Indonesia has sent hundreds of riot police to a tiny island after protests broke out against a China-backed project that would displace thousands of residents.
About 1,000 people protested in Batam City on Monday over a plan to develop Rempang island into a Chinese-funded economic zone, including the construction of a multibillion-dollar glass factory, that would displace about 7,500 people.
Some protesters clashed with security forces outside a government agency, wielding machetes, Molotov cocktails and stones, police said, adding that dozens were arrested.
Photo: Reuters
Beijing has poured money into infrastructure and resource projects in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy and its investments have previously caused social unrest, including a deadly January riot at a nickel smelting facility on Sulawesi island.
Police in Riau Islands province, near Singapore, said that 200 officers from the mobile brigade riot police unit known as Brimob were dispatched to the scene on Thursday.
“They are from Riau Province’s mobile brigade. The deployment is ... to create security,” police spokesman Zahwani Pandra Arsyad told reporters. “This is a precautionary step to ... maintain security as Batam, Riau Islands is strategic [for] people to do business and invest.”
Arsyad said the length of deployment “depends on the situation.”
Monday’s unrest took place outside a building of BP Batam, the agency that oversees the region’s development.
Jakarta secured a reported US$11.5 billion investment pledge from Xinyi Glass Holdings (信義玻璃控股有限公司), the world’s biggest glass producer, to build the factory during a visit by Indonesian President Joko Widodo to the Chinese city of Chengdu in July.
Widodo responded to the unrest on Thursday, saying that anger against the project was caused by miscommunication that could have been prevented if relocation package details were properly explained.
BP Batam has said the packages would include rent and meal compensation.
The government says the development will create tens of thousands of jobs for Indonesians.
It aims to attract more than 300,000 jobs by 2080, according to officials, who have not said when the project is expected to be finished.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
GEOPOLITICAL CONCERNS: Foreign companies such as Nissan, Volkswagen and Konica Minolta have pulled back their operations in China this year Foreign companies pulled more money from China last quarter, a sign that some investors are still pessimistic even as Beijing rolls out stimulus measures aimed at stabilizing growth. China’s direct investment liabilities in its balance of payments dropped US$8.1 billion in the third quarter, data released by the Chinese State Administration of Foreign Exchange showed on Friday. The gauge, which measures foreign direct investment (FDI) in China, was down almost US$13 billion for the first nine months of the year. Foreign investment into China has slumped in the past three years after hitting a record in 2021, a casualty of geopolitical tensions,