Tác giả: Trần Đình Hoành

I am an attorney in the Washington DC area, with a Doctor of Law in the US, attended the master program at the National School of Administration of Việt Nam, and graduated from Sài Gòn University Law School. I aso studied philosophy at the School of Letters in Sài Gòn. . I have worked as an anti-trust attorney for Federal Trade Commission and a litigator for a fortune-100 telecom company in Washington DC. I have taught law courses for legal professionals in Việt Nam and still counsel VN government agencies on legal matters. I have founded and managed businesses for me and my family, both law and non-law. I have published many articles on national newspapers and radio stations in Việt Nam. In 1989 I was one of the founding members of US-VN Trade Council, working to re-establish US-VN relationship. Since the early 90's, I have established and managed VNFORUM and VNBIZ forum on VN-related matters; these forums are the subject of a PhD thesis by Dr. Caroline Valverde at UC-Berkeley and her book Transnationalizing Viet Nam. I translate poetry and my translation of "A Request at Đồng Lộc Cemetery" is now engraved on a stone memorial at Đồng Lộc National Shrine in VN. I study and teach the Bible and Buddhism. In 2009 I founded and still manage dotchuoinon.com on positive thinking and two other blogs on Buddhism. In 2015 a group of friends and I founded website CVD - Conversations on Vietnam Development (cvdvn.net). I study the art of leadership with many friends who are religious, business and government leaders from many countries. I have written these books, published by Phu Nu Publishing House in Hanoi: "Positive Thinking to Change Your Life", in Vietnamese (TƯ DUY TÍCH CỰC Thay Đổi Cuộc Sống) (Oct. 2011) "10 Core Values for Success" (10 Giá trị cốt lõi của thành công) (Dec. 2013) "Live a Life Worth Living" (Sống Một Cuộc Đời Đáng Sống) (Oct. 2023) I practice Jiu Jitsu and Tai Chi for health, and play guitar as a hobby, usually accompanying my wife Trần Lê Túy Phượng, aka singer Linh Phượng.

‘We had to sue’: the five lawyers taking on China’s authorities over smog

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The  Guardian

In an unprecedented legal case, a group of Chinese lawyers have charged the governments of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei with failing to protect their citizens from air pollution, which is linked to a third of all deaths in the country

Pinterest
Airpocalypse now: time-lapse video of smog posted by Beijing-based Briton Chas Pope on 1 January this year

Who is responsible for China’s chronic and deadly air pollution? That depends on who you ask. Officials blame the weather or outdoor barbecues, activists blame steel companies and coal-fired power plants. But Yu Wensheng blames only one actor: the government.

The 50-year-old lawyer recently launched an unprecedented suit against the authorities in three regions in China, claiming they have failed in their responsibilities. For a government with the motto “Serve the People”, Yu feels the officials are serving other interests by allowing nearly half a billion people to choke on toxic smog. Tiếp tục đọc “‘We had to sue’: the five lawyers taking on China’s authorities over smog” →

Philippine bid to jail nine-year-olds is ‘a great child violation’, Unicef says

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The Guardian

Duterte’s allies have been pushing to lower the age of criminal responsibility from 15 to nine

Children playing on a hill of garbage in the Philippines
Unicef says a nine-year-old is unable to fully comprehend the consequences of a crime. Photograph: Jes Aznar/Getty Images

, Southeast Asia correspondent

Sunday 12 February 2017 22.03 EST Last modified on Sunday 12 February 2017 22.06 EST

A law proposing children as young as nine be jailed for crimes is “wrong from every angle”, the head of the United Nations children’s agency in the Philippines has warned.

“If they grow up, spending their teenage years in a prison, they most probably will be damaged for life,” Unicef’s country representative, Lotta Sylwander, said in a telephone interview from Manila.

The current age of criminal responsibility in the Philippines is 15. President Rodrigo Duterte’s allies have been pushing to lower it, coupled with another draft bill that would restore the death penalty.Politicians opposing the bills say their passing could lead to a situation in which a nine-year-old may be sentenced to death. Tiếp tục đọc “Philippine bid to jail nine-year-olds is ‘a great child violation’, Unicef says” →

International Criminal Court told Australia’s detention regime could be a crime against humanity

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The Guardian

Submission argues ICC should investigate possible crimes ‘committed by individuals and corporate actors’

Asylum seekers on Manus Island in 2014
Asylum seekers on Manus Island in 2014. The Global Legal Action Network says Australia’s immigration detention regime could constitute a crime against humanity. Photograph: Eoin Blackwell/AAP

Australia’s offshore immigration detention regime could constitute a crime against humanity, a petition before the International Criminal Court from a coalition of legal experts has alleged.

On Monday morning, GMT, a 108-page legal submission from the Global Legal Action Network (Glan) and the Stanford International Human Rights Clinic was submitted to the court, detailing what the network describes as the “harrowing practices of the Australian state and corporations towards asylum seekers”. The petition submits the office of the prosecutor of the ICC should open an investigation into possible “crimes against humanity committed by individuals and corporate actors”.

“As recent leaks reveal, these privatised facilities entail long-term detention in inhumane conditions, often including physical and sexual abuse of adults and children,” Glan said in a statement. Tiếp tục đọc “International Criminal Court told Australia’s detention regime could be a crime against humanity” →

Indonesian Muslim school students protest Valentine’s Day

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ChannelNewsAsia

  • Posted 13 Feb 2017 20:26

An anti-Valentine’s Day rally in Surabaya, East Java province on February 13, 2017 AFP/Juni KriswantoSURABAYA, Indonesia: Indonesian Muslim school students staged a protest against Valentine’s Day on Monday (Feb 13), denouncing what they said was a Western celebration that encourages casual sex.

While teenagers in many countries treat the day as an occasion to declare love for their classmates, in the Indonesian city of Surabaya it was a different story as students from one school held a noisy demonstration.

“Say no to Valentine!” chanted the students, who were aged between 13 and 15 and included many girls wearing headscarves. Tiếp tục đọc “Indonesian Muslim school students protest Valentine’s Day” →

Pakistan high court bans Valentine’s Day

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ChannelNewsAsia

  • Posted 13 Feb 2017 21:42
  • Updated 13 Feb 2017 21:50

Pakistani vendors prepare heart-shaped bouquets for sale ahead of Valentine’s Day along a street in Islamabad on Feb 13, 2017. (AFP Photo/Aamir Qureshi)

ISLAMABAD: A Pakistani court Monday (Feb 13) banned public celebrations of Valentine’s Day in the capital Islamabad, the latest attempt by authorities to outlaw a holiday seen by many in the traditional Muslim society as vulgar and Western.

The Islamabad high court issued the order after a petitioner declared love was being used as a “cover” to spread “immorality, nudity and indecency… which is against our rich traditions and values”. Tiếp tục đọc “Pakistan high court bans Valentine’s Day” →

Saiga Antelopes Are Struck Again by a Plague in Central Asia

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By ERICA GOODE FEB. 8, 2017

The carcasses of saiga antelopes in Mongolia’s western Khovd province. Scientists have identified the culprit as a virus known as goat plague. WCS

They found the first carcasses in late December, on the frozen steppes of Mongolia’s western Khovd province.

By the end of January, officials in the region had recorded the deaths of 2,500 endangered saiga antelopes — about a quarter of the country’s saiga population — and scientists had identified a culprit: a virus called peste des petits ruminants, or P.P.R., also known as goat plague.

It was the first time the disease, usually seen in goats, sheep and other small livestock, had been found in free-ranging antelopes. For the saiga, an ancient animal that once roamed the grasslands of the world with the woolly mammoth and the saber-toothed tiger, the outbreak was potentially catastrophic.

The antelope’s numbers, once in the millions, have been severely depleted by illegal hunting, habitat loss and competition for food. The species is described as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List.

In 2015, 211,000 saigas in Kazakhstan — more than half of the entire antelope species — were wiped out by a bacterial infection in less than a month.

Election in Indonesia’s Capital Could Test Ethnic and Religious Tolerance

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Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, the governor of Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital. While campaigning ahead of elections on Wednesday, Mr. Basuki, who is ethnic Chinese and a Christian, has also been defending himself in court against charges of blasphemy against Islam. Darren Whiteside/Reuters

JAKARTA, Indonesia — In one of the most contentious campaigns in the history of Indonesia’s young democracy, Basuki Tjahaja Purnama, the governor of Jakarta, is battling on two fronts: in the court of public opinion and in the court of law.

Mr. Basuki, an ethnic Chinese Christian who leads the capital of the world’s most populous predominantly Muslim country, is not only campaigning in the election on Wednesday but also defending himself against criminal charges of blasphemy against Islam.

He and his chief political ally, President Joko Widodo, have labeled his court case a conspiracy by “political actors” who aim to quash his re-election bid for one of the country’s most powerful offices. Some political analysts also called the court case, which they say violates a decades-old ban on using ethnicity and religion as a political weapon, a move by opponents of Mr. Joko to weaken the president in the prelude to his 2019 re-election bid.

A series of rallies in Jakarta late last year that drew hundreds of thousands of hard-line Islamists, including one in November that turned violent and left one dead and hundreds injured, have eroded Mr. Basuki’s once double-digit lead.

Mr. Basuki is only the second non-Muslim governor of Jakarta since Indonesia’s independence from the Netherlands in 1945. Wednesday’s election is viewed as a test of religious as well as ethnic tolerance in the country, which has more than 190 million Muslims among its population of 250 million, as well as influential religious minorities of Christians, Hindus and Buddhists.

E-mail click rates plunge 12.5% in Asia Pacific

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shutterstock_computer

E-mail click rates in Asia Pacific in Q3 2016 (July to September) have plunged 12.5% from Q2 – a likely consequence of a 53% increase in the average number of e-mails delivered per company at the same period, the latest study from Epsilon showed.

The analysis was compiled from 772 million e-mails sent by approximately 60 company in Q3 2016 across Australia, mainland China, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore.

E-mail open rates also showed a mild drop from 16.6% to 16.4%. In Q3 2015 the e-mail open rates was 19.6%. Non-bounce rates decreased slightly to 96.2% from 96.7% in Q2 2016 and are slightly higher than Q3 2015 (95.1%). Among all the email sent,  triggered messages accounted for 1.8% of total email volume in Q3 2016, above Q2 2016 (1.2%) and higher than Q1 2016 (0.8%). Tiếp tục đọc “E-mail click rates plunge 12.5% in Asia Pacific” →

US, Japan, S Korea request UN Security Council meeting on N Korea

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ChannelNewsAsia

  • Posted 13 Feb 2017 08:38
  • Updated 13 Feb 2017 08:40

Passengers watch a TV screen broadcasting a news report on North Korea firing a ballistic missile into the sea off its east coast, at a railway station in Seoul, South Korea, February 12, 2017. REUTERS/Kim Hong-Ji

WASHINGTON: The United States, Japan and South Korea on Sunday (Feb 12) requested an urgent UN Security Council meeting to discuss North Korea’s latest missile test.

“The United States, along with Japan and the Republic of Korea, have requested urgent consultations on the DPRK’s launch of a ballistic missile on February 12,” said a US mission spokesperson.

The test was seen as a challenge to Donald Trump’s young presidency.

The request comes after North Korea’s state media quoted officials as saying the ballistic missile test was a “success”.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “guided” the test, the KCNA report said, adding it was carried out in a way that took the “security of the neighbouring countries into consideration”. Tiếp tục đọc “US, Japan, S Korea request UN Security Council meeting on N Korea” →

China expels 32 South Korean missionaries amid tension over THAAD missile defense system

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Japan  Times

Reuters Feb 11, 2017

SEOUL – China has expelled 32 South Korean Christian missionaries, a South Korean government official said on Saturday, amid diplomatic tension between the two countries over the planned deployment of a U.S. missile defense system in the South.

The 32 were based in China’s northeastern Yanji region near the border with North Korea, many of whom had worked there more than a decade, South Korean media have reported.

South Korea’s foreign ministry said on Friday it briefed Christian groups on the case of the missionaries, adding that they were expelled in January.

The ministry advised the groups on the importance of complying with the laws and customs of the areas where they work, it said. Tiếp tục đọc “China expels 32 South Korean missionaries amid tension over THAAD missile defense system” →

U.S., Chinese military planes in ‘unsafe’ encounter over disputed South China Sea

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Japan Times

A Chinese H-6K bomber patrols islands and reefs in the South China Sea in this undated photo. | XINHUA NEWS AGENCY / VIA AP
by Staff Writer Feb 10, 2017

A U.S. Navy reconnaissance aircraft and a Chinese military plane were involved in an “unsafe” encounter earlier this week in international airspace over the disputed South China Sea, the U.S. Pacific Command said Friday.

The U.S. Navy P-3C was on a “routine mission” over the waters on Wednesday when the encounter with a Chinese military KJ-200 aircraft occurred, Pacific Command said.

The two planes flew within 1,000 feet (300 meters) of each other in the area of the contested Scarborough Shoal, just 230 km (140 miles) from the Philippine coast, CNN reported, citing unnamed U.S. defense officials.

Scarborough Shoal, which is also claimed by Manila, has been known as a potential flashpoint, and rumors of a push by China to build on the collection of rocky outcroppings have stoked concern in the region. Building at Scarborough would create a large “strategic triangle” covering much of the South China Sea that would give it the ability to declare and police an air defense identification zone (ADIZ) there. Tiếp tục đọc “U.S., Chinese military planes in ‘unsafe’ encounter over disputed South China Sea” →

NATO Checking Claim that U.S. Airstrikes Killed 22 Afghan Civilians

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By MUJIB MASHAL and TAIMOOR SHAH FEB. 11, 2017

Afghan police during an operation against Taliban militants in the Sangin district of Afghanistan’s Helmand province in January. Watan Yar/European Pressphoto Agency

KABUL, Afghanistan — The NATO mission in Afghanistan has opened a preliminary investigation into claims that more than 20 civilians were killed in recent American airstrikes in the southern province of Helmand, military officials said Saturday.

Elders from the Sangin district, the scene of heavy fighting in recent weeks, with the Taliban blowing up Afghan Army posts there, have said that multiple American airstrikes early Friday morning killed at least 22 civilians, including several women and children.

Brig. Gen. Charles H. Cleveland, a spokesman for the American-led NATO mission, insisted that the military command had seen no conclusive evidence that civilians were killed in the airstrikes, but said that “a formal review to determine the credibility of the claims” had been opened. The investigation team involved NATO officers outside the American command to ensure impartiality, he added.

Trump Responds to North Korean Missile Launch With Uncharacteristic Restraint

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By PETER BAKER FEB. 12, 2017

On Sunday in Seoul, South Korea, people watched a news broadcast on the North Korean missile test. President Trump had a decidedly muted response. Kim Hee-Chul/European Pressphoto Agency

WASHINGTON — After North Korea threatened on New Year’s Day to test an intercontinental ballistic missile, Donald J. Trump, then president-elect, reacted with characteristic swagger. He vowed to stop the North from developing a nuclear weapon capable of hitting the United States. “It won’t happen!” he wrote on Twitter.

But six weeks later, after North Korea defiantly launched a missile into the sea, Mr. Trump, now president, reacted with surprising restraint. Appearing before cameras late at night on Saturday in Florida with his golfing guest, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan, Mr. Trump read a statement of just 23 words that pledged American support for Tokyo without even mentioning North Korea.

North Korea Fires Ballistic Missile, Challenging Trump

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By CHOE SANG-HUN FEB. 11, 2017

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan and President Trump denounced North Korea’s latest ballistic missile test, while Senator Chuck Schumer of New York said China should “put the wood to North Korea.”

By REUTERS and THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. Photo by Ahn Young-Joon/Associated Press. Watch in Times Video

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea launched a ballistic missile toward the sea off its eastern coast on Sunday, in what South Korea called the North’s first attempt to test President Trump’s policy on the isolated country.

A projectile believed to be a modified version of the North’s intermediate-range ballistic missile Musudan took off at 7:55 a.m. from Banghyon, a town near North Korea’s northwestern border with China, and flew 310 miles before falling in the sea, the South Korean military said. Earlier, the United States Strategic Command issued a statement identifying the missile as a medium- or intermediate-range system that “did not pose a threat to North America.”

South Korea condemned the missile launching, saying that it violated a series of United Nations Security Council resolutions that bar North Korea from developing or testing ballistic missile and nuclear weapons technologies. It also said the North had launched the missile to raise tensions over its weapons programs and to use it as leverage in dealing with the Trump administration.

Top Opposition Leader in Cambodia Resigns as Election Nears

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By JULIA WALLACE FEB. 12, 2017

Sam Rainsy, until Saturday the leader of the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, arriving in Phnom Penh, the capital, in August 2015. He fled the country that November to avoid jail time. Heng Sinith/Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — The embattled leader of Cambodia’s main opposition party abruptly quit on Saturday in the face of increasing government pressure, ceding a political stage he had occupied for more than two decades.

The resignation of the leader, Sam Rainsy, came after the government began a series of moves that would allow it to dissolve the Cambodia National Rescue Party he led, in advance of crucial local elections set for June. The opposition has also been hit with a barrage of lawsuits and leaked telephone conversations between leading figures and women purported to be their mistresses.

It was unclear whether Mr. Sam Rainsy, 67, was leaving politics for good or was planning to work quietly behind the scenes. Either way, his exit seemed to represent the end of an era.

As the head of three liberal-leaning political parties since 1995, he had been a thorn in the side of the country’s long-ruling prime minister, Hun Sen, for more than 20 years.