Asian Studies Blog

In recent news, Pakistan has made new censorship guidelines that companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter are not happy about. In the past when other countries have created censorship rules the companies have cared but they haven't threatened to do such a thing as leave the country. With these new guidelines, the three companies threatened to leave the country as a form of rebellion. Well their threats worked, Pakistani officials have come to an agreement where they would review and come up with new guidelines. Pakistan does not have any data protection law, with that companies like Google, Facebook, etc. don't necessarily need to abide by those rules. Pakistani officials got a bit scared with threats from companies to leave the country and other people to file lawsuits. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/technology/pakistan-internet-censorship.html

This article in the New York Times talks about these 3 reporters working for the Wall Street Journal. These 3 men were working in mainland China and they came out with a headline that Chinese officials were unhappy about, it read "Chine is the Real Sick Man of Asia". A spokesperson said that their credentials would be revoked if they didn't get rid of the headline. They also wanted an apology. The three reporters were given a few days to leave the country as their visas would be revoked. The Secretary of State came out with a statement saying how successful countries should recognize freedom of speech.   Link

After already being shaken up, Thailand experienced yet another shooting. Thankfully this time it didn't injure anyone or kill any one. Thailand had already experienced a mass shooting in which 29 people were killed. This shooting lasted for 18 hours, as the shooter went off an a spree. This most recent shooting only lasted for 6 hours and the no one was harmed in any way. When authorities finally arrested the guy, he said his motive was stemmed from family problems. Now a days, its scary to see how many shooting occur, and sadly it's not only in America that we're experiencing this. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/14/world/asia/shooting-bangkok-gunman.html

For this weeks article I stumbled upon an interesting article in The New York Times. It is about these two men who run a bird hospital in Delhi. These two men specifically rescue Black Kite birds, which are apparently all over Delhi. They started the hospital after the Jains (a religion) opened an animal hospital that helped non-carnivorous animals. The owner of the hospital, Mr. Shehzad, opened up the hospital to help black birds because he felt it was unfair the they didn't receive any treated. These two men have been dedicated to treat wildlife animals. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/07/science/kites-birds-conservation-india.html

A lady by the name of Leila Janah, who was the daughter to immigrant parents, became a social entrepreneur and hired many people from India and Africa that were in financial need. She recently died in Manhattan at the age of 37. Her story is that she would visit these countries and she realized that there were villages where it was predominately low income people. She decided that they too had potential and hired them. She mainly hired women to the job. What these workers did was produce data that many companies of self-driving cars, etc could use. People that worked for her company Samasource in Kenya, went on to work under contracts for Google, Glassdoor, Facebook, Microsoft, etc. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/30/business/leila-janah-dead.html

In recent times, there has been a new deadly virus that started off in China and has made it's way into other countries. The new virus that is killing many is called "coronavirus". Many have been getting sick and some have even died from this virus. It has gotten so bad that transportation has been cancelled, events have been cancelled, etc. It seems to  have started in Wuhan. Many have been advised to not travel, but despite it all, the virus has spread to other countries like Japan and Thailand.  There have also been reports that people in Canada and even a student at Texas A&M University have become ill with the virus. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51230011?intlink_from_url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world/asia&link_location=live-reporting-story

Parental leave in Japan is common amongst women, but rare for men. However according to the BBC Asia article, parents are allowed up to a year of parental leave. Women have been more likely to go on parental leave than man are. For the first time Japan's Environmental Minister (Shinjiro Koizumi) will be taking two weeks of parental leave. This will be the first time a Japanese cabinet minister will take parental leave. Even though it is ok for men to go on parental leave, many don't because they feel that they are obligated to keep working. Link: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-51127022