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 Washington — Local media in Myanmar are reporting that six FTC-2000G fighter jets purchased from China have arrived, and observers are concerned that Chinese military support for the Myanmar military is prolonging the conflict and worsening civilian suffering.  China's supply of fighter jets, such as the FTC-2000G, has helped the junta maintain air superiority, and that has caused widespread casualties across Myanmar. According to media reports, this delivery in August 2024 is the second batch of FTC-2000G jets received by Myanmar’s military. The junta took delivery of the first batch in November 2022.  Military-controlled media later showed the FTC-2000G aircraft at a Myanmar Air Force ceremony on Dec. 15, 2022. The second batch is widely expected to be showcased at this year’s Air Force Day celebration in December.  Zay Ya, a former sergeant in the Myanmar Air Force, explained to VOA from an undisclosed location on the Thai-Myanmar border, “Many of the Russian-made Yak-130s are out of service, so the Chinese jets are now critical to the military’s operations."  He added that the Chinese jets are already used in combat, with several stationed at key air bases.  Zay Ya, who served in Myanmar’s Air Force for nearly a decade, deserted the military following the February 2021 overthrow of an elected government and is now assisting fellow former service members who have joined the Civil Disobedience Movement against the military junta.  Based on his hands-on experience with the Myanmar Air Force, Zay Ya pointed out that Russia’s aircraft are high-cost and fuel-consuming, while Chinese planes are more compatible with Myanmar’s existing defense industry. "The Russian-made Sukhoi Su-30 — four of them arrived before the FTC-2000G — but the FTC-2000G can be used immediately," Zay Ya said.  VOA’s Burmese Service contacted the Myanmar government’s military information team in Nay Pyi Taw and the Chinese Embassy in Yangon and Washington, D.C., regarding the delivery of FTC-2000G jets but has not yet received a response.  Use of FTC-2000G  The FTC-2000G’s ability to carry missiles, rockets and bombs has significantly enhanced the junta’s airstrike capabilities, particularly in conflict zones like northern Shan State and areas controlled by the Brotherhood Alliance, an ethnic armed group near the Chinese border, according to the observers.  A report by Justice for Myanmar and Info Birmanie highlighted how China's FTC-2000G aircraft have been used for air raids on civilian areas. On Jan. 16, 2024, opposition forces downed an FTC-2000G jet involved in an attack over the Namhpatkar region in northern Shan State. In December 2023, another FTC-2000G jet dropped bombs on residential buildings near Namkham.  ‘It will not shift the balance’  Dr. Abdul Rahman Yaacob, an expert on Southeast Asia’s defense and security issues with Lowy Institute, commented on the broader implications of the jet deliveries. “China is clearly taking sides in the civil war,” he told VOA. “It shows that China is not a neutral actor in the Myanmar crisis by supplying arms to the junta."  While the delivery of combat aircraft may give the junta some tactical advantage, Yaacob said, “Overall, it will not shift the balance to the side of the junta. The junta is actually facing a counterinsurgency. An insurgency campaign cannot be dealt with just by air power alone. It has to be fought by foot soldiers. And this is where the junta is facing a major problem — it has a shortage of manpower.”  Several experts believe China’s actions are about more than military support.  Jason Tower, the country director for the Burma program at the United States Institute of Peace, or USIP, told VOA, "It’s very clear that China still sees the Myanmar military as the government of Myanmar, and it seems unlikely that over the short term, China’s posture is going to change."  He argues that the sale of the fighter jets signals China’s intention to maintain stability in Myanmar and convince other international actors to accept the military junta.  Thomas Kean, a senior consultant at the International Crisis Group, said China’s goal is to stabilize Myanmar and protect its strategic interests. "I think China wants stability and a degree of normalization," Kean said. "China is pushing for a deal between the military and ethnic armed groups."  Civilian impact, international calls  The conflict has displaced millions, with the United Nations estimating that more than 2.3 million people have fled their homes since the coup. Bombings have targeted schools, hospitals, and residential areas with little regard for civilian lives, according to the U.N.  The international community has condemned Myanmar’s military for its atrocities. In a statement to the U.N. Human Rights Council, Nicholas Koumjian, head of the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, said, "In many instances, civilians are not just collateral damage but the target of attacks, which appear intended to create terror."  Human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Justice for Myanmar, have called on China to stop arms transfers to the junta.  

NEW YORK — You've heard the horror stories: Someone casting multiple ballots, people voting in the name of dead relatives, mail-in ballots being intercepted.  Voter fraud does happen occasionally. When it does, we tend to hear a lot about it. It also gets caught and prosecuted.  The nation's multilayered election processes provide many safeguards that keep voter fraud generally detectable and rare, according to current and former election administrators of both parties.  America's elections are decentralized, with thousands of independent voting jurisdictions. That makes it virtually impossible to pull off a large-scale vote-rigging operation that could tip a presidential race — or almost any other race.  "You're probably not going to have a perfect election system," said Republican Trey Grayson, a former Kentucky secretary of state and the advisory board chair of the Secure Elections Project. "But if you're looking for one that you should have confidence in, you should feel good about that here in America."  What's stopping people from committing voter fraud?  Voting more than once, tampering with ballots, lying about your residence to vote somewhere else, or casting someone else's ballot are crimes that can be punished with hefty fines and prison time. Non-U.S. citizens who break election laws can be deported.  For anyone still motivated to cheat, election systems in the United States are designed with multiple layers of protection and transparency intended to stand in the way.  For in-person voting, most states either require or request voters provide some sort of ID at the polls. Others require voters to verify who they are in another way, such as stating their name and address, signing a poll book or signing an affidavit.  People who try to vote in the name of a recently deceased friend or family member can be caught when election officials update voter lists with death records and obituaries, said Gail Pellerin, a Democratic in the California Assembly who ran elections in Santa Cruz County for more than 27 years.  Those who try to impersonate someone else run the risk that someone at the polls knows that person or that the person will later try to cast their own ballot, she said.  What protections exist for absentee voting?  For absentee voting, different states have different ballot verification protocols. All states require a voter's signature. Many states have further precautions, such as having bipartisan teams compare the signature with other signatures on file, requiring the signature to be notarized or requiring a witness to sign.  That means even if a ballot is erroneously sent to someone's past address and the current resident mails it in, there are checks to alert election workers to the foul play.  A growing number of states offer online or text-based ballot tracking tools as an extra layer of protection, allowing voters to see when their ballot has been sent out, returned and counted.  Federal law requires voter list maintenance, and election officials do that through a variety of methods, from checking state and federal databases to collaborating with other states to track voters who have moved.  Ballot drop boxes have security protocols, too, said Tammy Patrick, chief executive officer for programs at the National Association of Election Officials.  She explained the boxes are often designed to stop hands from stealing ballots and are surveilled by camera, bolted to the ground and constructed with fire-retardant chambers, so if someone threw in a lit match, it wouldn't destroy the ballots inside.  Sometimes, alleged voter fraud isn't what it seems  After the 2020 election, social media surged with claims of dead people casting ballots, double voting or destroyed piles of ballots on the side of the road.  Former President Donald Trump promoted and has continued to amplify these claims. But the vast majority of them were found to be untrue.  An Associated Press investigation that explored every potential case of voter fraud in the six battleground states disputed by Trump found there were fewer than 475 out of millions of votes cast. That was not nearly enough to tip the outcome. Democrat Joe Biden won the six states by a combined 311,257 votes.  The review also showed no collusion intended to rig the voting. Virtually every case was based on an individual acting alone to cast additional ballots. In one case, a man mistakenly thought he could vote while on parole. In another, a woman was suspected of sending in a ballot for her dead mother.  Former election officials say that even more often, allegations of voter fraud turn out to result from a clerical error or a misunderstanding.  Pellerin said she remembered when a political candidate in her county raised suspicion about many people being registered to vote at the same address. It turned out the voters were nuns who all lived in the same home.  Patrick said that when she worked in elections in Maricopa County, Arizona, mismatched signatures were sometimes explained by a broken arm or a recent stroke. In other cases, an elderly person tried to vote twice because they forgot they had already submitted a mail ballot.  "You really have to think about the intent of the voter," Patrick said. "It isn't always intuitive."  Why voter fraud is unlikely to affect the presidential race  It would be wrong to suggest that voter fraud never happens.  With millions of votes cast in an election year, it's almost guaranteed there will be a few cases of someone trying to game the system. There also have been more insidious efforts, such as a vote-buying scheme in 2006 in Kentucky.  In that case, Grayson said, voters complained, and an investigation ensued. Then participants admitted what they had done.  He said the example shows how important it is for election officials to stay vigilant and constantly improve security in order to help voters feel confident.  But, he said, it would be hard to make any such scheme work on a larger scale. Fraudsters would have to navigate onerous nuances in each county's election system. They also would have to keep a large number of people quiet about a crime that could be caught at any moment by officials or observers.  "This decentralized nature of the elections is itself a deterrent," Grayson said. 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks directly to the people of Lebanon, telling them they have an opportunity to take their county back from Iran-backed Hezbollah or face a long war with destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza. We talk with Alex Vatanka, the founding director of the Iran Program at the Middle East Institute. Netanyahu also had a phone conversation with U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday. It’s the first time they have spoken since August.

WASHINGTON — A prominent Ukrainian news outlet reported Wednesday it is facing “ongoing and systematic pressure” from the office of the Ukrainian president that is threatening the outlet’s work. In a statement on its website, the online newspaper Ukrainska Pravda said officials are being blocked from communicating with the outlet’s journalists, its reporters are being denied access to official events and businesses are being pressured to stop advertising on its website. In the statement, the outlet also highlighted a tense exchange between Ukrainska Pravda journalist Roman Kravets and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during a recent press conference. During the interaction, Zelenskyy questioned the outlet’s editorial independence. Ukrainska Pravda editor-in-chief Sevgil Musayeva told VOA it was important for the outlet to be honest with readers about the pressure it faces from the government. “Ukraine is fighting for the right to exist but also for the right to be democratic, independent and transparent,” Musayeva said from Kyiv. “And freedom of press and freedom of speech is one of [the] essential values of democracy. That’s why we will protect this value as much as we can,” Musayeva continued. Ukrainska Pravda said it views the government’s actions as attempts to influence the outlet’s editorial policy. The outlet has been facing this kind of pressure for about one year, but it has become even worse over the past two months, according to Musayeva. From now on, Ukrainska Pravda said, it will make public any attempts by the president’s office to pressure the outlet, according to the statement. “Each such attempt only strengthens our motivation to expose corruption and mismanagement in the highest ranks of power,” the statement said. “We call on everyone who values freedom of speech and the independence of Ukrainian journalism to join us in defending these values.” Media watchdogs — and Ukrainian journalists — have expressed concern about the state of press freedom in Ukraine in recent months amid Russia’s war on the country. In June, Reporters Without Borders, or RSF, said press freedom was “shrinking” in Ukraine, with challenges that include rising political pressure, surveillance and threats. “The pressure, threats and interference must stop,” Jeanne Cavelier, head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said in the June statement. “Despite their admirable resilience after Russia launched its full scale invasion on 24 February 2022, the Ukrainian media landscape remains fragile.” The Ukrainian president’s office, the Foreign Ministry and Ukraine’s Washington embassy did not immediately reply to VOA emails requesting comment for this story. Musayeva told VOA she believes the pressure is in response to critical coverage Ukrainska Pravda has produced about the Ukrainian government, including on misconduct and corruption. Ever since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Musayeva said, there has been a sense of less tolerance for news stories critical of the government. Still, the outlet will continue to cover all aspects of government, good or bad, she said. “We continue our critical coverage on some bad governance,” she said. “We still see that corruption didn’t disappear.” Musayeva said she recognizes the importance for the media to cover positive stories about Ukraine. “But at the same time, the role of independent media in democratic countries is to provide information for the people and truthful information for the people about the current situation,” she said.

Islamabad — Pakistan has justified its decision to outlaw a regional ethnic rights movement, citing alleged incitement of violence against the state and attempts to establish a “parallel judicial system” under the guise of peaceful public gatherings. The group, known as the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), has openly criticized the powerful Pakistani military and mainly gets support from residents of the militancy-hit northwestern tribal districts bordering Afghanistan. On Sunday, the government listed the PTM as a proscribed organization, saying it was engaged in activities “prejudicial to the peace and security of the country.” The ban drew backlash from local and international human rights groups. Wednesday, Federal Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi told a televised news conference in Islamabad that PTM leaders were using “abusive language” against security institutions at their rallies and promoting “racial discrimination” in Pakistan. The ban under the country’s anti-terrorism law allowed authorities to seal PTM offices, assets and bank accounts; seize literature; and prohibit public advocacy such as media statements or speeches. Naqvi spoke hours after hundreds of enraged PTM supporters clashed with police near Peshawar, the capital of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa border province, resulting in the deaths of at least three activists.  The violence took place in an area where the PTM had planned to hold a three-day public gathering Friday, called a "Pashtun National Jirga [assembly] Court.” It was intended to protest the civilian casualties and regional losses of property and commerce due to the increased Islamist militancy and army operations to counter the threat. "We cannot allow anyone to set up a parallel judicial system in the country,” the minister said. "You are allowed to engage in discussions about politics and rights, but you are not allowed to encourage people to revolt against national institutions or to provoke them to take up arms against these institutions,” Naqvi stated.  The independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, or HRCP, denounced the ban on the PTM as “neither transparent nor warranted” and criticized the subsequent use of force by police against the group’s members.  “We oppose any use of unwarranted and unlawful force against those protesters who are unarmed. The state has already taken disproportionate measures by proscribing the PTM and attempting to prevent it from holding this assembly," the watchdog said.  The HRCP noted that a provincial high court ruling had protected PTM supporters’ “right to assemble peacefully.”  Amnesty International has also demanded Pakistan immediately revoke the ban on the PTM. “The listing of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement as a proscribed organization, days ahead of their gathering scheduled on 11 October, is part of a systematic and relentless clampdown by the Pakistani authorities on peaceful protests and assemblies by dissenting groups,” the global rights defender said in a Tuesday statement. “This latest arbitrary ban under overbroad powers of the terror law is only the tip of the iceberg — for years, the Pakistani authorities have suppressed such movements from marginalized regions by resorting to unlawful use of force, enforced disappearances, and media bans on the coverage of protests or rallies,” said Babu Ram Pant, Amnesty’s deputy regional director for South Asia. Pakistan has experienced a surge in terrorist attacks claimed by or blamed on Tehrik-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, which is listed as a terrorist group by the United Nations. An alliance of banned Pakistani groups, TTP is commonly known as the Pakistani Taliban, and its fighters are mainly active in border districts, allegedly conducting cross-border attacks from sanctuaries in Afghanistan with the support of the Taliban government there.

AiF cherry-picked the quotes, used them out of context, omitted key information and distorted The Washington Post report to make it fit the Kremlin propaganda. AiF also misattributed all quotes to a “senior Ukrainian official” while The Post cited multiple sources including non-governmental.

The United Nations says a quarter million people have fled Israeli attacks in Lebanon over the past two weeks for the relative safety of Syria. Most of them are Syrians who went to Lebanon to escape their country’s civil war but are now back home with no place to stay. VOA's Heather Murdock has more from Istanbul with Yan Boechat and Diego Baravelli in Hasakah, Syria.

One county in the battleground U.S. state of Wisconsin plays a disproportionate role in deciding whether Democrats or Republicans win the White House in November, analysts say. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias takes us to Dane County, where the fight to sway votes is getting hotter as the election draws near.

LAS VEGAS — Sin City blew a kiss goodbye to the Tropicana before first light Wednesday in an elaborate implosion that reduced to rubble the last true mob building on the Las Vegas Strip.  The Tropicana's hotel towers tumbled in a celebration that included a fireworks display. It was the first implosion in nearly a decade for a city that loves fresh starts and that has made casino implosions as much a part of its identity as gambling itself.  "What Las Vegas has done, in classic Las Vegas style, they've turned many of these implosions into spectacles," said Geoff Schumacher, historian and vice president of exhibits and programs at the Mob Museum.  Former casino mogul Steve Wynn changed the way Las Vegas blows up casinos in 1993 with the implosion of the Dunes to make room for the Bellagio. Wynn thought not only to televise the event but created a fantastical story for the implosion that made it look like pirate ships at his other casino across the street were firing at the Dunes.  From then on, Schumacher said, there was a sense in Las Vegas that destruction at that magnitude was worth witnessing.  The city hasn't blown up a Strip casino since 2016, when the final tower of the Riviera was leveled for a convention center expansion.  This time, the implosion cleared land for a $1.5 billion baseball stadium for the relocating Oakland Athletics, part of the city's latest rebrand into a sports hub.  That will leave only the Flamingo from the city's mob era on the Strip. But, Schumacher said, the Flamingo's original structures are long gone. The casino was completely rebuilt in the 1990s.  The Tropicana, the third-oldest casino on the Strip, closed in April after welcoming guests for 67 years.  Once known as the "Tiffany of the Strip" for its opulence, it was a frequent haunt of the legendary Rat Pack, while its past under the mob has long cemented its place in Las Vegas lore.  It opened in 1957 with three stories and 300 hotel rooms split into two wings.  As Las Vegas rapidly evolved in the following decades, including a building boom of Strip megaresorts in the 1990s, the Tropicana also underwent major changes. Two hotel towers were added in later years. In 1979, the casino's beloved $1 million green-and-amber stained glass ceiling was installed above the casino floor.  The Tropicana's original low-rise hotel wings survived the many renovations, however, making it the last true mob structure on the Strip.  Behind the scenes of the casino's grand opening, the Tropicana had ties to organized crime, largely through reputed mobster Frank Costello.  Costello was shot in the head in New York weeks after the Tropicana's debut. He survived, but the investigation led police to a piece of paper in his coat pocket with the Tropicana's exact earnings figure, revealing the mob's stake in the casino.  By the 1970s, federal authorities investigating mobsters in Kansas City charged more than a dozen operatives with conspiring to skim $2 million in gambling revenue from Las Vegas casinos, including the Tropicana. Charges connected to the Tropicana alone resulted in five convictions.  There were no public viewing areas for the event, but fans of the Tropicana did have a chance in April to bid farewell to the vintage Vegas relic.  "Old Vegas, it's going," Joe Zappulla, a teary-eyed New Jersey resident, said at the time as he exited the casino, shortly before the locks went on the doors.

Nairobi — Kenya’s National Assembly has impeached the country's deputy president over accusations of corruption and abuse of office. Lawmakers voted overwhelmingly to remove Rigathi Gachagua from office in the vote Tuesday night. The fate of the deputy president now rests in the hands of the Senate.  The process to consider removal of Kenya's deputy president from office moved to the Senate Wednesday after parliamentarians approved a motion to do so Tuesday night. Ahead of the vote, embattled deputy president Rigathi Gachagua and his allies presented his defense to the National Assembly for more than 90 minutes. But the lawmakers were not swayed, and 281 of them approved a motion to remove Gachagua from office. Forty-four others voted against the motion, and one abstained. Gachagua was accused of acquiring properties through corrupt means, though he argued the assets belonged to his late brother.  He is also accused of practicing ethnic politics and acting to undermine the government. The impeachment comes after Gachagua's fell out with President William Ruto. The deputy president has denied all the allegations against him, calling them outrageous and saying they are propaganda meant to tarnish his name. Political commentator Martin Andati said the way in which Gachagua works with other politicians and the people cost him his job. "His fate is sealed. He antagonized the MPs, he antagonized the Senate by talking badly about the chambers and the speakers, and generally, he is not a pro-people person. He has poor people management skills," he said. Some members of parliament, like Robert Mbui, who is also deputy leader of the minority, were against the impeachment. He said the house should concentrate on public issues instead of debating one man. "The cost of living has gone too high, people have no jobs, Mr. Speaker. Those are the things that this house should passionately deal with, but for a whole day, even the last two or three weeks to deal with one matter, I think we are losing direction. It's important that we deal with things that are affecting our people," he said. In the past four months, Kenya has witnessed a wave of protests aimed at President Ruto's government over allegations of corruption by some politicians and government officers. Kenyans also protested high taxes and parliament’s alleged failure to act independently from the president. Some politicians have accused the deputy president of helping to organize anti-government protests, an accusation Gachagua denies. Kenyan political expert Harman Manyora said the parliament is setting a dangerous precedent that threatens the country's political future and ethnic cohesion. “[It] should not surprise us. In the future, we can have governments fall in the manner in which governments come and go in parliamentary democracies like India, Israel, the UK, and Italy, which I doubt we can withstand. From a political front, this is also a country with a lot of flashpoints. It is an ethnically charged country, and a move like this has the potential of negatively impacting the country by causing division, and you can never know where it can lead us,” said Manyora. The debate and voting about Gachagua’s conduct will continue next week. After that, some believe the issue may go to court, where he could seek legal help to either keep his job or clear his name of the allegations against him.

ANN ARBOR, FLINT AND DETROIT, MICHIGAN — U.S. election officials in battleground states are pushing back against disinformation about election integrity and working to assure Americans that their votes will be counted. Officials from both major parties in six states — Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — met in Ann Arbor, Michigan, last month for panel discussions hosted by the nonpartisan group Keep our Republic. The group seeks to educate the American public about threats to the U.S. election system and build trust in the electoral system. They’re working to avoid a repeat of November 2020 scenes in nearby Detroit and other American cities where supporters of then-President Donald Trump, riled up by his baseless accusations of election fraud, pressured officials to stop counting the votes. This year, many Trump supporters who spoke with VOA say they worry about fraud in this election. “Right now, our government, you're going to question everything about it,” said Marvin Minton, a Trump supporter who attended the Republican presidential nominee's town hall event in Flint, Michigan, in September. “I wish I could say differently, but that's not how America feels. We don't trust nobody.” Angelina Kandow, who was also at the Flint event, said, “Was [the 2020 election] stolen or not? One case, one case is enough to question the whole system.” Some Trump supporters quoted alleged instances of 2020 election fraud that were disproven during court cases triggered by the more than 60 lawsuits filed by Republicans and the Trump campaign after that year’s election. Disinformation around election integrity has gained traction among Republicans, according to an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and USAFacts poll, released in August. The poll found 67% of Republicans trust Trump and his campaign for accurate information on the outcome of the election. Only 51% of Republicans said they trust the government’s certification of election results. In contrast, 87% of Democrats trust government certifications, while 82% trust Vice President Kamala Harris, the party’s presidential nominee, and her campaign. Dangerous disinformation Officials in battleground states say disinformation can be dangerous. “They can in some cases lead to people making threats to election officials or worse, based on lies or misinformation they have been told about elections,” said Jonathan Brater, director of the Michigan Bureau of Elections. “Even if it doesn't result in any sort of physical violence, it does undermine trust long term in the election system, which is bad for our republic and is bad for our democracy,” he told VOA. Meagan Wolfe, an election official in Wisconsin, another battleground state, has been targeted with intimidation, even death threats. Republicans loyal to Trump have attempted to oust her over false claims that she helped to rig the 2020 vote in favor of President Joe Biden. Wolfe encouraged people who don’t trust the election process to become involved. “They can become a poll worker. They can become a poll observer. They can watch the audits of the voting equipment,” she told VOA.” All of that is open for [the] public to view.” In many states, efforts to ensure voters that elections are secure are supported by Republicans. Justin Roebuck, a Republican election official in Ottawa County, Michigan, acknowledges it’s an uphill battle. “Our political leaders at every level need to also seek facts and to seek data,” he told VOA. “And I think until that happens, we will have a problem in terms of our confidence and trust in the process.” Roebuck said he is working directly with citizens, instead of through the campaigns. “We have very decentralized elections in the United States. There are always things that we can do better,” he said. “Sometimes we have to work through those challenges and work through those messes.” Messy in Michigan It’s already looking like it could become messy in Michigan. Republicans loyal to Trump have sued Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, over absentee ballot processing guidelines and voter registration lists. “If Jocelyn Benson is not responding to what is required under the law, we will take her to court to get the courts to compel her to do that,” Michigan Republican Party chairperson Pete Hoekstra told VOA. Benson dismissed it as a Republican strategy to create a “false sense of irregularities in the process.” “In general, we see lawsuits masquerading as a legal strategy when they're really a PR strategy to get misinformation or sow seeds of doubt about our elections into the narrative,” she told VOA. She said that there are “more checks and balances in place than ever before” to ensure the integrity and accuracy of the election process. Both parties have launched election-related lawsuits in various battleground states, which could mean chaos in the November election. “Any kind of legal challenge happening this close to an election, typically, is lawyers putting a placeholder in case they may not win in a state or may not have an outcome they like, and it gives them the ability to challenge the election after the fact,” said Kim Wyman, senior fellow with the Bipartisan Policy Center's Elections Project in Washington. There are other potential disruptions, including efforts to delay election certification by county officials who support Trump. “We've seen some legal maneuvers and some boards of elections that have changed the rules that allow more scrutiny over the canvas period and the certification of the election,” Wyman told VOA. After Trump's efforts to overturn his 2020 loss culminated in the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters, Congress sought to prevent such events from recurring by passing the Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act. Mandatory deadline The reforms set a new mandatory December 11 deadline for states to submit certified slates of presidential electors, provided expedited court access to resolve challenges and raised the threshold for objecting to election results in Congress. Battleground states Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and North Carolina have passed legislation to ensure that canvasses, recounts, audits and legal challenges meet the new deadline. Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have not, leaving their electoral systems vulnerable to partisan lawsuits and political pressures that could force them to miss the certification deadline. This could leave uncertain the fate of 29 electoral college votes. A presidential candidate needs at least 270 electoral college votes to win. VOA’s Rivan Dwiastono contributed to this report.

ISLAMABAD — Hardline Taliban authorities in Afghanistan reported Wednesday that nine people, including at least two women, were publicly flogged after being convicted of various crimes, such as adultery.  Five of the punishments took place at a sports stadium in Kandahar, capital of the eponymous southern province. Local Taliban officials, judicial officers, and ordinary Afghans were among the onlookers.   The Taliban’s Supreme Court announced the details, saying the five individuals were found guilty of adultery, sodomy, and robbery, with each of them receiving 39 lashes and prison sentences ranging from two to seven years. It did not say whether females were among the convicts.  The court separately announced that two men and two women were publicly flogged Wednesday for adultery in the northern Afghan provinces of Takhar and Samangan.  Hundreds of men and women have been lashed in sports stadiums across Afghanistan since the Taliban regained power in 2021.    In June this year, the Islamist leaders carried out a mass lashing of 63 convicts, including 14 women, in a packed northern sports stadium for committing “immoral crimes," such as adultery and homosexuality.   The Taliban have also executed at least five Afghan murder convicts in crowded sports stadiums, citing the Islamic concept of retributive justice known as qisas.  Global outcry  The executions and corporeal punishments have drawn an outcry and calls from the United Nations to immediately end them for being in breach of human rights and international law.  Taliban leaders defend their criminal justice system, arguing that it is in line with their interpretation of the Islamic law of Sharia. They also rejected criticism of their curbs on Afghan women’s access to education, employment, and public life at large.  The United States and the world at large have refused to recognize Taliban authorities as the official government of Afghanistan, citing their treatment of women, among other human rights concerns.  “We continue to make clear that any significant steps towards normalization of relations is contingent upon a profound shift in the Taliban’s human rights conduct,” said Matthew Miller, the U.S. State Department spokesperson, speaking to reporters Tuesday. “And there has been remarkable unity among the international community on that question.”  Girls ages 12 and older are not allowed to attend secondary school, making Afghanistan the only country in the world with this restriction, while female students have been barred from universities. Most Afghan women are prohibited from working in both public and private sectors, including the U.N.  The Taliban last month enacted so-called “vice and virtue” laws that, according to critics, have dealt another blow to women’s rights in Afghanistan. The contentious decree deems the sound of a woman’s voice in public a moral violation and requires them to cover their entire bodies and faces when outdoors. It also forbids women from looking at men to whom they are not related and vice versa. 

TAIPEI, TAIWAN — As Laos hosts this year’s summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Beijing is calling for additions to its free-trade agreement with the regional forum that focus on smart cities, 5G, artificial intelligence and e-commerce. Ahead of the ASEAN summit, which began Sunday and ends Friday, Chinese state media have stepped up efforts to promote the benefits of what they call an upgrade to the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area, or CAFTA, agreement. Analysts point out that the two sides have not reached agreement on what’s being called “CAFTA 3.0,” and that it remains to be seen whether including China's electric vehicles and e-commerce would benefit Southeast Asian industries that are struggling to compete with their Chinese counterparts. "The establishment of a free-trade demonstration zone is actually nothing more than the hope that things can be sold into China,” Ming-Fang Tsai, a professor in the Department of Industrial Economics at Taiwan’s Tamkang University, told VOA. However, he said the Chinese market is facing a lack of domestic demand and overproduction, leading to price competition. “So, is the FTA 3.0 really an upgrade? Actually, it is a big question mark,” he said by email. Nevertheless, some specific areas in the 3.0 agreement still attract the attention of experts, including its focus on the EV industry. Although ASEAN is also actively developing an EV industry, He Jiangbing, a China-based economist and finance commentator, told VOA if China's major EV manufacturers pour into Southeast Asia through changes in the agreement, it would likely have a huge impact on the local automobile industries. “China’s mainland started relatively early in new-energy vehicles and has developed rapidly for 10 years. But the automotive industry in ASEAN is relatively weak. If China's new-energy vehicles are sold in ASEAN, it will be difficult for Southeast Asian [traditional] car companies to resist,” He said. Southeast Asia's own automobile industry will be greatly affected or cease to exist, He said. But Lu Xi, a senior lecturer at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, told VOA that most of China's EVs are not getting into Southeast Asia through exports but through production-line transfer, similar to joint ventures, so a price war should not cause a negative impact. “With the transfer of [China's EV] manufacturing industry chain, the economic structure of Southeast Asia will undergo a huge transformation,” Lu said by email. “Depending on the current political and economic situation between China and the US, Southeast Asia itself also has a very broad local market and a very good young population structure, so on the whole, the Southeast Asian market should be one of the important engines of economic growth in the whole region in the future." Tsai noted that Chinese manufacturers will set up factories in Southeast Asia to avoid the “Made in China” label and restrictions on Chinese products. “U.S. controls on technology may affect the components of EVs in the future,” he said, “which brings great pressure to Chinese manufacturers.” In addition to EVs, the 3.0 agreement also focuses on smart cities, 5G, artificial intelligence and e-commerce. Analysts say China’s e-commerce is already having a negative impact on the region as orders of cheaper Chinese imports and knockoffs are flooding Southeast Asia. Half of the ceramic factories in Thailand's northern Lampang province have closed, and Indonesian textile workers are facing mass layoffs, the South China Morning Post and the Bangkok Post reported. "In the face of the massive entry of the [Chinese] e-commerce, frankly speaking, these Southeast Asian countries are relatively uncompetitive,” said Tsai. “Because first, [they] will not be able to compete with China in marketing and sales. Second, [China's] own products are cheaper. “If my entire e-commerce system is better than yours,” Tsai said, “and my products are not more expensive than yours, then how can you compete with me?” Nonetheless, in a September speech for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, or RCEP, in Nanning, China, ASEAN Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn called on businesses to take full advantage of the partnership as they move toward the changes. He touted the RCEP, the world’s largest trade bloc, covering nearly 30% of global gross domestic product at $29 trillion and 2.3 billion people across the Asia Pacific region. “ASEAN’s multidirectional economic relations have been a major driver behind the use of RCEP,” said Hourn, according to a written statement. “China, for example, has remained ASEAN’s largest trading partner for the past 15 years and has also climbed from the 5th largest source of FDI to ASEAN in 2022 to the 3rd largest in 2023. With both RCEP and ACFTA 3.0 in place, I am confident that trade and investment between ASEAN, China, and the rest of the RCEP partners will continue to flourish for the benefit of the people in this wider region.” ASEAN calls the free-trade agreement ACFTA; Beijing refers to it as CAFTA. The agreement was established by China and ASEAN in 2009, and the ASEAN-China Summit announced the launch of negotiations for the changes in November 2022. VOA’s Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.

LONDON — That long-held Wimbledon tradition of line judges dressed in elegant uniforms is no more.  The All England Club announced Wednesday that artificial intelligence will be used to make the "out" and "fault" calls at the championships from 2025.  Wimbledon organizers said the decision to adopt live electronic line calling was made following extensive testing at the 2024 tournament and "builds on the existing ball-tracking and line-calling technology that has been in place for many years."  "We consider the technology to be sufficiently robust and the time is right to take this important step in seeking maximum accuracy in our officiating," said Sally Bolton, chief executive of the All England Club. "For the players, it will offer them the same conditions they have played under at a number of other events on tour."  Bolton said Wimbledon had a responsibility to "balance tradition and innovation."  "Line umpires have played a central role in our officiating setup at the championships for many decades," she said, "and we recognize their valuable contribution and thank them for their commitment and service."  Line-calling technology has long been used at Wimbledon and other tennis tournaments to call whether serves are in or out.  The All England Club also said Wednesday that the ladies' and gentlemen's singles finals will be scheduled to take place at the later time of 4 p.m. local time on the second Saturday and Sunday, respectively — and after doubles finals on those days.  Bolton said the moves have been made to ensure the day of the finals "builds towards the crescendo of the ladies' and gentlemen's singles finals, with our champions being crowned in front of the largest possible worldwide audience."  

Maputo — Mozambicans vote Wednesday between the party that has dominated their country’s political landscape for nearly 50 years or something different. Whoever wins will inherit major challenges, including an insurgency in the oil and gas-rich area of Cabo Delgado. Voters braved morning rain in Maputo to line up as early as 7:00 am to cast their ballots. They have four candidates to choose from; Daniel Chapo, the ruling Frelimo party leader; Ossufo Momade, the candidate of one main opposition party that came in second in the last presidential election; Lutero Simango, the leader of the Mozambique Democratic Movement and Venancio Mondlane, an independent who seems popular among youth. Aslak Ore, a researcher on Mozambique at the Christian Michelsen Institute in Norway, said that while supporters of Mondlane have shown excitement, he still faces stiff challenges. “There’s been a lot of enthusiasm about his candidature, however he doesn’t have the electoral organization of either Renamo or Frelimo. The question is if he’s going to be able to convert that obvious enthusiasm among the population… into the votes,” he said. At a polling place at the Josina Machel secondary school in Maputo, 22-year-old Augusto Paz said he waited about an hour, but he had to make sure to vote. “As a young Mozambican man, I feel like this is important because it might be the choice that would change things in our country. I am talking about healthcare, education, and development in general,” he said. After casting his ballot, Sergio Pantie, a member of parliament and Frelimo supporter, told us he is confident his party will win. “People continue to love and highly consider Frelimo as an option to continue running this country... the results will prove, once again, that Frelimo is loved and esteemed by the Mozambican people,” he said. Two of the candidates, Momade and Simango, voted at the same polling place where outgoing President Filipe Nyusi casts his ballot. Former St. Lucia prime minister Dr. Kenny Anthony, who arrived in Maputo on October 2nd, heads the Commonwealth International Observers’ delegation. He told VOA his group was still visiting other polling stations and getting reports from other parts of the country. Meanwhile... “There seems to be some optimism that this is going to be a better administered election than previous elections. Whether that will be the case, I don’t know… we’ve just visited this polling station, and all seem to have gone on very well here,” he said. Whoever wins these elections will inherit many challenges starting with the economy and debt repayments, Ore said. “It’s between 12 and 14 billion dollars in external debt. Recently they have been able to pay back much of that debt, but they have done so by way of accumulating a lot of domestic debt. The state takes up loans from the banking system and institutions locally, so they are accumulating debt at the same time as they are paying back the external debt,” said Ore. In addition to debt challenges, the government has been battling an insurgency in the gas- and oil-rich Cabo Delgado province, where about 4,000 people have been killed and about 1 million displaced since 2017, hindering multibillion-dollar oil and gas projects. Some countries, including Rwanda, have stepped in recently to help quell the insurgency -- an act that Adriano Nuvunga, a social activist and director of the Center for Democracy and Human Rights in Mozambique, disagrees with. “Mozambique, big as it is, massive as it is… 33 million people… but it needs to import soldiers from Rwanda to protect its sovereignty… Rwanda, a tiny country of 13 million people to protect us here,” said Nuvunga. Ruling party candidate Chapo said if he wins, securing the Cabo Delgado area will be his top priority because without security, there is no development he recently told supporters. Nuvunga said while Frelimo was seen as a liberation movement 50 years ago, times have changed. “The people here, they have nothing to do with what people did five decades ago. It’s about today; are you able to put in place credible policies and put in place a credible system of governance that would work for the people,” said Nuvunga. More than 17 million people are registered to vote.