The Economist USA - 28.03.2020

34 Asia The EconomistMarch 28th 2020

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“F

irst he justasked for a picture of my

body, but then he asked if I could send

one that showed my face...and then he

asked me to play with myself...to use

school supplies,” the girl told a local radio

show on the morning of March 24th. She

went on to describe a weeks-long ordeal

during which she sent more than 40 graph-

ic videos to a man she feared would public-

ly humiliate her if she stopped complying.

“He had all my personal information...I

was afraid he would threaten me with that

if I quit.”

The girl was a middle-school student at

the time of the alleged incident two years

ago. She is only one of dozens of apparent

victims in the latest sexual-abuse scandal

to rock South Korea.

On the same day that she described her

plight, police revealed the identity of the

man who stands accused of running a

range of porn channels, known as “nth

rooms” on the Telegram chat app, charging

up to 30,000 subscribers between $200

and $1,200 (most of that, it seems, collected

in bitcoin to avoid detection) for access to

graphic sexual content extorted from

young women and under-age girls. Cho Ju-

bin (pictured), a 24-year-old graduate and

former college-newspaper editor who

called himself baksa, or “doctor”, was

named after 2.5m South Koreans signed a

petition clamouring for his identity to be

made public. Almost 2m people signed a

separate petition demanding that the po-

lice also identify all the subscribers to the

channels. Authorities say they have count-

ed more than a quarter of a million sub-

scribers across chat rooms featuring ex-

SEOUL

Yet another sex scandal provokes

national outrage

Sexual abuse in South Korea

Naming and

shaming

Like other East Asian countries, Japan

has learned from previous epidemics, such

as sarsand bird flu, about the importance

of containment: pains are taken to identify

infection clusters and then to track down

transmission routes, says Shindo Nahoko

of the who. A compliant population heeds

government health advice about frequent

hand-washing and accepts unpopular

measures such as the closure of schools.

Yet the government has to date commu-

nicated little sense of crisis—in part, the

suspicion goes, to make everything appear

normal so that the games could go ahead.

Instead of adopting the stringent suppress-

ion measures being pursued across Asia,

Europe and America, Japan is relaxing its

restrictions. Hokkaido, with a big cluster of

infections, has lifted the state of emergen-

cy declared in late February. Mr Abe says

that schools can reopen next month.

Meanwhile fewer than a sixth of work-

ers are working from home. Over the week-

end, Tokyoites ignored official guidance

and turned out in throngs to admire the

cherry blossoms. A kick-boxing event in

Saitama prefecture attracted 6,500 fans.

Late-night revellers slurp shoulder-to-

shoulder at ramen joints before heading

home on crowded trains. In the land of

bows, senior officials greet foreign visitors

with hearty handshakes, to show that

everything is fine.

Given that infections continue to rise,

some are finding the general nonchalance

unnerving. Reports are growing of corohara

(short for “coronavirus harassment”): the

bullying of people who have recently re-

turned from abroad, or who cough in pub-

lic places. Experts in public health are

alarmed. Some say the government’s test-

ing only of those who have clear symptoms

or who have been in contact with a carrier

risks missing the spread of infection

through the wider population. Mr Abe has

set up a task force and an expert panel but,

says Iwata Kentaro of Kobe University, no

one appears to be in charge. Kami Masa-

hiro, who heads the non-profit Medical

Governance Research Institute, fears that

in a climate of complacency and restricted

testing, coronavirus cases could “explode”.

For now, raising such fears is taboo

among national politicians and at the pub-

lic broadcaster, nhk—just as suggesting

that the games should be postponed was,

only a week ago. But that may soon change.

Faced with a new clutch of infections in her

city, the governor of Tokyo, Koike Yuriko,

this week warned that the city of 13m might

face a lockdown if cases could not be con-

tained. Transmission routes were becom-

ing increasingly hard to identify, she said;

the coming three weeks would be critical.

She urged Tokyoites to stay at home this

weekend, although she stopped short of or-

dering it.

Her comments ought to shake the city’s

residents out of their complacency. Nor

can the prime minister afford to be com-

placent. If the pandemic is mishandled,

even next year may prove too early to hold

the games. Party rules dictate that Mr Abe

retire by the autumn of 2021—which means

he could miss the games he did so much to

bring about, just like his grandfather did. 7

L

ike manyothers, the government of

Bangladesh has issued a ban on public

gatherings to curb the spread of covid-19.

Yet not even the threat of a pandemic

could deter supporters of Khaleda Zia, a

jailed opposition leader, from turning

out en masse to witness her release on

bail. The 74-year-old, who leads the

Bangladesh Nationalist Party (bnp), was

granted a six-month reprieve from pri-

son on March 25th in order to seek medi-

cal treatment.

Mrs Zia, who served as Bangladesh’s

prime minister from 1991 to 1996 and

from 2001 to 2006, was handed a five-

year prison sentence in 2018 for misusing

funds intended for a charity for children.

The bnpclaims that case and others

against Mrs Zia—there are 34 in all—are

politically motivated. For a time the

leadership of Bangladesh seesawed

between the two begums, Mrs Zia and

Sheikh Hasina Wajed, the incumbent

prime minister. But since her re-election

in 2008 Sheikh Hasina has governed in

an increasingly authoritarian vein.

“I hope this will bury the old ani-

mosity and pave the way for a new fu-

ture,” says Badiul Majumdar of shujan,

an anti-corruption group. But most

explanations of the decision are more

cynical. Tasvirul Islam, a bnpdistrict

leader, says it is designed to “divert the

attention of the people” from the covid

outbreak. Others speculate that the

government is worried that Mrs Zia

might die behind bars. “There would be

riots,” says one Bangladeshi journalist.

Whatever the government’s motivation,

Mr Islam sighs, “The current health crisis

will mean the government is even less

tolerant of opposition.”

Ee begum!

Politics in Bangladesh

The government releases a jailed opposition figure