The Congo Basin, which spans six African countries, is home to the world’s second-largest rainforest. In one of the states, the Republic of Congo, burning basin wood for traditional fish smoking threatens to accelerate deforestation. Researchers are looking at ways to counter these effects. VOA’s Brice Kinhou has more from Pointe-Noire in this story, narrated by Vincent Makori.
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Month: January 2024
In Uganda, Refugees Ravaged the Forests. Now, They’re Restoring Them
NAKIVALE, Uganda — Enock Twagirayesu was seeking sanctuary when he and his family fled violence in Burundi, and they found it in Uganda, the small East African nation that has absorbed thousands of refugees from unsettled neighbors.
Twagirayesu’s family has grown from two children when they arrived more than a decade ago to eight now, a boon for the family but also a marker of the immense pressure the Nakivale Refugee Settlement has put on the landscape near the Tanzania border.
What was wide forest cover two decades ago is now mostly gone, cut down for cooking fuel. When Twagirayesu saw women digging up roots to burn a few years ago, he knew it was time to act.
“We saw that in the days to come, when the trees are finished, we will also be finished,” he said. “Because if there are no trees to be used for cooking even the people cannot survive.”
He and two other refugees began planting trees in 2016, and Twagirayesu, who had sewn for a living back home, turned out to have a gift for mobilizing people. That early group quickly grew, and he now leads the Nakivale Green Environment Association to carry out what Twagirayesu calls the urgent business of reforesting.
“A tree is not like beans or maize, which you plant and tomorrow you will get something to eat. Planting trees is challenging,” he said.
Deforestation is a national issue in Uganda, where most people use firewood for cooking, trees are often cut to make charcoal for export and some forests fall to illegal logging. The country has lost 13% of its tree cover since 2000, according to Global Forest Watch.
Nakivale, sparsely populated by locals, is one of the few territories in Uganda that could accommodate many refugees. More than 180,000 live there now, with regular new arrivals.
They come from neighboring countries such as Congo, where sporadic violence means an influx of arrivals heading toward Nakivale. There are Rwandan refugees still living in Nakivale who first arrived there shortly after the 1994 genocide. After the refugees are registered, they are allocated small plots of land upon which they can build homes and plant gardens.
Nsamizi Training Institute for Social Development, a local organization, is supporting the tree-planting activities of Twagirayesu and others. The institute’s yearly goal is to plant 300,000 trees, with about 3 million planted in recent years, said Cleous Bwambale, who oversees monitoring and evaluation for the institute.
On one recent afternoon, a group of refugees were busy planting thousands of pine seedlings on the rocky, steep side of a hill facing the Kabahinda Primary School. In scorching heat, they attacked solid ground with pickaxes and hoes before carefully tucking the seedlings into the earth. Nearly all the workers have children enrolled at the government-owned but donor-supported school.
Deputy Headteacher Racheal Kekirunga said heavy rains in the valley bring the school to a standstill as stormwater races down the hill and runs through the yard, forcing teachers and students to stay inside.
“We hope that when we plant these trees it will help us to reduce on the running water that could affect our school, and our school gardens,” Kekirunga said. “Especially our learning and teaching. When the rain is too heavy, you must wait until it reduces and then you go to class.”
The Nsamizi institute, serving as an implementing partner in Nakivale for the U.N. refugee agency, collaborates with mobilizers like Twagirayesu in four parts of the 185-square-kilometer (71-square-mile) settlement, according to the U.N. refugee agency.
The institute encourages refugees with small cash payments for specific work done, maps out plans to reforest specific blocks of land and provides seedlings.
Twagirayesu said his group has planted at least 460,000 trees in Nakivale, creating woodlots of varying sizes and ages. They include pine, acacia and even bamboo. That success has come despite fears among some in the settlement that the authorities, wanting to protect mature woodlots, one day might force the refugees to go back home.
“We got a problem because some people were saying that when they plant trees, they will be chased away,” he said. “Teaching people to plant trees also became a war. But right now, after they saw us continue to plant trees, saw us getting firewood, they began to appreciate our work.”
Twagirayesu said that while he isn’t done yet as a tree planter, “when we are walking in the places where we planted trees, we feel much happiness.”
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Pakistan’s PTI Barred From Using Cricket Bat Electoral Symbol
Islamabad — Pakistan’s Supreme Court has upheld an electoral commission decision barring the party of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan from using its iconic cricket bat electoral symbol to identify party candidates contesting the Feb. 8 national election.
The decision has been criticized by his party as an effort to keep it off next month’s ballot.
The caretaker government of Anwaar-ul Haq Kakar has distanced itself from the election commission’s decisions, repeatedly stating that it does not want to comment on the working of a constitutionally autonomous institution.
The top court announced the verdict in a live telecast Saturday. It endorsed a controversial Election Commission decision prohibiting Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or PTI, from retaining the bat symbol, citing alleged irregularities in recent internal party elections. The party had appealed the commission’s decision to the Supreme Court.
Election symbols are essential campaign tools to identify candidates on ballot papers in the nation of about 241 million people, where most constituencies are in rural areas with low adult literacy rates.
Khan, a cricket hero-turned-prime minister, was removed from office through a parliamentary no-confidence vote in April 2022. The 71-year-old deposed leader has since directly accused Pakistan’s powerful military of being behind the toppling of this government and an ensuing nationwide crackdown on his party to keep it out of the election race.
“PTI cannot go into elections as a party, due to be held February 8 this year. This (court ruling), by far, is the worst decision impacting millions of voters of a party that enjoys the most popular public support. A sad day for democracy,” a party statement said in response to Saturday’s court ruling.
Michael Kugelman, the director of the South Asia Institute at Washington’s Wilson Center, noted that the 2018 elections, which the PTI won, were marred by preelection rigging. He said issues surrounding the integrity of this year’s elections persist.
“PTI leaders jailed. PTI electoral candidates’ nomination papers denied. PTI online rallies/fundraisers blocked…PTI denied [the] use of [the] election symbol. This is brazen, not subtle, pre-polls rigging,” Kugelman said on X.
The PTI said that despite being stripped of its iconic bat symbol, its candidates would still contest the vote as independents, using individual symbols. Observers cautioned it would likely confuse voters and benefit rival party candidates eventually.
“Excluding a major political party from elections on technical grounds will destabilize democracy. With this decision, the transparency of the general elections in 2024 is likely to become more controversial,” said the independent Human Rights Council of Pakistan in a statement following the Supreme Court decision.
Lawyer Jibran Nasir, a human rights activist and an independent election candidate, said winning PTI candidates would be vulnerable to state pressure and financial and political bribes to join other parties for personal gain.
“This, most regrettably, is equivalent to disenfranchising tens of millions of voters across Pakistan,” he said on X.
Nasir and other prominent legal experts said, citing constitutional provisions, that the election commission could not use intra-party elections to overrule the right to form and operate a political party and the right of Pakistanis to vote for a party of their choice.
“It is a huge blow to our fundamental rights jurisprudence regarding political parties + political participation,” Reema Omer, the legal South Asia adviser at the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Muddassir Rizvi is with the Islamabad-based independent Free and Fair Election Network, which works to promote democratic practices in the country. Rizvi noted that controversies have always marred national elections.
“We always consider that all political actors should be part of the electoral [process] and keeping one political party out of the contest for one reason or another will raise many questions on the legitimacy of the exercise,” Rizvi told VOA.
In an editorial Sunday, the country’s prestigious English-language DAWN newspaper denounced the Supreme Court for upholding what it said was a “deeply controversial” Electoral Commission decision. The editorial went on to say, “One also wonders what the general impact of this decision will be on how ‘free and fair’ the upcoming elections are publicly perceived to be.”
Khan was convicted and sentenced to three years last August on charges of corruption, leading to his disqualification from running for public office for five years. Most senior PTI leaders have also been in detention or in hiding to avoid arrest. But, according to public opinion polls, Khan remains the most popular political figure, with his party rated as the most significant national political force.
Since his ouster, authorities have launched scores of cases against the former Pakistani leader, ranging from murder to leaking state secrets and corruption. Khan denies any wrongdoing and maintains the military is punishing him and his party for pushing for an independent foreign policy.
His main rival and former three-time prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, who returned to Pakistan from self-imposed exile last October, is alleged to have secured the military’s backing and was eventually cleared of all graft lawsuits.
Sharif and his party have been largely silent about the allegations but have supported the decision to strip the PTI of its electoral symbol.
Last week, a controversial Supreme Court ruling also removed a lifetime ban on Sharif, enabling him to contest the polls in his bid to become prime minister for a record fourth time.
The army says it is “apolitical,” but has not challenged prime-time pro-military talk show hosts and political commentators who routinely claim on television and through newspaper articles that Khan’s removal from office and the ensuing political developments are directed by “the establishment,” a term used to refer to the military.
Generals staged several coups against elected governments and ruled Pakistan for more than three decades since it gained independence from Britain in 1947. They influence the making or breaking of elected governments when not in power, say Pakistani political parties and former prime ministers, including Sharif and Khan.
In November 2022, then-army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa, for the first time, acknowledged in a nationally televised speech that his institution’s decades of meddling in national politics were to blame for increasing criticism of the military in recent years. The gene
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Campaigners Urge Australia to Send Unwanted Military Helicopters to Ukraine
Sydney — Campaigners will gather Sunday at Sydney Town Hall for a rally to urge Australia to send unwanted helicopters to Ukraine. The Australian Defence Force plans to decommission 45 Taipan helicopters later this year and replace them with U.S.-made Blackhawks.
Australia’s entire fleet of MRH-90 Taipan helicopters was grounded after a crash during a multinational military exercise off the coast of Queensland state in July.
Officials have said that the aircraft will not return to “flying operations” before they are due to be withdrawn from active service in December of this year. The Taipans will be replaced by U.S.-made Blackhawk helicopters. Starting next year, the new Apache helicopters will also be introduced into service for the Australian army.
Ukraine has asked Australia about using the European-designed Taipan helicopters for its war against Russia. However, Australian officials have said the aircraft will be dismantled as planned and buried at an Australian defense site because of concerns over the safety and reliability of the aging Taipan fleet.
Campaigners Sunday will gather in Sydney to change the government’s mind.
Stefan Romaniw, the co-chair of the Australian Federation of Ukrainian Organizations told VOA that the aircraft would help Ukraine repel the Russian invasion.
“The way to support Ukraine now would be to give those Taipan helicopters,” he said. “They need to fight the war in the air. The air is very, very important to Ukraine’s winning of this war. Therefore, the callout is, support Ukraine now, send the Taipan helicopters ASAP [as soon as possible].”
Australia has promised to provide military support to Ukraine for “2024 and beyond.”
Acting Defense Minister Matt Thistlethwaite told local media that “Australia is one of the strongest supporters of the people of Ukraine and their military and their effort to resist the illegal and unprovoked aggression and invasion by Russia.”
Australia is one of the largest non-NATO contributors to Ukraine’s war effort.
Canberra has also imposed sweeping sanctions on Russian politicians, military commanders and businesspeople.
your ad hereAustralian-Born Princess Becomes Danish Queen
Sydney — While Denmark was preparing to celebrate the coronation of a new king, there are festivities too, half a world away, in Australia. Crown Princess Mary was born on the Australian island of Tasmania and met Prince Frederik in a chance encounter in a busy Sydney bar during the 2000 Olympic Games.
Before she was a princess, Mary Donaldson graduated with a degree in law and commerce from the University of Tasmania in Australia. A career in advertising and real estate followed.
In 2000, she met Denmark’s Prince Frederik in a bar in central Sydney during the Olympic Games. The couple was married in May 2004.
The unexpected abdication of Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II after 52 years of service will allow her son, Frederik, to become the new king and crown princess Mary to be his queen.
Denmark’s ambassador to Australia, Pernille Dahler Kardel, told local media that Mary has become a natural leader.
“She has, since she became crown princess, been an amazing woman and we are really thankful that we have a crown princess of that caliber,” said Kardel.
The couple met at a bar called the Slip Inn during the Sydney Olympics in 2000.
It is celebrating the coronation of the new Danish king.
Jack Dineley, the bar’s acting operations manager, told VOA that the establishment wants to celebrate the occasion.
“We’ve got Danish flags hung across the room where we normally have our Mexican-themed festoons, so it is flags abundant,” he said. “We’ve also got two thrones set up in the main Slip Inn area [for] people to come down and take a photo with a crown or a tiara if they please.”
The bar in central Sydney has over the years become a destination for Danish tourists. Many have come to the bar to enjoy the festivities to mark the coronation.
“My name is Natasha and I’m from Copenhagen and I’m here to celebrate love with Queen Mary becoming queen.”
REPORTER: What do people in Denmark make of Princess Mary?
NATASHA: “Oh, they love her. They love her.”
Crown Princess Mary renounced her Australian citizenship many years ago, but her journey from working in real estate to the Danish royal family has been closely followed here.
She becomes the world’s first Australian-born queen.
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India’s Rahul Gandhi Begins Second Cross-Country March to Boost Opposition Ahead of Polls
NEW DELHi — India’s main opposition leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday began a new cross-country march from a troubled northeastern state, aiming to generate political momentum to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi in general elections due by May.
The “Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra,” or Unite India Justice March, comes weeks after Gandhi’s Congress party suffered shock defeats in elections in three states, puncturing the mood of the opposition which intends to challenge Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Gandhi walked for 3,500-km (2,200 miles) from the southern tip of India to Kashmir in the north, ending a 135-day march in Jan. 2023 in a move to help revive the Congress and his popularity.
The latest march, setting off from remote northeastern Manipur state will cover 6,713 kilometers (4,200 miles) over 66 days, passing through 15 states, with some of the journey via car.
Gandhi decided to start in Manipur, a state that has witnessed fierce fighting since last year.
At least 180 people have died and thousands were displaced in clashes that erupted after a court order suggested privileges granted to minority Kukis also be extended to majority Meitei community.
“I was determined that the march should begin in Manipur…as we understand the pain, loss, hurt and sadness you have been through,” he said.
Congress ahead of the march said it is not a political campaign, but the list of concerns that will be highlighted during the march — unemployment, poverty, democracy and diversity and the BJP’s “politics of hatred and violence” — are key election issues for the opposition.
Opposition groups led by Congress last year formed a 28-party alliance called INDIA (Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance) to jointly fight the BJP in national elections but it has been riven by differences over giving up seats to field a common candidate against the BJP.
Gandhi’s latest march will pass through states which are strongholds of key INDIA partners and the extent of their participation will indicate the health of the opposition, analysts said.
your ad hereDenmark’s King Frederik X Takes the Throne as His Mother Steps Down
COPENHAGEN — Denmark’s King Frederik X ascended the throne on Sunday, succeeding his mother, Queen Margrethe II, who formally abdicated after 52 years as monarch, with big crowds gathered in the capital to witness history.
Margrethe, 83, stunned the nation on New Year’s Eve when she announced she planned to become the first Danish monarch in nearly 900 years to voluntarily relinquish the throne.
The succession was formalized the moment Margrethe signed the declaration of her abdication during a meeting of the Council of State at parliament, the royal palace said. Denmark, one of the oldest monarchies in the world, does not have a coronation.
The meeting was attended by government representatives, Margrethe, Frederik, 55, his Australian-born wife Mary, 51, who is now queen, and their oldest son Christian, 18, who is the new heir to the throne.
About an hour after the signing, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen was due to proclaim the new king on the balcony of the parliament and Frederik will give a short speech.
In close to freezing temperatures, tens of thousands of people from all over Denmark converged on the capital to witness events, in a sign of the huge popularity the monarchy is enjoying in the nation of nearly six million.
“We have come here today because this is history being made in front of our eyes. We just had to be here,” said Soren Kristian Bisgaard, 30, a pilot.
He was drinking champagne with three friends, sitting in camping chairs in front of parliament.
“I’m very fond of the royal family. I have been in the Royal Life Guards myself, standing guard at the royal palace. I’m very proud to have done that and also to be here today,” he said.
Later in the afternoon, the new king and queen were due to ride by horse carriage back to their residence, Amalienborg, a royal complex built in the 1750s and located in central Copenhagen.
The couple will continue to reside with Margrethe, who will retain her title as queen, in Amalienborg albeit in their respective palaces in the octagonal complex.
Royal power couple
Margrethe, who in the past had said she would remain on the throne for life, did not give an exact reason for her decision to step down but said that a major back surgery she underwent in February last year had made her consider her future.
“It could be that she thinks Prince Frederik is prepared to take over now,” said Lars Hovbakke Sorensen, a historian and associate professor at University College Absalon in Denmark.
“He’s 55, and maybe the queen wanted to avoid a situation where you would have a very, very old king, as you saw with Prince Charles.” The British king was 73 when he ascended the throne after his mother Queen Elizabeth died in September 2022 aged 96.
The new king and queen take the throne at a time of huge public support and enthusiasm for the monarchy. The most recent survey done after Margrethe announced she would abdicate indicated that 82% of Danes expect Frederik to do well or very well in his new role, while 86% said the same about Mary.
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Romanian Farmers, Truck Drivers Protest Against Subsidies, Taxes
BUCHAREST — Romanian farmers and truck drivers continued sporadic protests across the country on Sunday as negotiations with the coalition government over high insurance rates and slow subsidy payments resumed.
Convoys of tractors and trucks began gathering five days ago on national roads, mainly near large Romanian cities, slowing or blocking traffic.
Farmers and haulers also briefly blocked a border crossing with Ukraine in northeastern Romania on Saturday, and tried to prevent entrance to the Black Sea port of Constanta.
They are demanding the government address high insurance premia and excise levels on diesel fuel, loan moratoriums, the time taken to pay farm subsidies and drought damages as well as technical measures to reduce long waiting times at border crossings.
Truckers have also asked that lorries coming from the European Union have a separate line at border crossings and in Constanta port than trucks from outside the bloc, including Ukraine.
Ukraine is one of the world’s biggest grain exporters and Constanta has become Kyiv’s largest alternative export route since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, with grains arriving at the port by road, rail and barge across the Danube.
The port shipped 36 million metric tons of grain last year, up 50% from the previous year. Ukrainian grain accounted for roughly 40% of the total, or 14 million tons.
After talks with transport and farm ministries on Saturday, protesters were set to meet the finance minister on Sunday.
Romania holds local, parliamentary, presidential and European elections this year.
German farmers also began a week of nationwide protests against subsidy cuts on Monday while Polish truck drivers and farmers have blocked several crossings with Ukraine since late 2023, demanding that the EU reinstate a system whereby Ukrainian companies obtain permits to operate in the bloc.
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Collapse of Goldmine in Tanzania Kills 22, Official Says
DAR ES SALAAM — The collapse of an illegal small-scale gold mine has killed at least 22 people in northern Tanzania following heavy rains, a senior government official said on Sunday.
The accident happened early on Saturday in the Simiyu region after a group of people aged between 24 and 38 years old started mining in an area where activity had been restricted due to ongoing heavy rains, Simon Simalenga, the region’s Bariadi district commissioner, told Reuters.
“Initially we were told that there were 19 to 20 people who were trapped in the mines but unfortunately we ended up retrieving 22 bodies,” he said, adding that the search and rescue operation was continuing although almost all the rubble that had buried them had now been removed.
Simalenga said the group had discovered an area rich in minerals around two to three weeks previously and moved to start mining before the government had approved physical and environmental safety and procedures.
“The regional mining officer visited them and stopped them from mining as it was working on the required procedures,” he said.
The group defied the order, he added, starting to mine late on Friday before part of the area caved in and buried them inside.
The government has worked for years to improve safety for small scale miners but unsafe and unregulated illegal mining still occurs in Tanzania, which is Africa’s fourth-largest gold producer after South Africa, Ghana and Mali.
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Comoros Holds Presidential Election, Incumbent Largely Expected to Win
Moroni — Voting was under way in Comoros on Sunday in an election widely expected to hand a fourth five-year term to President Azali Assoumani, who faces five opponents in a vote some opposition leaders have boycotted.
The polls opened across the Indian Ocean archipelago at 8 a.m. (0500 GMT) for the 338,940 registered voters out of its 800,000 population. Voting ends at 6 p.m.
Comoros has experienced around 20 coups or attempted coups since winning independence from France in 1975 and is a major source of irregular migration to the nearby French island of Mayotte.
Some opposition leaders have called for a boycott, accusing the election commission of favoring the ruling party. The commission denies this, saying the process will be transparent.
“I am delighted with this anchoring of democracy in our country,” Assoumani told reporters after voting in his home town of Mitsoudjé, adding that he hoped for victory in the first round.
The former army officer first came to power in a coup in 1999. He has since won three elections and has served as the chair of the African Union for the past year.
He won the 2019 election with 60% of the vote, breaching the 50% mark required to avoid a run-off. Critics say since then his government has cracked down on dissent, an accusation it denies.
Assoumani’s opponents include a former interior minister and Salim Issa, a medical doctor and flagbearer for Juwa, former president Ahmed Abdallah Sambi’s party.
“We welcome the conduct of the vote. We hope that everything will continue calmly,” Issa wrote on social media from Foumbouni, his hometown in the south of the Comoros.
Sambi is now behind bars after being sentenced to life in prison in 2022 for high treason related to accusations of corruption. Political protests have been repeatedly banned for security reasons.
Comoros changed its constitution in June 2018 to remove a requirement that the presidency rotate among its three main islands every five years. This allowed Assoumani to seek re-election.
The opposition leaders calling for a boycott and their supporters have wanted the armed forces barred from involvement in the elections and the unconditional release of Sambi and other political prisoners.
Provisional results are expected on Friday, according to the election commission.
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Russian Market, EVs Give China Fuel to Pass Japan as Top Car Exporter
washington — China’s car industry groups have said the country is set to surpass Japan to become the world’s top car exporter for 2023, driven by the Russian market and a growing global appetite for electric vehicles (EVs).
The official China Daily newspaper reported the Association of Automobile Manufacturers on Thursday said China’s vehicle production for the first time reached 30 million units last year, 4.91 million of them exported. The exports are a 58% increase from 2022’s 3.11 million vehicles exported, appearing to overtake Japan as the world’s top car exporter.
Japan’s NHK news agency reported Thursday that the country exported 3.99 million vehicles through November 2023 and was unlikely to catch up with China’s exports when it releases its December export figures.
The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday reported the China Passenger Car Association’s Secretary-General Cui Dongshu citing a jump in demand in the Russian market as a key factor for taking the lead, accounting for about 800,000 of the additional vehicles China exported.
Chinese carmakers were quick to jump on the Russian market after Western auto companies pulled out of the country over Moscow’s 2022 invasion and war on Ukraine.
Chinese customs data shows during the first 11 months of 2023, China’s vehicle shipments to Russia soared 545% from a year ago, to 840,000 units, making it China’s fastest-growing market.
New energy vehicles (NEVs), such as hybrids and electric vehicles (EVs), were also fueling the record production and exports.
The China car manufacturer’s association said Thursday that production of NEVs reached a high of 9.59 million units in 2023, a 36% increase from 2022, accounting for nearly a third of the country’s vehicle production and a quarter of exports. The association said NEV exports reached 1.2 million units, a 77% increase from 2022.
China’s leading EV carmaker, BYD, which is backed by American billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, sold 526,400 of the vehicles in the fourth quarter of last year, for the first time surpassing market leader Tesla’s sales of 484,500 cars in the same period.
Tesla still sold more EVs in all of 2023 than BYD, 1.8 million compared with 1.6 million, but the gap between the Chinese and American EV makers is quickly closing. Tesla has the world’s largest EV car factory in Shanghai, which accounts for more than half its global production.
Analysts credit China’s robust subsidies of NEV makers and buyers for growing the EV industry so quickly and boosting exports.
Paul Triolo, associate partner for China and Technology Policy Lead at the Washington-based Dentons Global Advisors, told VOA the subsidies allowed Chinese firms to focus on design, manufacturing and dominating critical supply chains. “Both the U.S. and EU governments were … late to subsidize and encourage the development of EV battery supply chains, in particular, after some failed efforts a decade ago.”
China began implementing incentive and subsidy policies in 2009 to encourage domestic car companies to focus more on manufacturing EVs, expand charging infrastructure and provide tax exemptions to EV consumers.
Consulting firm AlixPartners estimates that China’s state subsidies for electric and hybrid vehicles will total $57 billion from 2016 to 2022. Beijing in June unveiled tax breaks for new energy vehicles that are expected to amount to more than $72 billion from 2024 to 2027.
Triolo said European and U.S. EV makers are far behind Chinese ones in developing markets.
“Chinese firms will almost certainly dominate markets in the Global South and places like Southeast Asia, and it will be hard for Western automakers to compete in these markets,” he said.
But Chinese EVs are still struggling for market share in Europe and the United States, where domestic EVs dominate. And as China’s EV exports have grown, now accounting for 8% of the European market, Europe and the U.S. have started to respond.
The EU imposes a 10% tariff on imported EVs from China, which can cost 20% less than European brands.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in September noted that global markets were flooded with cheaper Chinese electric cars.
“And their price is kept artificially low by huge state subsidies,” she said. “This is distorting our market.”
Reuters news agency reported Friday that European Commission investigators will in the coming weeks begin inspecting Chinese EV makers as part of a probe into China’s subsidies that could see the EU impose additional tariffs.
Beijing has denounced the move as “naked protectionism.”
The U.S. has a 27.5% tariff on Chinese EVs, but last month the Biden administration indicated it could be raised this year.
And the U.S. announced in December that starting this year, EVs produced in the U.S. with battery components manufactured or assembled in China would no longer qualify for tax credits of up to $7,500.
Analyst Triolo told VOA that imposing tariffs might not prevent Chinese companies from building factories in Mexico — or even the U.S. — to supply the U.S. market.
Triolo also warned that if BYD dominated the Western market, it could pose national security risks similar to those of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei.
“At one level, a smart EV is just a smartphone on wheels, and [EVs] generate similar levels of concern about data [collection] and sharing, given their sensor suites and onboard computing power.”
Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
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Russian Orthodox Priest Faces Expulsion for Refusing to Pray for War Victory
Russia Designates Popular Writer A ‘Foreign Agent’ Over Ukraine Stance
2 Navy SEALs Missing After Night Mission off Somali Coast
WASHINGTON — Two U.S. Navy SEALs are missing after conducting a nighttime boarding mission Thursday off the coast of Somalia, according to three U.S. officials.
The SEALs were on an interdiction mission, climbing up a vessel when one got knocked off by high waves. Under their protocol, when one SEAL is overtaken the next jumps in after them.
Both SEALs are still missing. A search and rescue mission is under way and the waters in the Gulf of Aden, where they were operating, are warm, two of the U.S. officials said.
The U.S. Navy has conducted regular interdiction missions, where they have intercepted weapons on ships that were bound for Houthi-controlled Yemen.
The mission was not related to Operation Prosperity Guardian, the ongoing U.S. and international mission to provide protection to commercial vessels in the Red Sea, or the retaliatory strikes that the United States and the United Kingdom have conducted in Yemen over the past two days, the official said Saturday. It was also not related to the seizure of the oil tanker St. Nikolas by Iran, a third U.S. official said.
The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details that have not yet been made public.
Besides defending ships from the drones and missiles launched from Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen, the U.S. military has also come to the aid of commercial ships that have been the targets of piracy.
In a statement Saturday, U.S. Central Command said it would not release additional information on the Thursday night incident until the personnel recovery mission is complete.
The sailors were forward-deployed to the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations supporting a wide variety of missions.
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Uncertainty About Fairness Looms Over Pakistan’s Next Elections
Concerns are rising over whether Pakistan’s February 8 general elections will be free and fair as challenges mount for the political party of former Prime Minister Imran Khan. Also adding to the uncertainty are calls to delay elections amid deteriorating security and a lackluster campaign season. VOA Pakistan Bureau Chief Sarah Zaman reports from Islamabad. Camera: Wajid Asad.
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India’s Foreign Minister to Travel to Iran
New Delhi — India’s Minister of External Affairs will make a two-day trip to Iran starting Sunday, following Western airstrikes against Yemen’s Houthi rebels over the Tehran-backed group’s attacks on vessels in the Red Sea.
The visit by Subrahmanyam Jaishankar comes a month after a drone attack on a ship near Indian waters that the United States blamed on Iran.
A government statement issued Saturday said that Jaishankar would meet his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amirabdollahian to discuss “bilateral, regional and global issues,” without giving further detail.
The Houthis have carried out scores of drone and missile strikes on the key international route through the Red Sea since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza, which was triggered by Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7.
Many vessels have been rerouted from the Red Sea due to drone and missile attacks carried out by the Houthi rebels in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
India has significantly stepped up its own maritime patrols in the Arabian Sea to “maintain a deterrent presence” after the string of attacks on vessels.
In December a drone attack hit the MV Chem Pluto oil tanker 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) off the coast of India, which the United States blamed on Iran — claims Tehran dubbed “worthless.”
Earlier this month India’s navy said it had rescued 21 crew members from a vessel in the Arabian Sea after a hijacking distress call.
Jaishankar said Thursday he had spoken to U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken about “maritime security challenges, especially (in) the Red Sea region.”
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