Jim Snyder

Radio Free Asia • 1st November 2024

Military advances force evacuation of villages in Myanmar’s Shan state

A drone strike on Thursday by Myanmar’s military killed an 8-year-old girl, a 37-year-old man, and wounded eight other civilians in a small village in southern Shan state as junta troops sought to retake towns controlled by rebel forces.

Radio Free Asia • 18th February 2024

For Uyghur family, a legacy of rootlessness

The Muhammads fled China and war-torn Afghanistan. Decades later, they may be on the move again.

RFA • 7th June 2024

Five years after a summer of protest, Hong Kong exiles are still rebuilding their lives

As she stood across the street from the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Washington, D.C., Frances Hui couldn’t quite suppress a smile, despite the bounty on her head. “Behind this building is a regime that is still actively trying to hunt activists down,” said Hui, who grew up in Hong Kong but now lives in the U.S. capital.
“One of them is me.”

Radio Free Asia • 22nd November 2023

A quicker trip to Seoul – and potential curb on Chinese illegal fishing

Although more than half a century has passed, Kim Sang-jin still remembers when his family placed doenjang, a soybean paste, outside their home on South Korea’s Heuksan Island to ferment overnight – only to find it gone the next morning. “That’s how we knew,” Kim said, “North Korean spies had infiltrated the island.”

Radio Free Asia • 3rd October 2023

Fleeing North Korea has never been harder, or costlier

More North Koreans fleeing poverty and a repressive government have reached South Korea this year compared to last, as rescue operations restart after a hiatus during COVID.But the number remains well below the historical average, and likely will for the foreseeable future.

Radio Free Asia • 24th December 2022

A Ukrainian village occupied by Russian troops tries to recover

In the early weeks of the invasion, Yahidne residents were held captive in the basement of their local school.

For four weeks last March, the Yahidne school served as a makeshift prison for more than 300 of the town's residents.

Ivan Petrovich wearily unlocks the gate to the school that for four harrowing weeks in March became a makeshift prison, a morning fog still lingering in the surrounding woods.

“I know there are a lot of things to do – cleaning up the village, farming, fixing the house

Radio Free Asia • 20th March 2023

For female journalists, covering China comes at a cost

Su Yutong, Vicky Xu and other reporters of Asian descent face an onslaught of abuse covering China critically.

The strange men started showing up at Su Yutong’s Berlin apartment in early June. For weeks, one or two would arrive each day.

Su grew up in China but since 2010 has lived in Germany, where she works as a journalist, including for Radio Free Asia. Her visitors, though, thought they were visiting a prostitute.

“Almost every day different people rang my doorbell,” Su said. “They say th

Radio Free Asia • 11th January 2023

‘He is always perfect in my heart’

Wolf warrior Zhao Lijian has a big fan base in China. Some boosters aren’t happy with his new job, or his wife.

Weibo user “Lilaoshilifuzhen” is taking the news of Zhao Lijian’s new job hard. She says she was in tears over learning Zhao, one of China’s best-known wolf warrior diplomats, would leave his post as the high-profile Foreign Ministry spokesman to become the deputy head of the lesser-known Department of Boundary and Oceans Affairs.

“China’s foreign affairs are always fascinating, but

1st February 2023

Under the Gun in Myanmar

Conditions in Myanmar have “gone from bad, to worse, to horrific for untold numbers of innocent Myanmar people."

Radio Free Asia • 26th April 2023

China’s transgender ‘medicine girls’ can’t find the medicine they need

An already fraught transition process has been made harder by new restrictions on online drug sales in China.

For transgender women in China, transitioning can feel like a mythical quest, a fresh obstacle arising just after one has been cleared.

Treatments are expensive, difficult to obtain and can require years of fighting unwilling doctors, red tape and familial disapproval.

In recent months, a difficult process has become even harder, according to Chinese trans women who spoke to RFA. In D

Radio Free Asia • 5th April 2023

Cambodia sells research monkeys to the world. It’s not all legal, US says.

As COVID-19 sends demand for research macaques soaring, a U.S. court case is raising questions about their origins.

Visitors are not welcome at the monkey farm co-owned by the sister of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen.

The farm is ringed by moat-like canals, 6-foot-6-inch-high (2 meters) earthworks and a brick wall topped with razor wire.

A former employee told RFA that guards with Kalashnikov assault rifles patrol the grounds inside the farm in rural Kampong Speu province, which is two hour