expulsion of the population. Taken in the context of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ordering a plan to “thin” Gaza’s population “to a minimum,” as reported in Israeli media, and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s calls to depopulate Gaza, the intent seems clear. Underscoring the point was Netanyahu’s display of a map of “the new Middle East” that erased Palestine and showed an Israel “from the river to the sea” when he addressed the U.N. two weeks before October 7.

It is unlikely we will ever know for sure. But the prospect of occupying a key point in global shipping, with all the leverage and money that comes with that, provides at least reasonable grounds for suspicion that Israeli officials indeed had foreknowledge of October 7 and allowed the attacks to happen. It would only be one factor playing into a general desire for an ethnically cleansed region “from the river to the sea,” but a powerful factor nonetheless.

Donate to UNRWA

The United States and other countries have opted to defund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) on the grounds that 12 named and one unnamed employee of its 13,000 participated in the October 7 attacks. The 12 were immediately fired. But, as Responsible Statecraft reported, “ . . . while the Israelis make a number of claims and accusations that they say are based on intelligence and other source data, the document itself contains no direct evidence that these 12 identified UNRWA employees participated in or assisted the Oct. 7 attack.”

The Israeli report came immediately after another U.N. arm, the International Court of Justice, ruled there is a case that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, and ordered it to take measures to prevent it. The report and subsequent funding are widely seen as a way to divert attention from the ruling and discredit the U.N. in general.

Defunding the UNRWA undermines the prime agency bringing humanitarian aid into Gaza and intensifies the now widespread starvation of the population. But just because the U.S. and other nations have cut off funding doesn’t mean you have to. You can make a direct donation to UNRWA here. Please do.

This article first appeared in the Raven.

The post How is the Proposed Ben Gurion Canal Tied to Israel’s Gaza Invasion? appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Patrick Mazza.

Israel, however, has been spared any toothy sanctions regime over its conduct in Gaza.  If anything, the Biden administration in Washington has been brightly enthusiastic in sending more shells to the Israeli Defence Forces, despite Congressional reservations and some grumbling within the Democratic Party.  This has made such figures as Norwegian doctor Mads Gilbert, who has a long-standing association with the health system in Gaza, wonder why the wealthy states of the West exempt Israel from financial chastisement while economically punishing other powers, such as Russia, without reservation.  “Where are the sanctions against the war crimes of Israel?” he asks.  “Where are the sanctions against the occupation of Palestine?  Where are the sanctions against these abhorrent attacks on civilian healthcare in Gaza?”

The retaliatory initiative has tended to be left to protests at the community level, typified by the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement created in 2005.  The war in Gaza, however, has resulted in a broader efflorescence of interest.  Israeli companies such as Elbit Systems have become specific targets of international protest. On December 21, a global coalition of groups under the umbrella of Progressive International took a day of action against the country’s largest arms company, drawing attention to the tentacular nature of the enterprise in the US, UK, Europe, Brazil and Australia.

Restricting the docking of Israeli shipping at ports, notably from ZIM Integrated Shipping Services, has also presented an opportunity to the protest movement.  Actions have been organised as far afield as Australia where “Block the Boat” measures have taken place.  During the early evening of November 8, several hundred protesters flocked to the entrance of Melbourne’s international container terminal.  On catching sight of a ZIM-branded shipping container, the protestors staged a blockade lasting till the morning of the next day.  A similar action was repeated in Sydney on November 11, involving several hundred protestors holding the line on the shores of Port Botany and delaying the arrival of a ZIM vessel.

The assessments that followed the protest were mixed.  Zacharias Szumer, writing in Jacobin, admits that such blockades, on their own, “are unlikely to cause a major dint in ZIM’s bottom line.”  That said, he is confident enough to see it as part of a globalised effort which “can cumulatively make a difference.”

Then came the sceptical voices who felt that these actions fell dramatically short of substance and effect, a product of righteous, ineffectual tokenism.  An anonymous contribution to the New Socialist, purporting to be from one of the protestors, went so far as to call the “Block the Boat” strategy misguided, since it never actually entailed blocking vessels.  The promotional materials for the events “indicated that the purpose was actually to say somebody should ‘Block the Boats’, and to ‘call for’ a boycott – a message addressed to ZIM and Albanese.”  The writer, clearly agitated, also took issue with the choice of locations (they “weren’t conducive to disruption”) and the “suspiciously rigid, and convenient” timing of the rallies.

Short of these efforts, it is precisely the absence of responses at the highest levels that has precipitated a more global reaction that is upending the order of things.  Beyond the protests of activists, community groups, and the more generally outraged come the more direct, state-sponsored measures that have rattled financiers, the carriers and the operators.  The crisis in the Red Sea, for instance, where Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels (Ansar Allah), are putting the brakes on international shipping, is the stellar example.  While the measure initially began on November 14 to target Israeli-affiliated merchant shipping, largescale operators have not been spared.  “Unlike previous piracy related events in the Red Sea/Gulf of Aden this is a sophisticated military threat and requires a very sophisticated response,” states a briefing note from Inchcape Shipping Services.

The disruptions are significant, given that 30 percent of all container ship traffic passes through the Bab al-Mandab Strait off the coast of Yemen, the point where both the Red Sea and Indian Ocean meet.  The actions and threats by the Houthis have seen various oil and gas companies reroute their tankers. Decisions are even being made to suspend shipping through that route in favour of the safer, though costlier and longer route via the Cape of Good Hope.  Insurance premiums are also on the rise.

The Egyptians are also raising fees for those using the Suez Canal for the new year.  In an October announcement, the SCA promised an increase of between 5-15%, effective from January 15, 2024.  The measure is applicable to a fairly comprehensive list of vessel categories, including crude oil tankers, petroleum product tankers, liquefied petroleum gas carriers, containerships and cruise ships.

On December 20, Malaysia, as if heeding the “Block the Boat” protests, announced that it would be preventing Israeli-flagged cargo ships from docking at the country’s ports.  Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim announced the decision in a statement, with a specific reference to ZIM.  “The Malaysian government decided to block and disallow the Israeli-based shipping company ZIM from docking at any Malaysian port.”  Such sanctions were “a response to Israel’s actions that ignore basic humanitarian principles and violate international law through the ongoing massacre and brutality against Palestinians.”

Malaysia also announced, in addition to barring ships using the Israeli flag from docking in the country, the banning of “any ship on its way to Israel from loading cargo in Malaysian ports.”

Blockade, barring, embargo, constriction – all these measures are familiar to the Israeli security establishment as it seeks to strangle and pulverize the Gaza Strip.  While closing ports to Israeli shipping is modest in comparison to starving and strafing an entire population, it is fittingly reciprocal and warranted.  The Israel campaign against Gaza, and Palestinians more generally, is no longer a local, contained affair.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Binoy Kampmark.

I was beginning to think that nothing new or relevant could be said about the life of Sir Kissinger (he was made a Knight of the Order of St. Michael and St. George in 1995). But with the smell of Messianic fanaticism weighing heavily in the air of Jerusalem these days, I realized I was quite mistaken. In 2012, Kissinger said something quite curious that very few people have taken seriously, yet his statement opens the door to an important lesson about world history—and Kissinger’s peculiar life gives us a window into it.

Speaking on Israel’s future in 2012, Kissinger sent shock-waves of confusion through the world when he said, “in 10 years, there will be no more Israel.”

Why would Kissinger, a man who devoted such a major part of his life to the cause of Zionism, believe with certainty that Israel would no longer exist in 10 years? What was supposed to happen under a Hillary Clinton regime that would have resulted in Kissinger’s prediction unfolding in 2022?

Did Kissinger not want the Middle East stability he so often spoke so highly of?

His apparent dual support for Zionist empowerment on one hand and his belief in the impending destruction of Israel on the other is not a glitch in the matrix nor a contradiction in Sir Kissinger’s thinking. Rather, it represents two sides of one bloody program that ultimately involves purging the Holy Land of both Jews and Arabs.

Since Kissinger’s 2012 opinion provided such an important, ironic crack in the machinery of oligarchism, I’d like to take a moment to invite you to join me as we peek through this crack into a story that may take us as far back as Babylon…

‘Greater Israel’ as a British Imperial Project

In 1914, the man who later became Israel’s first president, Chaim Weizman, stated:

Should Palestine fall within the British sphere of influence, and should Britain encourage a Jewish settlement there, as a British dependency, we could have in 20 to 30 years a million Jews there-perhaps more; they would. . . form a very effective guard for the Suez/Canal.”

These words indicated a deeply underappreciated value that leading Jewish Zionists had for the British empire’s plans for global control over a century ago; these Zionists believed the empire could further their own plans for a Jewish state. Lord Shaftesbury’s Zionist project was launched in 1839, the British Empire created the Palestinian Exploration Fund in 1865, and the founder of modern Zionism, Theodor Herzl, joined the cause of convincing the world’s Jews to live in the desert, but the role of British intelligence’s hidden hand in shaping the state of Israel, as well as international fascism more broadly, is often ignored. [1]

It wasn’t ignored by Sir Winston Churchill, then Lord of the British Admiralty during WWI. He wrote forcefully about the international Jewish conspiracy to take over the world on one hand, but he also spoke proudly of Zionism, saying in 1917: “If, as it may well happen, there should be created in our own lifetime by the banks of the Jordan a Jewish state under the protection of the British crown … [it] would be especially in harmony with the truest interests of the British Empire.”

While Churchill could not be said to be a supporter of Hitler’s National Socialism, up until 1935, he loudly proclaimed his admiration for Hitler and also spoke fondly of Mussolini’s Black Shirts. Churchill was also a rampant racist who presided over the mass extermination of ‘lower races’ as displayed in the controlled Bengal famine (killing three million Indians) in 1943. Like most other dominant Round Table leaders of Britain at this time, Churchill was an ‘imperial socialist,’ which has always been at the heart of 20th-century fascism.

Without the force of numerous antisemitic fascists throughout the last two centuries, Zionism would have never been possible.

Take as an example the case of Lord Arthur Balfour, a leading strategist of the Rhodes-Milner Round Table Group. Balfour co-authored the Balfour Accords in 1917 alongside Leo Amery, Lord Milner, and Walter Rothschild. It shouldn’t surprise anyone to learn that, like Churchill, Lord Balfour was also a devoted white supremacist, Zionist, and supporter of fascism. Prime Minister Lloyd George, who oversaw the project at this time, was an ardent social imperialist (aka international fascist) who openly praised Nazism alongside another pro-Nazi royal named King Edward VIII.

While Leo Amery was not openly antisemitic, his son John was a devoted supporter of British Nazism and Adolph Hitler. His other son, Julian Amery, worked closely with unreconstructed Nazis after World War Two as part of Operation Gladio. It was under Julian Amery [2] that Nazis like Otto Skorzeny, Walter Rauft, and Alois Brunner were transplanted to the Middle East and even worked for the Mossad after the CIA played a direct role in establishing that organization in 1951.

Additionally, Leo Amery was a close collaborator of pro-fascist Zionist leader Vladimir Ze’ev Jabotinsky during the former’s management of British Mandate Palestine (1925-1929) and co-founder of the Jewish Legion, which Jabotinsky went on to control. More than a Zionist, Amery was a believer in Cecil Rhodes’ vision for “a Church of the British Empire.”

Amery stated of his peculiar religion: “The Empire is not external to any of the British nation. It is something like the Kingdom of Heaven within ourselves.” (Take note that the term “Kingdom of Heaven” was the name of the Templar Kingdom of Jerusalem, which will play a larger role in this story).

After leading the passage of anti-Jewish immigration laws in England in 1905 that prevented persecuted Russian Jews from coming to the UK, Balfour wrote in 1919 that Zionism would “mitigate the age-long miseries created for Western civilization by the presence in its midst of a Body which it too long regarded as alien and even hostile, but which it was equally unable to expel or to absorb.”

Balfour saw the creation of Israel as one stone that could kill two birds by 1) providing an excuse to purge the Jews from Europe and 2) creating a perfect weapon for destabilization in the geopolitical pivot of Halford Mackinder’s Heartland and the cross-section of all major civilizational forces on the earth.

 Caption: The Silk Road trade routes of the Han Dynasty were revived again under the Tang Dynasty and have historically played a major role in disrupting systems of global empire by encouraging trade, cooperation, and understanding around diverse cultures (in opposition to the Crusader agenda that has promoted ‘clash of civilizations’ ideologies).

In his book Der Judenstat, Theodor Herzl openly admitted this when he said:

We should, there, form a portion of the rampart of Europe against Asia, an outpost of civilization as opposed to barbarism. We should, as a neutral state, remain in contact with all Europe, which would have to guarantee our existence.

Herzl was clear that like his British Imperial (and typically antisemitic pro-fascist sponsors), he envisioned Israel’s borders to extend “from the Brook of Egypt to the Euphrates.”

In the 1890s, Herzl was not yet settled on the specific location of the Jewish national homeland. William Eugene Blackstone, a devotee of John Nelson Darby, leader of a British sect called “The Plymouth Brethren,” sent him a voluminous report justifying Jerusalem as the only location ordained by God. This earned him the title of “the father of Zionism” by American Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis. In 1891, Blackstone drafted a memorandum dubbed “Palestine for the Jews,” which called for US leadership in establishing a homeland for the persecuted Jews of Russia. The memorandum was signed by 413 prominent Americans, including John D. Rockefeller, J. P. Morgan, Supreme Court Justice Cyrus McCormick, the heads of dozens of major newspapers, the Speaker of the House, and many members of Congress.

In the 1890s, Herzl was not yet settled on the specific location of the Jewish national homeland. William Eugene Blackstone, a devotee of John Nelson Darby, leader of a British sect called “The Plymouth Brethren,” sent him a voluminous report justifying Jerusalem as the only location ordained by God. This earned him the title of “the father of Zionism” by American Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis. In 1891, Blackstone drafted a memorandum dubbed “Palestine for the Jews,” which called for US leadership in establishing a homeland for the persecuted Jews of Russia. The memorandum was signed by 413 prominent Americans, including John D. Rockefeller, J. P. Morgan, Supreme Court Justice Cyrus McCormick, the heads of dozens of major newspapers, the Speaker of the House, and many members of Congress.

The Plymouth Brethren Gnostic Overhaul of Christianity

The Plymouth Brethren were a gnostic sect of pseudo-Christians founded in 1829 by an agent of the British East India Company named Anthony Norris Groves. Groves was sent to the Ottoman Empire and then India in 1830 as an orientalist engaged in recruiting young elites to train in British universities while carrying out espionage under the banner of Christian missionary work. Groves was soon joined by John Nelson Darby (godson of Admiral Horatio Nelson and father of modern rapture theology).

Darby, who considered himself a prophet, conducted six tours of the US seeding his doctrine into dozens of gnostic cults. Each one taught followers to interpret Bible prophecy the same way. This obviously required sending all Jews to Palestine, at which point a “secret rapture” for believers would unfold—followed by a hellscape of pain for heathens left to burn under the fires of global war and the anti-Christ.

Of course, in 1856, Darby’s prophetic gifts taught him that Russia—then Britain’s dominant nemesis after the US—was the anti-Christ and that the Civil War was a sign of the End Times. Darby went so far as to encourage his American followers not to fight to save the union since that would go against God’s will (to blow up the universe). Instead, he believed they should wait like good passive sheep atop their barns to be beamed up to heaven.

Among those American Christian movements influenced (and even created by Darby and the Plymouth Brethren sect), we have Cyrus Scofield. His 1909 reference bible became the most popular in the US during the 20th century and drew heavily upon Darby’s works.

Darby’s influence can also be seen in the works of Charles Fox Parham (the founder of Pentecostalism), George Pember, (the originator of the ‘fallen Nephilim’ interpretation of demonology now advanced by the alien disclosure movement), Dwight Lyman Moody (founder Moody Bible College), and James Hall Brookes (founding father and president of the Niagara Bible Conference, which helped spread Dispensationalism across America).

In fact, the entire Christian Zionist movement of war-pushing, faith-healing, rapture-loving preachers from John Hagee to Benny Hinn and Pat Robertson all sit on foundations created by Darby’s Plymouth Brethren—not the Bible.

The 1826 Albury Conferences on Prophecy

The Plymouth Brethren emerged onto the scene in tandem with a tightly knit network of Anglican/Jesuit intelligence operatives who operated under the leadership of 1) Henry Drummond (financier and co-founder of the New Apostolic Church founded in 1834), 2) Lord Anthony Ashley Cooper, the 7^th Earl of Shaftesbury, and 3) John Nelson Darby (founder of the ‘Exclusive Brethren’ Plymouth Brethren and leader of the sect).

Lord Anthony Ashley Cooper was a follower of Henry Drummond, who devoted himself to the cause of “Premillennial Dispensationalism” soon after a series of conferences on prophecy were held between 1826 and 1830. They were dubbed “The Albury Conferences.”

These conferences, overseen by Drummond at a vast estate he purchased featuring 70 bedrooms in Surrey, England, included leading figures of London’s gnostic intelligentsia. This included occultists Robert Haldane and Sir Thomas Carlyle, both of whom went on to become 12 “apostles/prophets” of the New Apostolic Catholic Church created by Drummond and George Irving in 1830.

The Albury Conferences themselves were sparked by the rediscovery of the writings of the influential Jesuit Francisco Ribera (1537-1591) of Salamanca, who played a major role in the Council of Trent of 1545, which ensured never-ending wars between Catholics and Protestants. This council and its Jesuit controllers are sometimes called ‘the counter-reformation.’

A Jesuit Sleight of Hand Sets the Stage for Zionism

Ribera’s primary task was to create an intellectual argument in opposition to the Protestant affirmation that the end times were now (i.e. 545) and that the Whore of Babylon described in the Book of Revelation was the Catholic Church. Ribera’s solution was simple: make the case why the events of Revelation were neither in the present nor in the past (the majority of Christians at the time believed that the subject of the “Whore of Babylon” was Nero’s Rome). Rather, he argued, they were to take place at some distant moment in the future.

Jesuit grand strategist and true father of Christian Zionism Francisco Ribera (1537-1591). Note the Templar Cross. That will make more sense later.

Moreover, in his 500-page treatise In Sacrum Beati Ioannis Apostoli, & Evangelistiae Apocalypsin Commentari, Ribera explained that the signs of the end times would only occur when the temple of Solomon, destroyed in 70 CE during the first Roman Jewish War, was rebuilt (additionally implying the restoration of Jews to their homeland). Ribera’s writings became known as the Futurist School of Pre-Millennial Dispensationalism, from which arose such modern perversions of Christian-Zionism, Rapture theology, and the diverse array of End Times Cultists of Christian and Jewish brands in our modern era.

By the early 17th century, Ribera’s writings had fallen into obscurity. They were only rediscovered when S.R. Maitland (Keeper of Manuscripts for the Archbishop of Canterbury) found himself working in the Vatican archives. Maitland believed the Jesuitical concepts were revolutionary, and they inspired him to write books on the antichrist and End Times in the form of An Inquiry into the Grounds of the Prophetic Period in Daniel and St, John (1826), A Second Inquiry (1829), and An Attempt to Elucidate the Prophecies Concerning Anti Christ (1830).

Perhaps most importantly, Ribera’s eschatology lent itself to the geopolitical aims of a British Empire struggling to 1) prevent the spread of independence movements across the world that followed America’s lead and 2) maintain a system of global enslavement with India, Russia, Egypt, China, and the Ottoman Empire as prime targets.

The obvious danger of the renewal of Silk Road routes of cooperation connecting these ancient civilizational states would be a disaster for the British Empire’s ambitions to become a New Roman Empire retaining control through divide-to-conquer tactics.

The Cabalistic Fraud of Apostolic End Times Cults

Echoing a similar gnostic ‘secret doctrine’ that paralleled the Cabalistic traditions of ‘exoteric’ (public) Torah and esoteric (hidden/oral) Torah, these self-professed ‘apostles’ claimed to hold prophetic gifts and that they could interact with angels and Jesus through what they called ‘the holy spirit’ (a practice commonly involving going into self-induced trances and speaking in uncontrolled gibberish/tongues).

Dozens of End Times cults splintered off from this source. Various prophets like Edward Irving (founder of the Irvingites), John Dowie (founder of Zion Illinois), John Darby (founder of Exclusive Brethren), Charles Parham (founder of Pentecostalism), Joseph Smith of the Mormons, and Dwight L. Moody (founder of Moody Bible College) created occult societies masquerading as “Christian” movements.

The thread tying these new sects together tended to revolve around 1) rapture interpretations of the Bible, 2) the restoration of the Jews to the Holy Land, and, in most cases, 3) the rebuilding of Solomon’s Temple.

Were these actions to occur, it was taught by those with ‘special gnostic knowledge,’ the apocalyptic End Times would be invoked. The dual origins of Christian Zionism and End Times rapture theology are found here—not in the Bible.

The Fraud of British Israelism

It is also noteworthy that many of these “apostolic” cult creators were also devotees of “British Israelism,” which claimed that the 10 lost Tribes of Israel actually settled in Britain, and the British Royal family was directly descended from the House of David—the ‘secret children’ of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Films such as Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ and the popular book Holy Blood Holy Grail made these actual beliefs of the oligarchy into articles of popular mythology in the minds of plebian consumers.

Most people watching King Charles III sprinkled with water from the River Jordan during his coronation had no idea what insane symbolism was occurring. In the mind of Charles and the broader oligarchy he represents, this ritual symbolizes Charles as the blood heir to the throne of Christ himself. The choice to carry a metallic globe and cross symbolizing his divine right to rule the entire globe as prima inter pares (first among equals)—a symbol of the Holy Roman Emperor—should also not be ignored (see image below).

In 1834, British Israelite Henry Drummond stated that “The majority of what was called the religious world, disbelieved that the Jews were to be restored to their own land, and that the Lord Jesus Christ was to return and reign in person on this earth.”

The Logic of England’s Use of Zionism

In January 1839, Lord Anthony Ashley Cooper wrote an article in the London Quarterly Review commonly referred to as the first public call for the restoration of the Jews in Palestine:

The soil and climate of Palestine are singularly adapted to the growth of produce required for the exigencies of Great Britain; the finest cotton may be obtained in almost unlimited abundance; silk and madder are the staple of the country, and olive oil is now, as it ever was, the very fatness of the land. Capital and skill are alone required: the presence of a British officer, and the increased security of property which his presence will confer, may invite them from these islands to the cultivation of Palestine; and the Jews, who will betake themselves to agriculture in no other land, having found, in the English consul, a mediator between their people and the Pasha, will probably return in yet greater numbers, and become once more the husbandmen of Judaea and Galilee. (Cited in Victoria Clark, Allies for Armageddon, p.67)

In 1840, Lord Palmerston (Lord Cooper’s cousin and British Foreign Secretary) echoed this proto-zionist outlook in a letter to the British ambassador to Constantinople:

There exists at the present time among the Jews dispersed over Europe, a strong notion that the time is approaching when their nation is to return to Palestine… It would be of manifest importance to the Sultan to encourage the Jews to return and to settle in Palestine… I have to instruct your Excellency to recommend to hold out every just encouragement to the Jews of Europe to return to Palestine.

In 1853, Shaftesbury wrote to then-Prime Minister Aberdeen describing Syria as “a country without a nation, which should be matched to a nation without a country… Is there such a thing? To be sure there is. The ancient and rightful lords of the soil, the Jews!”

Shaftesbury recognized the need to map Palestine (which also involved finding the location of Solomon’s Temple) in preparation for this vast project. To this end, he worked closely with his cousin Lord Palmerston and the Prince of Whales (later King Edward VII) to create the Palestinian Exploration Fund in 1865.

Templars, Mithra, and the Roots of the Palestinian Exploration Fund

This project was been put into motion a little earlier, when in 1862, Queen Victoria’s son, Prince Edward Albert, led an expedition to Palestine. The first secretary of the Palestinian Exploration Fund (PEF), Walter Besant, described the importance of the King’s venture to the Holy Land in his work Twenty-One Years Work in the Holy Land (1886):

Hitherto the opportunity for such systematic research has been wanting. It appears now to have arrived. The visit of HRH the Prince of Wales to the Mosque at Hebron has broken down the bar which for centuries obstructed the entrance of Christians to that most venerable of the sanctuaries of Palestine; and may be said to have thrown open the whole of Syria to Christian research.

The fact that Walter Besant of the Palestinian Expedition Fund was the brother-in-law of Annie Besant, leader of the international Theosophy movement, should raise some alarm bells since it has been noted that John Nelson Darby infused his translations of the Bible with language and terms only being used by the Theosophists.

Before Prince Edward Albert’s trip, the last royal to step foot in Jerusalem was King Richard the Lionheart in 1192 CE during the 3rd Crusade overseen by the Templars.

The Templars were a mercenary cult established by Cistercian grand strategist Bernard of Clairvaux in 1118 CE. They were officially called “The Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon.” Not living up to their aspirations of poverty, this order of elite Christian mercenaries soon became the dominant financial empire across Europe and the Mediterranean sphere. It oversaw a network of Mithraic mystery cults throughout the world stretching from Russia to Europe, England, and the Middle East.

In fact, the Kingdom of Jerusalem, which reigned from 1099-1291, was frequently managed by the Templars and ranged widely in size during several bloody Crusades against the Muslims. An animation of the Kingdom can be seen here:

The Kingdom’s flag can be seen here:

The Jerusalem crosses became affiliated with the Templars before the order was dissolved (at least publicly) and appeared on the insignia of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre, established as a papal knighthood in 1098. It currently has 30,000 official members under an Order not too dissimilar in structure to Jesuit Generals [3]. Keep in mind that this papal knighthood was established 20 years before the founding of the Clairvaux’s Templars.

According to the sect’s website, the Knighthood of the Holy Sepulchre is devoted to “absolute fidelity to the Popes” and seeks to “sustain and aid…the Catholic Church in the Holy Land.” In Freemasonic fashion, the Order is organized around a Grand Master and a chain of command of obedience down to the lower degrees.

Among the priorities of the order today are the funding and maintenance of religious schools across Palestine, Israel, and the broader Middle East.

Below, one can see a Good Friday ritual celebrated by a group of Knights of the Sepulchre in Bolivia. I’m sure the similarities to the KKK (which emerged out of the Masonic Knights of the Golden Circle that nearly became the occult center of North America under Albert Pike’s command in the 19th century) are a complete coincidence.

In 1222, Francis of Assisi (ordained as the environmentalist’s saint) established a subdivision of his Franciscans dubbed “The Order of Penitent Brothers and Sisters.” Like its later incarnation in the Jesuits, the order was arranged around a general and featured an outward (exoteric) practice of strict Benedictine asceticism (this involved self-flagellation).

This order became known as the Franciscan Minorite Order and selected for themselves a very peculiar emblem.

This is important to keep in mind since the Prince of Whales Albert Edward celebrated his 1862 arrival in the Holy Land by engraving a tattoo featuring the Templar crosses on his arm. The Templar headquarters in Jerusalem were found in the elaborate crypts built under the Al-Aqsa Mosque (the supposed location of Solomon’s Temple) and are the source of much speculation. The likelihood of a Mithraic temple as part of a network of thousands scattered across the Holy Land and Europe is the most attractive hypothesis this author has yet seen.

Working directly under Prince Albert Edward was Sir Charles Warren, chief of the Palestine Exploration Fund (PEF) and First Grand Master of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, which was established in 1886. The Quatuor Coronati (Four Crowns) was the first archeology lodge devoted to mapping out the Middle East and ultimately rebuilding Solomon’s Temple, which was destroyed in 70 CE.

Additional aims of the lodge and Palestinian Exploration Fund involved locating the ark of the covenant and holy grail. The geopolitical benefits of mapping the Middle East for the British High Command (as well as mapping out the tribal relations of Arabs living there under the manipulation of British orientalists) were obvious.

The entire field of ‘Biblical Archeology’ was created—and continues to be shaped—by the Quatuor Coronati. Upon founding the PEF, Warren stated that it was designed with the avowed intention of “gradually introducing the Jews, pure and simple, who are eventually to occupy and govern this country.”

In 1886, Sir Charles Warren was appointed the chief commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, where he was assigned to protect the Prince of Whales’ ritualistic murder of prostitutes across London in a famous unsolved case called “Jack the Ripper.” Warren worked with Plymouth Brethren member Sir Robert Anderson, head of Scotland Yard, to sabotage the investigation into the masonic ritual murder of prostitutes across London. These murders most likely occurred at the hand of Prince Albert Edward’s eldest son Prince Albert Victor. The 2001 Hollywood film From Hell, starring Johny Depp, was but one of many films banalizing this grotesque chapter of history in the form of popular entertainment.

It is also worth noting that author Michael Baigent—who wrote Holy Blood Holy Grail, which informed Dan Brown’s Davinci Code—was also a member of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge.

The Plymouth Brethren Start Religious Fires

Another Plymouth Brethren cultist played an important role in British Mandate Palestine. Colonel Charles Wingate was a leading figure in Darby’s sect and ensured that his son, Colonel Orde Wingate, would follow in his father’s shoes as a deviant imperialist and Christian Zionist.

Orde Wingate worked closely with Christopher Sykes (son of Mark Sykes of Sykes-Picot fame) and was sent to British Mandate Palestine in 1935 to train Zionist paramilitary groups. He created a network of elite ‘Night Squads’ working in tandem with Jabotinsky’s Haganah paramilitary group.

As demonstrated by the pioneering work of Steven P. Meyer, Vladimir Jabotinsky was a British intelligence asset from Ukraine who was groomed in the Freemasonic Young Turk operation set into motion by Lord Palmerston and Giuseppe Mazzini in the 1840s. He was a Jewish fascist admirer who Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, called “Vladimir Hitler” due to his adoption of Nazi practices and his rabidly racist ethnonationalist attitude.

In a letter to his cousin, Orde wrote:

The Jews are loyal to the Empire… Palestine is essential to our Empire- our Empire is essential to England- England is essential to world peace. We have the chance to plant here in Palestine and Transjordan a loyal, rich and intelligent nation, with which we can hold for us the key to world domination without expense or effort on our part.

It is a notable irony that Col. Orde Wingate had two very influential “pro-Arab” Orientalist cousins: 1) E.G Browne (sponsor of Al-Afghani, the spiritual father of Salafiyyism) and 2) T.E. Lawrence, whose manipulation of Bedouin Hashemite tribes drove the British Empire’s first ‘Arab Spring’ against the weak Ottoman Empire during World War One.

British Mandate Palestine Grand Mullah Haj Amin frequently collaborated with British intelligence from Britain’s Cairo office, including the Muslim Brotherhood, to 1) assassinate moderate Arabs seeking economic cooperation with the Jews and 2) kill Jews to stoke revenge sentiments similar to the earlier program of keeping Protestant vs. Catholic wars ablaze in Europe.

Haj Amin’s story as a British asset and provocateur is told in full by Cynthia Chung in her book The Empire in Which the Black Sun Never Set. [4]

British intelligence’s support of Islamist cults throughout the Arab world, from al-Afghani (founder of Salafyyism) to the Muslim Brotherhood, and their simultaneous support of the most fascist and violent Zionist ideologues should not be seen as contradictory in any way. Rather, this support is united by one firm principle: maintain global dominance for the Church of the British Empire.

With a game so dirty, one shouldn’t be surprised to discover that Wingate’s fellow British intelligence agent and self-professed satanist Aleister Crowley himself emerged out of Darby’s Plymouth Brethren sect.

Mystery Babylon from a New Lens

Plymouth Brethren grand strategist George Hawkins Pember (1837-1910) is known as one of the most influential of Darby’s sect. His works on ancient mystery cults, Zionism, prophecy, and even alien interpretations of scripture have done an incredible amount of damage in shaping imperial strategic planning for over 150 years.

In his book The Antichrist, Babylon, and the Coming of the Kingdom, Pember laid out the challenge of interpreting what the ‘Whore of Babylon’ might be. This information is very important for anyone wishing to calculate the days until the End Times.

Pember followed the Pre-Millennial Dispensationalist line by extracting the cataclysmic events into the future. “It would seem, that Babylon must be rebuilt and become again the center of the world and the glory of kingdoms, as we have it represented in the eighteenth chapter of the apocalypse,” he wrote.

But who is this Babylon that must rise to power to usher in the End Times? Is it Russia? Is it the papacy? Is it the British Empire? Or is it something else?

As a devout Christian Zionist cut from the cloth of Palmerston, Churchill, or Eichmann, the answer is clear, according to Pember. In his book The Antichrist, Babylon, and the Coming of the Kingdom, he wrote:

The wonder is that the restoration of Babylon has never yet been attempted…As soon, however, as Christendom is united in the form of the Ten Confederate Kingdoms, all jealousy will be at an end, and the great prize may then be seized for the common good. No doubt commerce will be the exciting motive: the civilized world will, perhaps, combine to build a great central emporium, which by their united exertions will quickly surpass all other cities, and finally become the capital of the Antichrist.

Keeping in mind the role of the Plymouth Brethren and gnostic intelligence operatives of the Palestinian Expedition Fund in creating Zionism in the first place, let’s review once more the region proclaimed by Herzl, Jabotinsky, and other Greater Zionists as the divine land ordained by God’s covenant for the “chosen people”…

Today, the Anglo-Zionist project has grown from an aggressively demonic fetus to a vicious, full-grown monster. It appears intent on fulfilling a divine prophecy to recreate a new Babylon while provoking a war with literally every Arab neighbor surrounding them. The maps of Babylon 539 BCE and Herzl’s fantasy are eerily similar.

America’s nuclear arsenal will likely support Zionist ambitions to purge the land of Arabs, starting with Palestine and followed by Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, and possibly Saudi Arabia, as outlined by the neo-con Clean Break Doctrine submitted to Netanyahu in 1996. But are all Americans (or even Israelis) happy about this scenario? Judging from the mass protests in the US against Netanyahu’s current war and the collapse of his support within Israel itself, the answer is no.

But do the voices of the people who will be exterminated in the wake of a global nuclear war have any influence over the decisions made by imperial ideologues marching about Washington, London, or Tel Aviv? That remains to be seen.

I would also pose the question: Is it at all possible that the forces that birthed the Zionist project may ultimately see their creation as a disposable pawn in the great game? Is it also possible that these same forces don’t even see the US as a permanent fixture of the “end of history” some imperialists wish to see emerge onto the scene? These are just a few questions to ponder.

With all of this in mind, it is worth revisiting Henry Kissinger’s 2012 prophecy that “in 10 years, there will be no more Israel.”

The Fall of Babylon 2.0?

The Truth Concerning the Land is Revealed in Cabala. Jewish Mysticism (Cabala) militates for life in the Land of Israel. Rationalistic approaches to Judaism place no special value on the Land of Israel. In wars, national characters crystalize. Israel, as the universal reflection of mankind, benefits thereby. The heels of Messiah follow upon World Conflageration… At the hour of the downfall of Western civilization, Israel is called upon to fulfill its divine mission by providing the spiritual basis for a New World Order. [emphasis added]

— Rabbi Abraham Isaac Cohen Kook, Greater Israel champion, End Times cultist, Chief Ashkenaz Rabbi for British Mandate Palestine (1919-1935)

The genie of Greater Israelism, as promoted by the likes of Theodor Herzl, Rabbi A.I Kook, and the army of gnostic Christian Zionist heirs of John Nelson Darby begging for a first strike onto Iran represents a level of zealotry and fanaticism that may spell disaster for much of humanity. Unlike most End Times cults that have stained this world, this one happens to possess a nuclear arsenal, and it is supported by raving hordes of rapture-believing Christian Zionists in America hungry for Armageddon.

A strange collusion of the Jesuit-run papacy of Pope Francis and the Anglican Church of the eco-Crusader King Charles III has united on multiple fronts. This includes Lynn Forester de Rothschild’s Council for Inclusive Capitalism under the banner of the World Economic Forum. Additionally, why did Pope Francis (who took the name from the Templar-connected Francis of Assisi) choose to give shards of the cross upon which Jesus died (so it is claimed) as a coronation gift to a man who is a British Israelite who probably believes himself to be a blood heir to Jesus himself?

For that matter, why did Prince William’s wife, Kate Middleton, present her second baby to the world dressed in an outfit made famous by accused satanist and pedophile Roman Polanski in the film Rosemary’s Baby (featuring the story of a woman who is impregnated by a satanic cult leader and gives birth to the anti-Christ)?

This cult is also operating in a world shaped in large measure by a collapsing hegemon sitting atop a systemic financial meltdown that may make the 1929 depression look like a cakewalk.

Kissinger’s Role as a Midwife to Satan

Sir Henry Kissinger played an instrumental role in converting the US from a republic that aspired to uphold liberty to a nation fully committed to empire under the control of a techno-feudal priesthood.

It is important to keep in mind that throughout his long and destructive life, Kissinger cannot really be accused of being a cause of anything. Rather, he was always an instrument enslaved to a higher agency far beyond him. He was perhaps a fully witting agent—and thus all the more reprehensible than the many lower auxiliaries of technocracy who are ignorant of the evil they represent… but he was a slave nonetheless.

As a prized student of Rhodes Scholar William Yandall Elliot (who served as a guru to a nest of sociopathic young men at Harvard), Kissinger’s devout misanthropy, idealization of oligarchism, and spiritual devotion to systems of stasis were recognized by his handlers. He soon found himself working for the director of the CIA’s Office of Psychological Strategy Board in 1952, where he was brought into the inner sanctum of global intelligence operations.

Kissinger’s star rose quickly as he was made a member of the Round Table’s American think tank in 1956—The Council on Foreign Relations—and was soon brought into the Rockefeller Commission’s 1956 study group on America and the New World Order (named ‘Prospects for America’). There, he worked closely with Rhodes Scholar Dean Rusk and American fascist Henry Luce. This was soon followed by admission to the Bilderberg Group in 1957, where he went on to lead its steering committee.

Like his Rhodes Scholar mentor earlier, Kissinger found his own protégé in the form of a young sociopath named Klaus Schwab, whom he taught at a CIA-sponsored program at Harvard. Kissinger wasted no time setting the stage for the post-industrial era of deregulation, nation-stripping, and war as he brought the new Trilateral Commission into reality alongside David Rockefeller and Zbigniew Brzezinski.

During his time as secretary of state and national security advisor, Kissinger worked closely with George Schultz in removing the US dollar from the fixed exchange rate gold reserve system, ensuring that what was once a viable industrial capital system would become a speculative weapon of mass destruction.

Once this was achieved, Kissinger’s work in orchestrating the Yom Kippur War of 1973 and broader oil shocks that resulted in a US dollar pegged to the price of OPEC oil was a cakewalk [5]. Kissinger’s next step in drafting the NSSM-200 program, transforming America’s foreign policy from a pro-industrial growth orientation toward “population control,” was another step into hell.

But were any of these policies designed to serve the interests of America or even Israel or Saudi Arabia in the long term?

Were any of these policies designed to serve any nation, or were they all simply different elements to the same abstract painting of chaos that he served on behalf of a higher agency?

What agency could that be if not American or Israeli or Saudi?

Kissinger’s Devotion to the British Empire Means More Than You Think

Sir Kissinger let the cat out of the bag on May 10, 1982, during a Chatham House (see: Round Table) conference in Britain. He described the principled schism between traditionally American vs. British imperial ways of looking at the world and demonstrated his commitment to the British imperial paradigm:

Many American leaders condemned Churchill as needlessly obsessed with power politics, too rigidly anti-Soviet, too colonialist in his attitude to what is now called the Third World, and too little interested in building the fundamentally new international order towards which American idealism has always tended. The British undoubtedly saw the Americans as naive, moralistic, and evading responsibility for helping secure the global equilibrium. The dispute was resolved according to American preferences- in my view, to the detriment of postwar security… The disputes between Britain and America during the Second World War and after were, of course, not an accident. British policy drew upon two centuries of experience with the European balance of power, America on two centuries of rejecting it.

Where America had always imagined itself isolated from world affairs, Britain for centuries was keenly alert to the potential danger that any country’s domination of the European continent-whatever its domestic structure or method of dominance-placed British survival risk… Britain rarely proclaimed moral absolutes or rested her faith in the ultimate efficacy of technology, despite her achievements in this field. Philosophically she remains Hobbesian: She expects the worst and is rarely disappointed. In moral matters Britain has traditionally practiced a convenient form of ethical egoism, believing that what was good for Britain was best for the rest…. In the nineteenth century, British policy was perhaps the principal factor in European system that kept the peace for 99 years without a major war ….

Perhaps most revealing was his description of his own role as secretary of state when he described his relationship with the British Foreign Office:

The British were so matter-of-factly helpful that they became a participant in internal American deliberations, to a degree probably never practiced between sovereign nations… In my White House incarnation then, I kept the British Foreign Office better informed and more closely engaged than I did the American State Department… It was symptomatic.

For those who may not be aware, Kissinger’s recruitment to William Yandall Elliot’s Round Table operation in Harvard, his allegiance to the Round Table movement’s Chatham House operation in London and New York (dubbed “The Mothership” by Hillary Clinton), and his words above are nothing less than an admission of allegiance to a new Templar order.

The secret society that Cecil Rhodes established in his last will and testament as “a Church of the British Empire,” modeled on “The Jesuit Constitution” was explicitly based on the Grail Myths of the Knighthood of the Round Table. These were designed in the 13^th century to promote the Templar-managed Crusades and the reconstruction of the Crusader kingdom of Jerusalem.[6]

As even Scottish Rite Grand Master Albert Pike stated in 1871, the Jesuit Order was itself a reconstructed and more disciplined Templar Order. In his Morals and Dogma, he wrote:

The Templars were unintelligent and therefore unsuccessful Jesuits. Their watchword was, to become wealthy, in order to buy the world. They became so, and in 1312 they possessed in Europe alone more than nine thousand seignories. Riches were the shoal on which they were wrecked. They became insolent, and unwisely showed their contempt for the religious and social institutions which they aimed to overthrow. Their ambition was fatal to them.

It has also been demonstrated that the Order of Saint Francis of Assisi was additionally a Templar Order (with the additional attributes of a Magna Mater cult of Cybele that dominated Rome as a nature-worship sect). This order also merged into the later Jesuit society. With this in mind, the union of Jesuits and Franciscans in 2013 takes on new meaning and should raise eyebrows.

It was, after all, the Jesuit influence on the 1545-1563 Council of Trent that both fueled the flames of never-ending religious wars across Europe and established the foundations of Christian Zionism and the End Times cults of our modern-day.

Whether it was the British Empire that created political Zionism as part of the Great Game as Winston Churchill, Lord Shaftesbury, or Lord Balfour believed, or whether Jewish cabalistic bankers were attempting to create a Greater Israel capital for a New World Order as Herzl, Vladimir Jabotinsky, or Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook likely believed…it may not matter which imperial monstrosity is wagging the tail: both may be destined to the same fate that befell the first Babylon over two millennia ago.

Perhaps Kissinger knew what this new age of Babylon would involve… but he’s too busy dealing with other problems at this moment.

One thing is certain: the thing calling itself ‘the antichrist’ has been very angry with something very special within Christianity, Judaism, and Islam for a very long time. It’s time to rediscover what that is before the End Times cult Kissinger served achieves its final act.

Footnotes

[1] According to evidence available on record, Theodor Herzl was many things, but his own man was likely not one of them. His rise to prominence from a low-level journalist in 1893 to the leader of global Zionism within three years is unprecedented and doesn’t happen without vast institutional patronage. Additionally, his connection to Colonel Goldsmid (head of London’s Maccabee movement) from 1894 to 1904 is one of many important red flags of higher influences interfacing with Herzl. Colonel Goldsmid played a role in the Boer War alongside the new Round Table movement and was also the overseer of the British Empire’s Jewish colonial project in Argentina, which is no small thing. The Jewish colonial projects overseen by the British Empire in Argentina—like the Uganda scheme proposed by Chamberlain later (and submitted by Herzl to the World Zionist Congress in 1903)—was an indirect way of corralling international Jews from across Russia and Europe into controlled zones of British imperial domain that would serve as gateways towards a final Palestinian Zionist infusion. Ultimately, the empire’s success in sparking World War One and undermining the Ottoman Empire sped things up and made these stepping stones unnecessary. The fact that Herzl was also an antisemite who saw great practical use in antisemitism to make Europe and Russia unliveable for the Jews is a big red herring. It places him in conjunction with the intelligence agencies (often occult-theosophical) throughout the secret police operations of the Russian, French, Prussian, and British empires that coordinated the Dreyfuss Affair fiasco in France and the Protocols of Zion forgeries in Russia and their translations across the English world.

[2] In 1954, Egypt and the United Kingdom signed an agreement over the Suez Canal and British military basing rights. It was short-lived. By 1956 Great Britain, France, and Israel concocted a plot against Egypt aimed at toppling Nasser and seizing control of the Suez Canal, a conspiracy that enlisted the Muslim Brotherhood. The British went so far as to hold secret meetings with the Muslim Brotherhood in Geneva. According to author Stephen Dorril, two British intelligence agents, Col. Neil McLean and Julian Amery (Leo Amery’s son), helped MI6 organize a clandestine anti-Nasser opposition. Julian Amery would be directly linked to the Gladio networks. In Stephen Dorril’s book MI6: Fifty Years of Special Operations he writes, “They [McLean and Amery] also went so far as to make contact in Geneva…with members of the Muslim Brotherhood, informing only MI6 of this demarche which they kept secret from the rest of the Suez Group [which was planning the military operation via its British bases by the Suez Canal]. Julian Amery forwarded various names to [Britain’s Foreign Secretary].” The full story can be found in Dorril, Stephen. (2000) MI6: Fifty Years of Special Operations. The Free Press, New York p. 356, 629 and Chung, Cynthia, (2022) Empire on Which the Black Sun Never Set, Canadian Patriot Press p. 286

[3] The Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem (or Knights of the Holy Sepulchre), is a Catholic Order of knighthood (f.1099) under the protection of the Holy See. The pope is the sovereign of the Order. The Order creates canons as well as knights with the primary mission to “support the Christian presence in the Holy Land.” It is an internationally recognized Order of chivalry. The Order today is estimated to have some 30,000 knights and dames in 60 lieutenancies around the world. The cardinal grand master has been Fernando Filoni since 2019, and the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem is grand prior. Its headquarters are situated at Palazzo Della Rovere and its official church in Sant’Onofrio al Gianicolo, both in Rome, close to Vatican City.” [description from Wikipedia]

[4] Specifically Chapter 11: “Nazis, the British, and the Middle East.”

[5] Under his careful watch, oil prices increased 400% during the 1973 OPEC crisis. This has been acknowledged to have played a big role in driving the 1973-79 inflation. But as researcher William Engdahl demonstrated in his 1992 A Century of War, then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger had more of a role in manufacturing this crisis from scratch by keeping hundreds of tankers replete with petrol from being unloaded in the US and facilitating the 400% interest rate increase with the assistance of several high-level oil ministers in the Middle East beholden to Kissinger. In recent years, Saudi Arabia’s OPEC minister at the time of the crisis corroborated Engdahl’s research stating: “I am 100 per cent sure that the Americans were behind the increase in the price of oil. The oil companies were in real trouble at that time, they had borrowed a lot of money and they needed a high oil price to save them.”

[6] See From Ritual to Romance by Jessie L. Weston, Cambridge University Press, 1920.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Matthew J.L. Ehret.

On December 6, the High Authority of Communication (HAC), Guinea’s media regulator, ordered Canal+, a French distributor in Guinea, to suspend radio and TV content by privately owned broadcaster Djoma, according to a copy of the order shared with CPJ by Kalil Oularé, manager of the Djoma Média press group, and news reports.

Three days later, on December 9, the regulator ordered Canal+ to suspend radio and TV content by two other privately owned broadcasters, Evasion and Espace, according to Nfaly Guilavogui, Evasion deputy managing director, who spoke to CPJ, and a press release by Canal+. The regulator’s December 9 order cited “security imperatives” following a referral from “competent state services,” but did not elaborate.

Then, on December 12, Chinese television distributor StarTimes removed Djoma, Espace, and Evasion from its offerings “by decision of the competent authorities for reasons of national security,” according to StarTime’s press release on the matter and Guilavogui. The press release did not state which authority made the decision.

The formal suspension orders occurred after radio broadcasts of Espace, Evasion, Djoma, and privately owned Fim were already blocked. These broadcasts have been blocked since November 24, according to Djoma news director Aboubacar Condé, Fim editor Sekou Bah, and Guilavogui.  

“Guinean authorities must immediately allow broadcasts by Fim, Espace, Evasion, and Djoma to return on air though all available channels, and restore access to all social media and online communication networks in the country,” said Muthoki Mumo, CPJ’s sub-Saharan Africa representative, in Nairobi. “The blocks placed on radio, TV, and online media across Guinea directly threaten freedom of expression and the public’s right to access information.”

Bah and Oularé told CPJ that they could not point to specific reports that might have triggered the blocks and suspensions, but they believed their generally critical coverage of authorities played a role. “This is a programmed extinction of a medium known for its editorial line” and its critical coverage, including of injustices and human rights violations, Bah said.

Earlier in November, Fim’s radio broadcast was blocked when it was covering an incident in which four former military officials on trial for allegedly suppressing a 2009 demonstration escaped from prison. Espace, Evasion, and Djoma also covered the escape.

“The major event that [they covered which] could have a link with their blocking is the prison break, but the root of the problem is that these media, which have the largest audience in the country, are being blamed for their [critical] editorial line,” Sekou Jamal Pendessa, secretary general of the Syndicate of Press Professionals of Guinea (SPPG), a local trade group, told CPJ. Guilavogui told CPJ that Evasion’s TV programming is accessible via satellite, but that the vast majority of its audience relies on distribution by Canal+.

In addition to the broadcaster blocks, access to several online social media and communication platforms, including Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Twitter, has been blocked in Guinea since November 24, according to analysis by the Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI), a non-profit internet censorship tracker. Guilavogui and Nouhou Baldé, director of privately owned news site Guinée Matin, also confirmed the blocks, with Baldé telling CPJ that he was only able to access the platforms via a virtual private network.

Baldé told CPJ that the social media blocks hindered readers’ access to the news. “We distribute all the content on social networks and if internet users do not have access to it, this means that our articles are currently read very little,” Baldé told CPJ.  

In a separate incident, on December 11, Guinea’s Post and Telecommunications Agency, which manages radio frequencies in the country, issued a decision to close Ndimba Radio within three months over its alleged failure to pay license fees, which its director Ibrahima Sory Traoré denies, according to news reports.

Traoré told CPJ the closure was retribution for “the media’s non-complacent coverage of the government.”

Moussa Moïse Sylla, director of communications for the Guinean presidency, declined CPJ’s request for comment, stating he was not authorized to speak on the matter.

CPJ called HAC President Boubacar Yacine Diallo, government spokesman Ousmane Gaoual Diallo, and Guinea’s Post and Telecommunications Agency, but received no response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

CPJ has tracked attacks or threats against at least four journalists since the formal election campaign period began November 19, and the closure of at least one broadcast station.  

“Attacks on journalists Jerry Lombo Alauwa, Mao Zigabe, and Neyker Tokolo, threats against reporter John Kanyunyu Kyota, and the closure of Radio Top Lisala are stark examples of the various dangers faced by Congolese press covering ongoing election campaigns,” said Muthoki Mumo, CPJ’s sub-Saharan Africa representative, in Nairobi. “The safety of journalists is absolutely critical as the DRC approaches its nationwide elections on December 20, and authorities must ensure reporters are able to cover campaign events and voting without fear of reprisal.”

• Since November 22, freelance reporter John Kanyunyu Kyota  told CPJ he has received at least four death threats from anonymous callers purporting to be members of DRC intelligence agents. Kanyunyu has worked for the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle in the country’s Beni city and runs a WhatsApp group called “Habari Moto Moto,” which serves as a forum for local political news. The anonymous callers suggested that content Kanyunyu shared on “Habari Moto Moto”, including old videos of Tshisekedi, have been overly supportive of opposition presidential candidate Moïse Katumbi. Kanyunyu told CPJ that he was not or against working for any candidate, but rather in favor of the population who have the right to information relating to the election, and that he had gone into hiding as a result of the threats.
  
  Sébastien Kauma, the Beni police commander, told CPJ on December 8 that he was not aware of the threats and promised to instruct his officers to investigate.
  

• On November 27, a security agent working for the Union for the Congolese Nation (UNC) and around 10 of its supporters punched Jerry Lombo Alauwa, who works as a reporter with the privately owned Canal Congo Télévision (CCTV) and Radio Liberté Kisangani (RALIK) broadcasters, in the head and arm, and pulled his clothes as he covered a presidential campaign event for opposition politician Moïse Katumbi, in Kisangani, the capital of the DRC’s eastern Tshopo province, according to media reports and Lombo who spoke to CPJ. Lombo said the supporters did not want him covering the opposition campaign, and the attack left his hand injured and his camera damaged.
  
  The UNC supporters who attacked Lombo had been waiting for the arrival of Vital Kamerhe, the UNC party president and political ally of Tshisekedi, who was scheduled to arrive for a separate campaign event, when they spotted and attacked the journalist, Lombo said in a letter to the National Press Union of Congo (UNPC), which CPJ reviewed.
  
  CPJ’s calls to Kamerhe went unanswered and calls to UNC Secretary General Billy Kambale did not connect.
  

• On November 28, Desis Koyo, the mayor of the Mongala province’s capital, Lisala, issued an order banning all programs of the private Radio Top Lisala broadcaster for “incitement to hatred and serious harm to the process current election in the DRC,” according to Koyo who spoke on the phone with CPJ and director of this media Ernest Ngasa who spoke with CPJ. The outlet ceased broadcasting the same day and remains closed, they said.

• Two days earlier, on November 26, Radio Top Lisala had broadcast information suggesting Rwandan influence over certain political parties and that these actors had tried to dissuade voters in Lisala from supporting Tshisekedi and his political ally Jean-Pierre Bemba, according to CPJ’s review of the content.
  
  Koyo had previously closed Radio Top Lisala from October 6 until November 14.
  
  The general rapporteur of the official Congolese media regulatory body, known as the High Council for Audiovisual and Communication (CSAC), Oscar Kabamba, told CPJ that he was not informed of the banning, that he would contact Koyo, who does not have the power to close a media outlet without input from the regulator.

• On December 9, around 20 supporters of the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS), Tshisekedi’s political party, attacked and punched Mao Zigabe, a correspondent with the privately owned television broadcaster Digital Congo, at a hotel in Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, according to media reports and Zigabe who spoke to CPJ. The attackers carried UDPS party flags and wore t-shirts with images of Tshisekedi, who was scheduled to visit the city the next day. Zigabe said he had gone to the hotel to work and was editing footage of other campaign events when the supporters recognized him and accused him of regularly publishing information in favor of the opposition.

• Zigabe said that he had sought treatment at a local hospital for pain in his leg and planned to file a complaint to police.

CPJ called the secretary general of the UDPS, Augustin Kabuya, but he did not answer.

• On December 5, four armed soldiers arrived outside the home of Neyker Tokolo, a reporter with the privately owned Radio Liberté in Lisala fired their guns into the air, and threw four tear gas canisters inside, according to Tokolo, and the president of the local human rights organization Youth Action for Social Welfare (AJBS), Roger Nzumbu, who both spoke to CPJ.

Tokoko said he contacted the head of the Lisala military prosecutor’s office, who sent inspectors who found bullet casings and traces of military boots outside the home and promised to investigate further and identify those responsible.

The police commander of Mongale province, General Jean Yav Mukaya, told CPJ that he had not been informed of the Tokolo attack. Jacques Ebengo Kisombe, the military prosecutor of Lisala, did not pick up CPJ’s calls. In addition to these actions, on December 6, the Kinshasa/Gombe court rejected Stanis Bujakera’s fourth request for provisional release, one of his lawyers, Ndikulu Yana, told CPJ.

On December 1, the court denied Bujakera’s request for an independent expert to give a second opinion on evidence presented against him, instead imposing an expert of its choosing, Yana said. Bujakera, who works as a correspondent for the privately owned Jeune Afrique news website and Reuters news agency, and is also a deputy director of publication for the DRC-based news website Actualite.cd has remained in detention since September 8. In late November, a group of media outlets published findings that called technical evidence presented against Bujakera “false.” Yana said Bujakera’s next court date is scheduled for December 22.

In the DRC’s elections set for next week, President Felix Tshisikedi is running for a second term against one of the leaders of the opposition  Martin Fayulu, who claimed victory in the 2018 vote, and Nobel-winning gynecologist Denis Mukwege, among others.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Arlene Getz/CPJ Editorial Director.

In an effort to address the ongoing drought affecting the Southwest, the Gila River Indian Community is taking an innovative step forward by launching its Solar Canal Project to construct the country’s first solar-over-canal project. 

“A tribe is leading the way,” Gila River Indian Community Governor Stephen Roe Lewis said, adding that the shovel-ready project will immediately address water conservation.

The Gila River Indian Community and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers signed an agreement on Thursday in Sacaton, Arizona, kicking off construction on the first phase of the Pima-Maricopa Irrigation Project Renewal Energy Pilot Project, which is expected to be completed in 2025.

“This new technology fits and supports our culture and tradition as we look forward to being sustainable in the future in a very real way,” Lewis said. The project may break new ground for the tribe, but he said it furthers their role as stewards of their water.

Lewis said they’re looking at this in terms of a Blue-Green Tribal Agricultural Economy, in which blue represents conserving water and green symbolizes renewable energy.

The GRIC has over 150 miles of canal that could ultimately be covered with solar panels, and this project could be a game-changer for creating energy. 

The first phase of the project involves the construction of solar panels over a portion of the GRIC’s Interstate 10 Level Top canal, according to the tribe, and the project works to conserve water and generate renewable energy for tribal irrigation facilities.

David Deyoung, the director of the Pima-Maricopa Irrigation Project, said there are two ways this project can conserve water: reducing the evaporative water losses and minimizing water use for power generation. The combination, he said, will save about 200 acre-feet a year.

The project is expected to produce approximately 1 megawatt of renewable energy to offset energy needs and costs for tribal farmers, according to the GRIC.  

The solar panels are expected to cover more than 1,000 feet of the canal as part of phase one of the project. Lewis said he hopes to launch phase two in December, which involves installing solar panels on top of more canals near Casa Blanca.

Michael Connor, the assistant secretary of the Army for civil works, called the project incredibly innovative work toward clean energy and water conservation.

“The community has helped us innovate our process for working with tribes,” Conner said in a video about the signing shared on X.

Lewis said it’s great to see all the plans come to fruition, and he believes that the Gila River Indian Community is setting new ground for other tribes to follow.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Arizona’s Gila River Indian Community moves forward with first solar canal project in the US on Nov 18, 2023.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Shondiin Silversmith, Arizona Mirror.

Since February, CPJ has documented two journalists’ deaths, several reporters fleeing their homes, and numerous other threats and attacks on the press as gangs have taken over much of Port-au-Prince, killing, raping, burning homes, and terrorizing communities.

The journalists’ work appeared to be a clear motive for the abduction in some cases, though money and visibility were also likely factors. In every case, a ransom was paid to secure the release of the victim, although no one was willing to disclose the amount paid.

• On February 3, suspected gang members kidnapped Haitian journalist Jean Thony Lorthé, host of the show, “Memory Refresh,” on privately owned radio and television outlet Radio Vision 2000.

Lorthé told CPJ that he was headed to a funeral in Port-au-Prince’s Carrefour Feuilles neighborhood with his wife and brother at around 7 p.m. when they were ambushed at a crossroads by a dozen heavily armed men in the Laboule 12 neighborhood, which is controlled by the Tik Makak gang.

“They took us hostage and confiscated our two vehicles, stripping us of jewelry, cell phones, and cash,” Lorthé told CPJ.

Lorthé said he believed his journalism was a motive in the kidnapping. “I was asked a lot of questions about Radio Vision 2000, about some of my reports, and they questioned me about the government,” he said. The gang leader was present at the kidnapping, he said, taking that as a sign that the abduction was planned.

The three captives were freed after 15 days following the payment of a ransom. Lorthé, who has since left the country, said he went to the Central Directorate of the Judicial Police, responsible for investigating serious crimes in Haiti, to make a statement but he had not heard anything since and did not know if the police were investigating the case.

“Generally speaking, the police don’t react. Especially since the police don’t have the means or the strategy to confront the gangs,” he said. “I was given a certificate of my statement. I’m not aware of anything else.”

A spokesperson for the Haitian police did not respond to a request for comment on Lorthé‘s case.

• On March 17, Lebrun Saint-Hubert, owner of the community radio station RCH 2000 and host of a current affairs show “Konfizyon” (Confusion), was kidnapped and held captive for eight days. 

Saint-Hubert told CPJ that eight armed men dressed in black took him hostage around 7 p.m. in the Delmas 39 area of Port-au-Prince while he was drivingto a restaurant he owns, Kora Bar & Grill. The kidnappers demanded $1.5 million in ransom, said Saint-Hubert, who declined to tell CPJ how much he paid.

Upon his release, Saint-Hubert, who also filed a complaint with the police and briefly left the country. He has since returned to Haiti and resumed hosting his show.Saint-Hubert, who also works as a police officer, said he had requested to be transferred to a safer neighborhood. “No one can move in Haiti. It’s like a prison,” he said, in reference to the volatile situation on the ground.

Saint-Hubert confirmed that a dispute with a local politician over ownership of the radio station may have been the motive for the kidnapping, as reported by local media, but said he could not be certain who was responsible.

• From April 10 to 21, Robert Denis, the 75-year-old owner of the TV station Canal Bleu, was held captive until he paid an undisclosed ransom, he told CPJ.

Denis, who is also president of the National Association of Haitian Media,said hewas stopped by armed men while driving his car at 10 a.m. on the Route de Frères, east of the capital. Denis said that he was held in an empty room, where he slept on the floor, and was subjected to death threats.

“They only had one objective: money,” said Denis, adding that his car, laptop, passport, and other documents were stolen.

Denis said he filed a complaint with the police but had little hope of the case being resolved. “They said they would investigate, but it’s like we are at war. The police don’t have the resources to protect everyone. The gangs can kill and kidnap, and they know nothing will happen to them,” he said.

CPJ has previously documented the kidnappings of three other journalists in the country:

• On June 20, Pierre-Louis Opont, president of Haiti’s independent Télé Pluriel channel 44, was kidnapped a week after the brief abduction of his wife, Marie Lucie Bonhomme, a veteran journalist for  Radio Vision 2000, in Port-au-Prince’s Tabarre neighborhood. Bonhomme told CPJ that she was freed after several hours while her husband was held for over two months before his release.
• On July 21, Blondine Tanis, a host on the local broadcaster Radio Renovation FM, was kidnapped by unidentified people at her home in the Delmas neighborhood of Port-au-Prince. She was released on July 30 after a ransom was paid. In each case, victims told CPJ that they were unaware of any effort by the police or judicial authorities to investigate the incidents.

Haiti is one of the world’s most dangerous places for journalists. CPJ has documented the killings of nine journalists since 2021, with six confirmed to have been killed in connection with their work.

“Journalists must strike a balance between their duty to inform and their obligation to stay alive,” Lorthé said. “To protect themselves, they must analyze situations carefully before approaching gangs,” adding that journalists do not have the training or the equipment to protect themselves when covering gangs. 

On October 2, the United Nations Security Council approved sending an international security mission to Haiti to support the police in regaining territory from the gangs.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

The post What is Behind “the Canal Conflict” Between the Dominican Republic and Haiti? appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Danny Shaw.

Authorities first arrested Barahona, who hosts a political affairs show on the local station Canal 29 in the northeastern city of Apopa, in June 2022 and held him for 11 months under the country’s state of emergency for allegedly associating with criminal gangs, according to news reports and the Salvadoran Journalist Association. He was released on parole in May 2023, and is barred from leaving the country.

On Wednesday, July 26, a criminal court unexpectedly summoned Barahona for a hearing about potential changes to his parole, and authorities detained him overnight, the journalist told CPJ in a phone interview. Following his release on Thursday, Barahona’s lawyer told members of the press that the outcome of a court hearing was “positive,” but said he could not disclose further details.

“Salvadoran authorities should never have arrested journalist Victor Barahona in the first place, and his recent detention along with vague potential changes in his parole will only serve to further intimidate him over his work,” said Cristina Zahar, CPJ’s Latin America and the Caribbean program coordinator, in São Paulo. “Authorities must drop any investigation into Barahona, ensure that he can do his work in peace, and cease using the country’s state of emergency as an excuse to stifle the press.”

Barahona told CPJ that he has worked as a journalist for over 30 years, and hosts interviews about politics and social affairs.

The journalist association’s statement said the organization was providing legal support to Barahona and maintained his innocence. It said Barahona had not received access to the court filing detailing the specific allegations against him.

Barahona was not included in CPJ’s 2022 census of journalists imprisoned for their work because CPJ was not aware of his case at the time.

CPJ emailed the Salvadoran prosecutor’s office for comment but did not receive any reply.

El Salvador has been in a state of emergency since the end of March 2022 following an escalation in homicides attributed to gangs. According to news reports, the government has detained more than 65,000 people since then. In March, local human rights groups said that at least 5,082 people had their rights violated during the crackdown, mainly due to arbitrary detentions.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

On June 23, Burkina Faso’s media regulator, the Superior Council for Communication (known by its French acronym CSC), suspended LCI, which is part of private broadcaster TF1, for three months for allegedly airing false information about deteriorating security conditions in the country on its current affairs show, “24H Pujadas,” according to several media reports and a copy of the decision.

“We call on the Burkinabè authorities to reverse their decision and immediately lift the suspension of LCI’s broadcasting,” said Angela Quintal, CPJ’s Africa program coordinator in New York. “The latest suspension of a French media outlet over its insurgency reporting appears retaliatory rather than grounded in fact and robs the people of Burkina Faso of their right to know what is happening in their country.”

Thousands of Burkinabè citizens have died and millions have been displaced in the eight-year insurgency led by militants affiliated with Al-Qaeda and Islamic State, who currently control large areas of the country. Soured relations between France, the country’s former colonial power, and Burkina Faso’s ruling military junta led to the February withdrawal of French troops helping to fight the insurgents.

LCI is the third French outlet to be suspended since December 2022 in Burkina Faso after France 24’s suspension in March and the radio station RFI in December. In addition, two French journalists working for Le Monde and Libération were expelled from Burkina Faso in April.

The CSC suspension decision said commentary by LCI’s popular “24H Pujadas” host, Abnousse Shalmani, on an April 24 segment titled “Sahel, the lost zone” was “not based on any concrete evidence” and “lacked objectivity and credibility.” It also said the report exaggerated the scale of the insurgency and “seditiously” exposed “unverified” failures in Burkina Faso’s military response to the insurgency, Reuters reported.

Blahima Traoré, CSC general secretary, told CPJ by messaging app that the three satellite television providers that carry LCI for subscribers, were formally notified of the decision on June 23.

Canal+ Burkina, Neerwaya Multivision, and Stars Médias Burkina—the three providers—would be “liable for penalties” if they failed to suspend LCI for three months from the notification date, a CSC notification sent to Canal+ Burkina’s general manager said. At least one of the three—Canal+ Burkina—has suspended LCI broadcasts, but the channel is still available online, Guézouma Sanogo, president of the Association of Journalists of Burkina, told CPJ via messaging app on July 10. CPJ was not able to immediately confirm whether Neerwaya Multivision and Stars Médias Burkina have suspended LCI broadcasts.

According to Article 46 of the 2013 law that establishes the regulator and sets out its powers and composition, the CSC can suspend the broadcasting of a program “for a maximum of three months” depending on the seriousness of the breach.

CPJ tried unsuccessfully to contact LCI and Shalmani for comment via their social media accounts.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

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This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Dongsheng News.

On Friday, June 9, a judge in the capital city of Managua convicted Ticay, a correspondent for the privately owned TV station Canal 10, on charges of undermining national integrity and disseminating false news and transferred him to the Jorge Navarro Prison, known as “La Modelo.” The journalist was denied the right to a private defense attorney and was instead assigned a public defender. 

The national integrity offense, a type of treason, is punishable by up to six years in prison, and false news, which is considered a form of cybercrime, can carry a maximum prison sentence of up to 10 years. CPJ was unable to determine when Ticay will be sentenced.

Police arrested Ticay on April 6 after he recorded an Easter celebration in the town of Nandaime and posted it on La Portada, a Facebook news page that he manages. Public Catholic celebrations are banned by the Nicaraguan government.

“It is shocking how far Nicaraguan officials are willing to go to silence a journalist just because he covered a public event on Facebook,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martinez de la Serna, in New York. “Victor Ticay has committed no crime, and Nicaraguan authorities should end these absurd criminal proceedings against him, release him immediately, and stop criminalizing journalism.”

During the hearing on Wednesday, June 7, the prosecutor’s office called at least two police officers and several government supporters as witnesses, who told the judge that the journalist’s videos “posed a threat to the peace and stability of Nicaraguan families,” according to a report by news website Despacho 505.  

CPJ’s email to the Nicaraguan judiciary for comment did not immediately receive a response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

• US calls China “aggressive”
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This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Dongsheng News.

On May 19, prosecutors accused Ticay, a correspondent for the Nicaraguan TV station Canal 10, of treason and cybercrime, according to multiple news reports. He has been held at a police station in Managua, the capital, since he was arrested while covering an Easter celebration on April 6.

“Nicaraguan authorities never should have detained journalist Victor Ticay in the first place. By accusing him of crimes that carry harsh prison sentences, authorities are showing how little regard they have for press freedom,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martinez de la Serna, in New York. “The case against Ticay should be dropped immediately and Nicaraguan law enforcement must stop targeting journalists for their work.”

Those news reports said that one suspect arrested at the same time and facing the same accusations as Ticay was expected in court on June 7. CPJ could not immediately determine if Ticay is also due in court on that date.

If charged and convicted of treason, Ticay could face up to six years in prison. Convictions for cybercrime carry up to 10 years.

CPJ repeatedly called the Nicaraguan national prosecutor’s office for comment, but no one answered.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

“The Committee to Protect Journalists is profoundly saddened by the death of journalist Arman Soldin while covering the war in Ukraine. We extend our deep condolences to his friends and family,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, in New York. “Journalists are civilians whose reporting from war zones is essential. We call on Russian and Ukrainian authorities to thoroughly investigate the circumstances of Soldin’s death.”

Soldin, a Bosnian-French video journalist with the French news agency Agence France-Presse, was killed in a rocket attack while working with four AFP journalists in the company of the Ukrainian military, according to those reports and Twitter posts by AFP. The four other journalists were uninjured. 

CPJ was not able to immediately confirm the source of the fire. Chasiv Yar is located near the frontline city of Bakhmut and is regularly shelled by Russian forces, according to media reports.

In an internal communication and an AFP draft statement reviewed by CPJ, AFP CEO Fabrice Fries said Soldin’s death was “a terrible reminder of the risks and dangers faced by journalists every day covering the conflict in Ukraine.” According to those sources, Soldin, 32, was one of the first AFP correspondents to enter Ukraine after the Russian invasion.

Soldin had worked with AFP since 2015 and became the agency’s Ukraine video coordinator in September 2022. He has been living in Ukraine since then, “leading the team’s coverage and traveling regularly to the front lines in the east and south,” the statement said. In Ukraine, Soldin worked exclusively with AFP as a staff journalist, an AFP representative told CPJ via email.

“Arman’s brilliant work encapsulated everything that has made us so proud of AFP’s journalism in Ukraine,” AFP Global News Director Phil Chetwynd said in the internal communication. “He was courageous, creative, and tenacious. He was, above all, an excellent journalist who was totally committed to the story.”

A representative with French broadcaster Canal +, who declined to give their name, told CPJ via messaging app that Soldin has been working as a freelance journalist for the outlet’s sports department since 2019. His last report was from April 15.

“He went back to Ukraine right after, and was supposed to come back on May 26,” the representative said. “The football editorial team is in shock.”

Soldin is at least the 15th journalist to be killed while reporting on the war since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022.

On April 26, 2023, Ukrainian producer Bohdan Bitik was killed while reporting on the war. At least two other French journalists, Pierre Zakrzewski and Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff, have been killed covering the conflict.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

On May 5, police arrested Zamora while she traveled on a bus with her two children in the capital city of Managua, according to multiple news reports. Later that day, police raided Zamora’s house in the eastern coastal city of Bluefields and confiscated her computer, according to those reports and a person familiar with the case who spoke to CPJ on the condition of anonymity, citing safety concerns. 

Authorities charged Zamora with spreading false news and released her around midnight, according to those sources. If convicted, she faces up to 10 years in prison. 

“With the recent detentions of multiple journalists, the Nicaraguan government is showing once again that it has zero respect for the freedom of the press,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martínez de la Serna, in New York. “Authorities must halt their absurd campaign to threaten the press and immediately drop any criminal case against journalist Hazel Zamora.”

On May 6, authorities transported Zamora to Bluefields, where they released her on the condition that she report to the police daily.  

Zamora has worked as a journalist for 16 years, covering the Caribbean coastal region for privately owned TV broadcaster Canal 10 and posting news about the region on her Facebook page Doce Noticias including social issues, crime, and the cost of living, according to a person familiar with her case.

Previously, on May 3, authorities also arrested and freelance journalist William Aragon and charged him with spreading false news; he is also required to report to the police daily.

Separately, on April 6, police arrested Canal 10 reporter Victor Ticay for broadcasting a Catholic Holy Week procession on Facebook. He remains imprisoned without charge.

CPJ’s email to the Nicaraguan national police did not immediately receive a response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

On the morning of Thursday, April 6, police in the southwestern town of Nandaime arrested Ticay, a reporter for the privately owned TV broadcaster Canal 10, according to multiple news reports. His detention stemmed from the journalist’s April 5 reporting on Facebook about a Catholic Easter celebration. The government of President Daniel Ortega has banned public expressions of religion.

“The Nicaraguan government has once again shown little respect for the right to freedom of expression amid an absurd climate of total censorship, which extends even to religious activities,” said CPJ Program Director Carlos Martínez de la Serna, in New York. “Authorities must release journalist Victor Ticay at once and cease their relentless campaign to intimidate and threaten the press into silence or exile.”

Press Freedom Alerts Nicaragua, a social media-based outlet that documents attacks on the media, reported that Ticay posted a video of the Easter celebration on the Facebook news page La Portada, which he runs, but it was taken down following his arrest. An executive at Canal 10 confirmed the journalist’s detention, those news reports said.

CPJ emailed the Nicaraguan national police but did not immediately receive a response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

The Peruvian National Association of Journalists said January 10 that at least 72 journalists had been harassed and attacked while covering the demonstrations demanding the ouster of President Dina Boluarte and the return to power of former President Pedro Castillo.

“Peruvian authorities must investigate the assaults of dozens of journalists covering protests in Lima and throughout the country, and hold those responsible to account,” said Carlos Martinez de la Serna, CPJ’s program director, in New York. “It is essential that authorities send a clear message that violence against the press is not tolerated, and that journalists’ essential role in covering the protests is fully respected.”

On January 19, demonstrators in Lima insulted, spit on, and punched reporter Lourdes Paucar and camera operator Willy Nieva, both with the independent TV station Canal N and its sister station América Televisión, and tried to steal their equipment, according to news reports and Paucar, who spoke with CPJ via messaging app. Paucar said they escaped the attack and were treated at a clinic for minor injuries.

Paucar told CPJ that protesters also attacked other members of their reporting team, throwing bottles, rocks, and bricks at driver Abdias Vidarte, technician Cristian Ydoña, and camera operator Jair Cabezas. She said protesters knocked out two of Vidarte’s teeth.

Ydoña was quoted in those reports saying that the protesters “caught me, hit me, and threw rocks. I had to hang onto our vehicle so they wouldn’t drag me away.”

Paucar told CPJ that many of the protesters accuse the media of supporting the ouster of former President Castillo, who was impeached and arrested in December.

“There is a lot of hatred aimed at the press. The protesters don’t trust us. They say we spread false news,” she said.

Also on January 19, protesters in Lima similarly surrounded, insulted, and spit on Jonathan Castro, a journalist for the social media-based outlet El Encerrona, and tried to steal his camera, he told CPJ via messaging app.

IPYS also reported that on January 20, protesters surrounded Omar Coca, a reporter for the Lima daily La Republica, and shoved him to the ground, and other protesters threw rocks at Andrea Amésquita, a journalist for the RPP radio outlet, striking her in the legs, and stole her microphone.

CPJ emailed the Lima police for comment but did not immediately receive any response.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

The list of suspended news outlets that PCIN shared with CPJ includes TV stations Canal San José, NGTV, and Canal RB3, as well as radio broadcasters Radio Darío, Radio Sky, Radio La Guarachera, Radio Vos, Radio San Carlos, Radio Hermanos, Radio Nuestra Señora de Lourdes, Radio Nuestra Señora de Fátima, Radio Allens, Radio Monte Carmelo, Radio San José, Radio Stereo Santa Lucía, Radio Stereo Sol, and Radio Stereo Fe. Other suspended news outlets asked not to be publicly named, according to Cristopher Mendoza, a representative of PCIN, who spoke with CPJ via phone.

At least 12 of the suspended radio stations were owned and managed by the Catholic church in the northern region of the country, Mendoza said.

On August 1, the regulator, the Instituto Nicaragüense de Telecomunicaciones y Correos (Telcor) suspended seven radio stations under the direction of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, the head of the Matagalpa diocese, according to Mendoza and a report by Reuters.

Álvarez was placed under house arrest after a raid on his home on August 19, according to CNN and a statement from the Nicaraguan police, which Nicaraguan news website Confidencial published on its site and posted on Twitter. The bishop is facing a criminal investigation for “destabilizing and provocative activities,” according to the police statement.

In announcing the closure of the seven radio stations on August 2, Telcor said the stations “did not meet the technical requirements to be on the air,” but it did not specify the requirements, according to Reuters.

In addition to providing religious programming, these radio stations served rural communities with local and national news, according to Mendoza. “For these communities, this was the only contact they had with what was happening at a national level,” he said.

On August 12, Telcor ordered the suspension of operations of Radio Darío, an independent news and opinion radio station in the northwest city of León, according to station owner Anibal Toruño, who spoke with CPJ over the phone, and a public statement by Telcor that Toruño shared on his Twitter account.

Toruño told CPJ that Telcor argued that official records contained incorrect information about the radio station, including the station’s address, the make and model of the transmitter, and the radio frequency. Toruño said that the address and transmitter had changed after the radio station’s headquarters were burned down in 2018, and staff had to move to another building and buy new equipment, as CPJ has documented.

“We notified the authorities about all of this. This is simply an excuse to silence us,” Toruño told CPJ.

On August 15, two other stations owned by Toruño, Radio Sky and La Guarachera, which broadcast music, also had their licenses revoked, according to news reports and Toruño.

CPJ sent an email to Telcor requesting comment, but did not receive any response.

CPJ has documented the Nicaraguan government’s ongoing crackdown against the press since a wave of protests in spring 2018, including imprisonments, criminal proceedings, raids on news outlets, criminal defamation charges, and physical attacks. At least one journalist was killed while covering protests in April 2018.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

Seen from space, the Sudd swamp is a giant green smudge where the White Nile, one of the great river’s two main branches, spreads out across flat arid land, forming myriad back channels that are often covered in floating vegetation. Africa’s largest freshwater wetland permanently occupies roughly 3,500 square miles in an otherwise dry region of South Sudan and floods up to 10 times more in the wet season.

But now the Sudd is under threat of being turned to desert by the revival of a half-completed engineering megaproject that would divert the Nile River away from the wetland and shorten its route north to the Mediterranean Sea.

Egypt, which sponsored the original ill-fated Jonglei Canal project 40 years ago, is set to fund the scheme, which would reduce evaporation from the swamp, and so deliver water downstream to its reservoirs. Ministers in the South Sudan government hope the canal will also reduce flooding around the swamp, which forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes last year.

But South Sudan’s environment ministry is fighting a rearguard action against the canal. It announced last month that it “will not approve the resumption or completion of the canal because of the ecosystem services that Sudd provides to our nation, the region and the world.”

Conservationists say even a partial loss of the Sudd would be an ecological disaster, desiccating the world’s second largest swamp and ending seasonal flooding of the surrounding grasslands, which comprise Africa’s largest intact area of savannah.

The Sudd is home to thousands of crocodiles, hippos, elephants, and zebras, as well as the majority of the world’s shoebill storks. It also sustains one of the world’s largest mammal migrations, in which around 1.3 million antelope — comprising white-eared kob, tiang, and Mongalla gazelle — move each year from the Sudd east across hundreds of miles of open grasslands to Gambella in Ethiopia. Much of this would be lost.

Meanwhile, hydrologists say that while cutting evaporation from the swamp may deliver water to Egypt, it will reduce rainfall for farms and rainforests across South Sudan and neighboring countries.

The Nile waters take more than a year to pass through the Sudd swamp. Around half the flow, some 3.4 cubic miles annually, evaporates in the tropical sun. The canal — which was first proposed by British colonial engineers in 1904 and was two-thirds completed in the 1980s before being abandoned because of a civil war — would radically reduce this loss, providing an estimated 1.15 cubic miles more water to irrigate crops downstream in Egypt.

The abandoned site of the half-completed Jonglei Canal is one of the strangest scenes in Africa. A dry excavation, 250 feet wide and up to 25 feet deep, extends across near-desert east of the Sudd for 160 miles, ending at the Bucketwheel, a 2,300-ton laser-guided digging machine as tall as a five-story building. The machine was brought there in 1978 by a French construction company, and for six years its 12 giant rotating buckets steadily excavated the canal.

By 1984, it had dug two-thirds of the intended canal. Then, work was abruptly halted after operators were kidnapped by rebel separatists intent on protecting the Sudd and turning the remote southern region of Sudan into a new state of South Sudan.

The rebels saw the canal as a theft of water by Egypt that would deprive the Sudd’s nomadic Dinka, Nuer, and Shilluk communities of fisheries and the huge seasonally flooded pastures essential for their livestock.

A 22-year civil war followed, which the rebels eventually won. But since South Sudan gained independence, some of the new country’s ministers have changed heart and want to complete the canal. They now see the Sudd not as an ecological asset, but as a threat.

In recent times, many former nomads have adopted more sedentary lifestyles with houses built in places vulnerable to the vagaries of the Sudd. Up to half a million people were forced to leave their homes last year as high flows in the Nile engorged the swamp. There have been growing calls in the government to both tame the flooding and harness the Sudd’s water for economic development.

A private presentation by then water minister Manawa Peter Gatkuoth to the Council of Ministers in December 2021, seen by Yale Environment 360, claims that the canal could provide water to irrigate up to 7.5 million acres, an area the size of Maryland, “upgrade river transport, tourism, trade, industry, and social development,” and improve the country’s food security, while growing export crops and allowing the development of fish farms. (Gatkuoth died suddenly from a heart condition on June 19.)

In February, South Sudan’s vice president for infrastructure, Taban Deng Gai, who comes from an area hit by recent flooding, became the first minister to publicly call for the canal to be completed. “For our land not to be submerged by flood, let’s allow this water to flow to those who need it in Egypt,” he said. The expectation is that the government of Egypt, which has most to gain from the project, would foot the bill. The Egyptian government did not respond to requests for comment.

Despite the drive to push ahead with the scheme, opponents are becoming organized. A loose coalition of environmentally concerned members of the National Legislature, academics, and government and NGO officials in South Sudan has pushed back, forming a Save The Sudd campaign. Several were interviewed for this article. Most wish to remain anonymous, but one who has broken cover is the vice chancellor of the University of Juba, John Akec.

In April, Akec launched a petition aimed at gaining 100,000 signatures to be presented to the country’s president. Akec says he was among the students half a century ago who protested against the plan, which “has the potential of draining and destroying the Sudd’s ecosystem, with dire consequences on the Sudd region’s biodiversity, livelihood, culture and hydrological cycle.”

Jacob Lupai, an associate professor of food security at Akec’s university, agrees. “The canal would bring about the total disappearance of many lakes … and reduce others to seasonal lagoons with a serious loss of year-round fish,” he says. Besides its ecological impacts, the canal would dry out grasslands whose annual flooding is “an essential seasonal resource during the driest months of the year.”

“South Sudan did not fight two costly and devastating wars … just to be at the receiving end of predatory outsiders’ imposed projects and to allow its precious natural resources to be plundered,” Lupai wrote in the Sudan Post in April.

Joshua Dau Diu, a member of the Jieng Council of Elders, a group of prominent Dinka politicians, called the development projects that the water ministry says could be made possible by the canal “imaginary and fallacious.”

For the moment, the environment ministry is siding with opponents of the project. With different ministries at loggerheads, South Sudan President Salva Kiir Mayardit has invited foreign experts to a meeting in July to discuss the management of the Nile and the Sudd. “The government wanted to know exactly the impact of Nile water, particularly the clearance of the Nile, the digging of the canal, and the ecological impact to South Sudan … so that the government can give approval or deny the approval,” a presidential spokesman said.

Foreign experts expected to attend did not disclose their opinions when contacted for comment. But many other outside experts are lining up with Save The Sudd.

“The Sudd provides an incredible list of benefits,” says Hannes Lang, who, as an environmental economist at the Technical University in Munich in 2016, coauthored a study of the Sudd’s economic, cultural, and ecological value for the UN Environment Programme. It moderates floods and local climate, maintains extensive groundwaters, captures carbon, and acts as a wildlife refuge, he said.

A 2020 assessment for the Nile Basin Initiative, an intergovernmental partnerships of governments along the river, put the total economic value of the Sudd for natural resources, regulating the river, and cultural and biodiversity benefits at $3.3 billion.

But all that could easily be lost, according to Lang. “Once the canal exists and the Sudd marsh is partially drained, it will be impossible to return to the previous state,” he says. “The ecosystem cannot just be filled again.”

The water and irrigation ministries of Egypt and South Sudan agreed to undertake joint projects on the Nile in 2020. Earlier this summer, in what many see as a prelude to the canal, they announced plans for massive dredging operations in the Sudd to relieve flooding. Last month the South Sudan ministry took delivery of several large Egyptian dredging machines to remove vegetation from 20 miles of waterways in the north of the swamp, “for the health of the river system.” The dredging would also, said the water minister on a trip to Cairo last year, increase water flow down the Nile.

But opponents say the dredging will pollute the river, destroy wetlands, forests, and grazing grounds, and damage water supplies for local communities.

The environment ministry agrees. With dredging set to start last month, it issued a statement saying that unless and until environmental and social assessments have been completed, “any dredging of the river is illegal.” And after hearing an application from a local lawyer, the East African Court of Justice, which has jurisdiction over South Sudan, granted a restraining order preventing the dredging for now, saying it was “environmentally untenable” and “will traverse protected area … with undue regard to livelihoods,” international environmental law, and human rights.

Still, the pressure on South Sudan from Egypt to carry out dredging and resume canal digging continues to grow.

A desert country of more than 100 million people, Egypt has become increasingly worried by food and water insecurity, especially since Ethiopia began building the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam on the Blue Nile, the river’s second largest tributary. Egypt’s leaders reportedly see the revival of the Jonglei Canal as an opportunity to compensate by increasing flows down the Nile’s other branch.

The canal’s supporters point out that it would not entirely dry up the Sudd, merely shrink it. Yet how much is uncertain. Published estimates of the loss range from 7 percent, suggested by Mariam Allam of MIT and Cairo University, to as high as 40 percent.

But hydrologists say the central premise of the canal project — that it can save water by reducing the evaporation “loss” in the Sudd — is misguided. The evaporated water is not lost, they say. It moistens the air and creates rainfall downwind that maintains forests and crops.

A detailed hydrological modeling study published in 2010 by Ruud van der Ent of the Delft University of Technology found that at least half of local rainfall is ultimately fed by evaporation from land. The University of Juba’s Akec says the water evaporating from the swamp and carried south on the winds is responsible for maintaining a “green belt” across most of southern South Sudan and into neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda. Shrinking the Sudd could eliminate all-year rains across this area, he says.

Drying the Sudd would also release greenhouse gases. The swamp has an estimated 6,200 square miles of peat, which holds more than 10 times as much carbon as an equivalent area of rainforest. It holds around 4 billion tons of carbon, much of which could be released if the canal is completed.

Some see Egypt’s promotion of the Jonglei Canal as ironic, since it is set to host the next UN climate conference later this year. “Egypt is not a credible host for the COP27 when it proposes this Jonglei Canal scheme, which would permanently undermine the climate resilience of the region,” says Jane Madgwick, CEO of the environment group Wetlands International, which opposes the canal. “The Sudd needs to be recognized as a massive natural asset, vital to future peace and prosperity.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Will a Nile canal project dry up Africa’s largest wetland? on Jul 8, 2022.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Fred Pearce.

The two states share rights to water from the South Platte River, and Republican politicians in Nebraska say that a new canal is necessary to guard the state’s water supply from encroachment by its fast-growing neighbor to the west.

The strange thing about the political firestorm, according to water experts, is that the canal wouldn’t really do anything. The water Nebraska wants to protect doesn’t face an immediate threat from Colorado, and in any case it’s not clear the canal would provide Nebraska any additional water beyond what it already receives. The total amount of water that could flow through the planned $500-million-dollar canal is unlikely to change the course of either state’s future.

“It’s sort of a weird claim,” said Anthony Schutz, an associate law professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and an expert on water issues. “I’m not sure what exactly this thing would protect us from.” 

Even if the canal doesn’t alter the balance of water between the two states, however, it does help Nebraska lawmakers spend down federal funding they received from the $1.9 trillion stimulus package passed by Congressional Democrats last year. It might also allow them to score political points by antagonizing the Democrats who govern Colorado. The episode comes as other parts of the western U.S. really do face wrenching, zero-sum tradeoffs in allocating water during an ongoing megadrought that has been exacerbated by climate change — and it may be a preview of how anxieties around those issues can be mobilized for partisan warfare.

The history behind the canal project is a curious footnote in the larger story of western water. Way back in 1923, Colorado and Nebraska signed a treaty that governed the use of one segment of the South Platte River, which flows from the Colorado Rockies through Denver and into Nebraska. The treaty required Colorado to send 150 cubic feet of water per second to Nebraska for the duration of the irrigation season—in other words, it prevented Colorado from drying up the river before Nebraska farmers could use it. The treaty also gave Nebraska the right to build a canal large enough to divert an additional 500 cubic feet of water per second during the irrigation offseason, but the project never came to fruition: Engineers had already tried and failed to build a canal through the rocky territory connecting the states in the late 1800s, and no one ever revived the idea.

For about a century, the treaty collected dust. Nebraska has perhaps the largest groundwater resources of any state, not to mention thousands of miles of rivers, so water wasn’t a huge issue. Plus, Colorado often exceeded its treaty obligations on the South Platte: From 1996 through 2015, the state delivered Nebraska almost 8 million more acre feet than it was required to deliver under the treaty. Around the same time, however, Colorado began drawing more from the South Platte to support booming population growth, primarily in the Denver area. 

In January of this year, Colorado officials released an updated plan for the South Platte, outlining almost 300 possible water diversion projects along the river. This list of projects was just hypothetical, but it caught the attention of Nebraska lawmakers. Governor Ricketts released a statement saying he was “vigilantly watching” the construction of new water infrastructure in Colorado, and he told the legislature “they are trying to take our water.” Even though water from the South Platte is far from essential to the survival of Nebraskan agriculture, and even though Colorado already delivered far more to Nebraska than it needed to under the treaty, Ricketts insisted the state needed to protect its water rights from the growing liberal metropolis to the west.

“It’s a bit of a straw man,” Schutz, the University of Nebraska water law expert, said of Nebraska’s concern about the Colorado projects. “A lot of those projects that [Colorado] is proposing wouldn’t actually decrease the availability of water.”

Even so, the century-old treaty gave Nebraska the theoretical rights to build a canal of its own, and the state had plenty of money to pursue such a project. That was thanks to President Biden’s American Rescue Plan, which doled out billions of dollars of pandemic recovery aid to Nebraska and left the state with a significant budget surplus. The state’s unicameral legislature has spent most of this year’s session trying to find ways to spend down that surplus, and the $500 million canal project was a perfect candidate. The legislature passed a bill in April that allocated $50 million to start canal construction, enough to start purchasing land in Colorado and conduct preliminary designs.

The legislature’s sudden move on the bill came as a shock to water experts. As one Colorado water manager put it, “the water world was rocked” when the bill passed. 

That’s because, according to Schutz, the very premise of the canal project is flawed. Ricketts argued that the canal would avert a “decrease [in] agricultural water supplies and [increased] pumping costs,” but neither scenario is in the cards, even if Colorado’s population keeps growing. Nebraska relies on groundwater for more than 80 percent of its farming irrigation, and the water that comes from the hypothetical canal would only arrive during the offseason anyway, so it wouldn’t help the state’s farmers. Meanwhile, the state’s water rights only cover one section of the South Platte, and Colorado has unlimited rights over a section of the river farther upstream, meaning the Centennial State can sustain future growth even without encroaching on Nebraska’s water.

Furthermore, Schutz says, it isn’t clear that there’s even enough water in the river to fill the canal, should it ever be built.

“If you look at the amount that’s coming in right now, that’s probably the maximum amount of water that we would ever get in the canal,” he told Grist. “And that is not a lot of water.” Not only that, but the treaty also only gives Nebraska the right to build a canal that can divert 500 cubic feet of water per second. It doesn’t actually give the state the right to that much water.

“From a political perspective, I think that the governor had to make Colorado into a bad guy, but then when you really get into the weeds I don’t know how bad of a guy Colorado is,” Schutz said, arguing that the state’s conservative government has been straining to find ways to spend away the federal stimulus money so that lawmakers “don’t have to deal with the political dynamics of having a bunch of extra cash to spend on social programs.”

As the bill neared passage this spring, the two governors sniped back and forth at each other in the media. Colorado Governor Polis called the project a “boondoggle” and said his state would “aggressively assert” its water rights. Ricketts shot back: “I didn’t know Jared Polis was so concerned about taxpayers here in Nebraska…. In fact, he’s never really talked to me.”

For now the debate is just a war of words, but it could escalate if the canal moves forward. Colorado and Nebraska have sued each other in the past over water, and indeed Colorado reached a settlement with Nebraska just a few years ago over claims that Colorado violated a water-sharing compact on a different river. Building the canal would require Nebraska to purchase or condemn farmland across state lines in Colorado, which would likely lead to litigation from private landowners as well. Colorado probably wouldn’t sue Nebraska until the latter actually began to build the canal, but if it did sue, the dispute would go straight to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The fact that such a minor water project can generate so much controversy is a sign that water security is becoming a key political issue even in places where the drought situation is not yet catastrophic. The century-old compact between Nebraska and Colorado, like the treaties that anchor the use of the Colorado River farther to the west, was designed in an era of cooperation and compromise between the states. As water supplies across the region continue to vanish, though, that interstate friendliness is vanishing with them. In its place has emerged a conflict over how to balance competing interests like agriculture and urban growth. In this case, though, the conflict is more reminiscent of a schoolyard fight than a grand political debate.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Is Nebraska building a $500 million ‘canal to nowhere’ just to own the libs? on Jun 3, 2022.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Jake Bittle.

In the early afternoon of May 16, journalist Alexandre Megale said he was assaulted and hit with rocks by Paulo Luiz de Cantuária, a council member for the city of Ouro Fino in the southeast Brazilian state of Minas Gerais,  according to several news reports, a statement from the Brazilian Association of Investigative Journalism (Abraji), and Megale, who spoke to CPJ in a phone interview. Megale said the attack injured his shoulder, left hand, and head.

Megale, who founded the YouTube news channel Canal Sul das Gerais in April 2020, told CPJ he believes Cantuária assaulted him in retaliation for the journalist mentioning the council member’s 16-year jail sentence for child rape during a broadcast report about another rape case. Megale had previously reported the court’s decision on Cantuária’s case on September 8, 2021.

“Luckily, journalist Alexandre Megale was not seriously injured, but this was an unacceptable violent assault against a journalist, and Minas Gerais state authorities must ensure a timely and thorough investigation of the incident and bring the responsible party to justice,” said Natalie Southwick, CPJ’s Latin America and the Caribbean program coordinator, in New York. “Local journalists should be able to report safely without fear of violence or reprisal from public officials.”

Megale told CPJ he went to the Pinhalzinho dos Góes neighborhood in Ouro Fino on May 16 to investigate alleged irregularities in a construction site. He said he was on his motorcycle asking a man for directions when Cantuária arrived in his car.  

As Megale tried to ride away from the area, he fell from his motorcycle but kept walking as Cantuária picked up rocks and ran towards him, yelling “get out of here,” and “I’ll teach you.” Megale told CPJ that Cantuária hit him with rocks in his shoulder, head, and hand as he was trying to protect his face, adding that his helmet saved him from major injuries.

According to Megale, after being hit several times he passed out on the ground for a brief period and woke up surrounded by residents who had called an ambulance. He was taken to Santa Casa, a local hospital, where he was examined and treated for his injuries, and left the hospital the same day.   

“These assaults cause fear and insecurity, not only to the person who suffered the aggression but to other journalists as well,” Megale told CPJ. In its statement, Abraji said “the journalist was assaulted for exercising his role to inform” and that “an attack of this nature cannot remain unpunished nor be treated as a simple disagreement.”

Megale told CPJ that a military police officer came to the Santa Casa hospital to hear the journalist’s account and register the incident. On Wednesday, May 18, Megale said he went to the Ouro Fino Civil Police station, the unit responsible for investigating the case, to make a statement and on Thursday he was examined at the Medical Forensic Institute in the neighboring city of Pouso Alegre.

The Ouro Fino City Council, in a statement they sent CPJ via email, said they could not locate Cantuária and are looking into the case. CPJ emailed the Minas Gerais state press office for comment but did not receive any replies. CPJ called the Ouro Fino City Council and Paulo Araújo, the Council press officer, told CPJ that Cantuária was not there, that he hadn’t been there the past few days, and that the council member did not have an email.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

“We are saddened by the news of the death today of Chilean journalist Francisca Sandoval, who was shot while covering a demonstration on May 1, and express our condolences to her family and colleagues,” said Natalie Southwick, CPJ’s Latin America and the Caribbean program coordinator, in New York. “Chilean authorities must ensure that those responsible for this killing are brought to justice, and that media workers are allowed to work without risking their lives.”

On May 1, gunmen opened fire during a Workers’ Day demonstration in the Barrio Meiggs area of Santiago, the capital, as well as during looting that followed the demonstration, injuring at least three members of the press, including Sandoval, as CPJ documented at the time

Sandoval, 29, who was covering the demonstration for the local broadcaster Canal Señal 3 La Victoria, was shot in the face and remained in critical condition at the Posta Central hospital in Santiago until her death on Thursday, May 12, according to those reports, which said that her suspected shooter is in police custody.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.

On Sunday, May 1, gunmen opened fire during a Workers’ Day demonstration in the Barrio Meiggs area of Santiago, the capital, as well as during looting that followed the demonstration, injuring at least three members of the press, according to news reports and a statement by the Chilean Journalists Union, an independent professional association of journalists.

Francisca Sandoval, who was covering the demonstration for the local community broadcaster Canal Señal 3 La Victoria, was shot in the face and remains in critical condition at the Posta Central hospital in Santiago, according to those sources.

Fabiola Moreno, a reporter for Radio 7, was shot in the shoulder, and Roberto Caro, a reporter with the community news outlet Prensa Piensa, was shot in the leg, according to those news reports and Chilean Journalists Union President Danilo Ahumada, who spoke to CPJ via messaging app. Both journalists received medical treatment and were discharged, Ahumada said.

“Chilean authorities must thoroughly investigate the shootings of three reporters at a Workers’ Day demonstration, and ensure that the perpetrators are brought to justice,” said CPJ Latin America and the Caribbean Program Coordinator Natalie Southwick, in New York. “Protests are consistently one of the most dangerous environments for journalists in Chile, and it is essential that they be allowed to cover demonstrations safely and without fear of violence.”

Shortly after the incident, Chilean police detained two suspects in the shootings, and the prosecutor’s office ordered that they remain under house arrest, according to news reports.

On Monday, the Chilean Investigative Police detained a third suspect, believed to have shot Sandoval, according to press reports and a tweet by the Ministry of Interior.

CPJ called the Chilean Investigative Police for comment at the phone number listed on its official website, but the call did not connect.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Erik Crouch.