Jun
27
2011
THE long-anticipated trial of the four most senior living Khmer Rouge leaders begins today, more than 30 years after Cambodia was racked by their ultra-communist rule of mass torture and murder.
Burma film to stay in the shadows
Jun
15
2011
THE film is jinxed. Due to screen at the Sydney Film Festival today, Dancing with Dictators has been pulled at the 11th hour after a series of calamities.The problems began when the Australian filmmakers, Hugh Piper and Helen Barrow, were arrested and chucked out of Burma last November. Then the subject of their documentary, journalist …read more
Refugees clamour for inclusion on the magic list
Jun
9
2011
The magic list of refugees who might make the cut to come to Australia has taken on mythical proportions in the ghettos of Kuala Lumpur. To make the list means an end to a life of uncertainty and insecurity, an end to dodging police and the paramilitary corps. It means being able to work legally, …read more
Refugees on a hiding to nothing
May
11
2011
ALAM Shamsul Alam ran for his life. He ran barefoot across paddy fields for kilometres, then leaped into the sea and swam for two hours in a bid for freedom. He was eventually picked up by fishermen and handed to the police.
Painting the town
Mar
28
2011
The acting chairwoman of the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD) movement, better known as the ‘red shirts’, Thida smiles as she begins to address the anti-government protesters.
Royal Connections
Mar
1
2011
Back then, he was a skinny little kid, looking for his family in the wasteland of Khmer Rouge devastation. He had been forcibly separated from his parents in a distant commune years before, later discovering they had starved to death. After the fall of the brutal regime, in the confusion and desperation of those early …read more
Creative Fashion
Jan
2
2011
Hard at work in her office at the top of a candy-coloured rococo building in downtown Hanoi, Christina Yu is thinking about colour and shape and line and texture. Four floors down, the Ipa-Nima showroom is bursting with her rainbow creations: handbags in hues as varied as burgundy, olive green, deep purple, hot pink and …read more
Burma activists hope junta will end torture
Dec
11
2010
She’s just 26 years old, but, barring a miracle, she is destined to spend the next 26 years of her life in one of Burma’s notorious jails.
Thai threads
Dec
1
2010
A taupe knit dress with sleeves of cascading ruffles, a translucent silk bodice adorned with appliquéd silver hearts, a structured deep purple silk bustier, and a trench coat with a super-hero cape: just a few examples from this season’s eclectic Thai fashion collections.
Home Truths
Oct
31
2010
Five years ago, Aye Min Soe abandoned his work as an engineer to pick up a camera, dodge the Burmese military and risk arrest and another prison term.