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In appreciation of Professor Kumar David

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Professor Kumar David, once an academic in the Engineering Faculty, Peradeniya University, and a Fellow of the Institution of Electrical Engineers in the UK and Hong Kong has left for eternal rest, last Monday while in Los Angeles, USA. We believe the “left” leaning English reader would miss Kumar’s forays into political controversies, with his own reading of issues that often provided dissenting, but populist perspectives, he developed over the decades since leaving the NSSP in 1980 July. Politically, he was advocating for “unity in the scattered left”.

Professionally too, he stood out as an exceptional, pragmatic thinker and was accepted for that. We believe he still remains the youngest to be appointed to the Director Board of the CEB way back in 1970, perhaps after the change of government in July. Kumar would not have been 30 years then. He was also a strong critic of the Mahaweli Development power generation scheme in 1979, when the blueprint was out for academic observation.  

For us, Kumar was an interesting polemicist in our initial group of young Samasamaja activists, when we were into “entryism” trying to turn around the LSSP to its pre-coalition, Trotskyite politics of 1964. From among other academics including Wickramabahu, Sumanasiri, Shantha de Alwis, Nalin de Silva, Chris Rodrigo, who were key players in this small activist group labelled “Waama-Samasamajaya”, Kumar stood out as a frank and a blunt intervener in any discussion, when he had to disagree. He was a unique character in many ways. He was hard-hitting, sarcastic and witty in debates, at times consciously mispronouncing Sinhala terms or using them at the wrong place, gaining all the attention he wanted in discussions.

Kumar’s strength was his ability to politically see through issues. We remember his reading of the outcome on the 1980 July strike. A fortnight before the July strike he resigned from the NSSP Central Committee wanting to take up an academic post in Zimbabwe. We met him crossing the Jawatte Road, opposite his residence in the early afternoon, on the day he was to leave Sri Lanka for Zimbabwe. He asked us how the strike was turning out. Ridiculing our optimism he said, “Macho, JR would simply crush the whole strike mercilessly, in a few days. What general strike with some clerks? This era you need to have the CEB and Rupavahini out on strike, if you want Jayawardene to listen to your demands”. He was no doubt right.     

At barricades too when protesting on political issues, he would guess the response of the police, just looking at them. He often stood right in front with his broad frame, far taller than all others, with an untanned brown beard, creating an elite, dominant personality in him that police officers too respected when engaging with him. He was from a very elite background no doubt, with high profile Jaffna Catholic family roots. His father was a district judge and few others in the immediate family circle too were judges and lawyers.

A frequent visitor to Sri Lanka on a Sri Lankan passport, for he was no dual citizen, Kumar was quite familiar with local political issues and wrote his own interpretation on them in mainstream media. His high-flown English was very readable with his knack for wit and sarcasm and most would not miss his name in print media. So were we, despite our political differences and perspectives.

He was a dominating personality in any forum and his interventions would be missed by most in “left of centre” Sri Lankan politics. We share our grief with Rohini and his family, and with that of all others in Sri Lankan “left” and democratic politics. Thank you Kumar for all your contributions and companionship, we cherish with camaraderie.

– Siritunge Jayasuriya (General Secretary – USP)
– Kusal Perera (Political Essayist)

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How Japan’s youngest CEO transformed Hello Kitty

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Hello Kitty, arguably Japan’s best loved creation, is celebrating her 50th anniversary.

But all has not always been well at Sanrio, the Japanese company behind the character. The business has been on a spectacular journey of financial peaks and valleys.

Hello Kitty has been ranked the second-highest grossing media franchise in the world behind Pokémon, and ahead of the likes of Mickey Mouse and Star Wars.

Underscoring her global fame, Britain’s King Charles wished her a happy birthday during the state visit to the UK by Japan’s Emperor and Empress in June.

In recent years though Sanrio had been struggling to make money, as interest in Hello Kitty waned.

Two previous surges in Sanrio sales, in 1999 and 2014, were both driven by the character’s popularity. But these jumps in demand for the firm’s products were not sustainable, says Yasuki Yoshioka of investment company SMBC Nikko.

“In the past, its performance had many ups and downs, as if it was on a rollercoaster ride,” Mr Yoshioka says.

Tomokuni Tsuji took over the top job at Sanrio four years ago

Then, in 2020, Tomokuni Tsuji inherited the role as Sanrio’s boss.

He is the grandson of the firm’s founder, Shintaro Tsuji, and was just 31 at the time, making him the youngest chief executive of a listed Japanese company.

His grandfather then became Sanrio’s chairman.

Under the younger Mr Tsuji’s leadership, Sanrio changed its marketing strategy of its stable of other characters.

“It is not about lowering Hello Kitty’s popularity but it is about boosting others’ recognition,” he says.

This resulted in Hello Kitty losing the position of Sanrio’s most popular character.

According to a poll of customers, that spot is now held by Cinnamoroll – a blue-eyed white puppy with pink cheeks, long ears and a tail that looks like a Cinnamon roll.

Sanrio is also no longer just about cute characters.

If Hello Kitty is Japan’s ambassador of cute, then angry red panda Aggressive Retsuko – or Aggretsuko – channels the frustrations of an ordinary working woman.

The character, which is popular among Gen Zers, first appeared in a cartoon series on Japan’s TBS Television before it became a global hit on Netflix.

Another unconventional character is Gudetama, or “lazy egg”, who is living with depression and fires out cold one-liners that reflect dark realities of life.

Sanrio is also no longer just about cute characters

As well as diversifying its characters, Sanrio boosted its overseas marketing and is now tackling counterfeits more rigorously.

“We are now using artificial intelligence to detect fake products and to make removal requests,” says Mr Tsuji.

For its marketing strategy, collaborations with major brands – including Starbucks, Crocs and the LA Dodgers baseball team – have been key, he added.

“In addition to our own promotion, by collaborating with global brands, we are trying to have our characters in the market throughout the year without many breaks.”

Hello Kitty collaborated with the LA Dodgers, home to Japanese baseball sensation Shohei Ohtani

In a society that puts so much emphasis on seniority, Mr Tsuji’s surname was crucial to his ability to make major changes at Sanrio.

Almost a quarter of listed companies in Japan, like car makers Toyota and Suzuki and camera firm Canon, are managed by members of the family that founded them.

The reason is cultural, according to Professor Hokuto Dazai of Nagoya University of Commerce and Business.

In Japan, home to the world’s oldest continuous monarchy, “there is strong recognition of families and family businesses,” he says.

The master-servant relationship from the samurai period has transitioned into the relationship between founding families and their employees, and “historically commoners never fought over the top job”.

“It is also because Japan has a smaller pool of professional executives to choose from,” says Professor Dazai.

“Firms tend to look for their next boss internally, including founding family members.”

King Charles wished Hello Kitty a happy birthday during the Japanese Emperor’s state visit

Still, “it would be a lie if I said there was no pushback” from other managers and employees in the company, Mr Tsuji says.

He also says he clashed with his grandfather over how to run the company.

“But one day I realised that I was being arrogant, trying to convince someone 60 years senior,” he says.

“After about a year, my grandfather told me to run the company as I see fit – that he will leave it up to me.”

The new boss’s revamp of the business has been paying off so far.

Within two years of the younger Tsuji becoming chief executive, Sanrio was profitable again, in what analyst Mr Yoshioka calls “a beautiful V-shaped recovery”.

Its share price has risen tenfold since 2020 and the company now has a stock market valuation of more than a trillion yen ($6.5bn; £5bn).

Hello Kitty is no longer the most popular Sanrio character

Away from the boardroom and stock market, there was also an intriguing incident earlier this year.

While Hello Kitty’s true identity is relatively well-known in Japan, some overseas fans were shocked by comments from a Sanrio executive in July.

Speaking on US television, retail business development director Jill Koch told viewers that “Hello Kitty is not a cat” and is in fact a British schoolgirl.

Her comments sparked a flurry of social media posts, with fans expressing their shock and confusion about the revelation.

“Hello Kitty is Hello Kitty and she can be whoever you want her to be – she can be your sister, your mother, it can be another you,” Mr Tsuji says.

Pushed on whether he has any idea why his grandfather decided not to make her Japanese, Mr Tsuji concludes: “London is an amazing city and it was the envy of many Japanese girls, so that may be one of the reasons they decided that she’s from London.”

It may not be the definitive answer her fans are looking for – but after all, Hello Kitty was created 14 years before the younger Tsuji was even born. Half a century since her creation, it is possible that the beloved character’s origin story will continue to be shrouded in mystery for years to come.

– Mariko Oi

(BBC News)

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How hoax bomb threats are hurting air travel in India

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A dramatic and unprecedented surge in hoax bomb threats targeting Indian airlines is wreaking havoc on flight schedules, diverting planes and causing widespread disruptions.

A video posted on social media last week showed passengers draped in woollens, walking down the icy ladder of an Air India plane into the frigid air of Iqaluit, a remote city in Canada.

The 211 passengers on the Boeing 777, originally en route from Mumbai to Chicago, had been diverted early on 15 October due to a bomb threat.

“We have been stuck at the airport since 5am with 200 passengers… We have no idea what’s happening or what we are supposed to do next… We are completely stranded,” Harit Sachdeva, a passenger, posted on social media. He praised the “kind airport staff” and alleged Air India was not doing enough to inform the passengers.

Mr Sachdeva’s post captured the frustration and anxiety of passengers diverted to an unknown, remote destination. Hours later, a Canadian Air Force plane ended their ordeal by ferrying the stranded passengers to Chicago. Air India confirmed that the flight had been diverted to Iqaluit due to a “security threat posted online”.

The threat was false, mirroring scores of similar hoaxes targeting India’s airlines so far this year. Last week alone, there were at least 90 threats, resulting in diversions, cancellations and delays. In June, 41 airports received hoax bomb threats via email in a single day, prompting heightened security.

A Frankfurt-bound Vistara plane was diverted to Turkey after a bomb threat in September

For context, between 2014 and 2017, authorities recorded 120 bomb hoax alerts at airports, with nearly half directed at Delhi and Mumbai, the country’s largest airports. This underscores the recurring nature of such threats in recent years, but this year’s surge has been sensational.

“I am deeply concerned over the recent disruptive acts targeting Indian airlines, affecting domestic and international operations. Such mischievous and unlawful actions are a matter of grave concern. I condemn attempts to compromise safety, security and operational integrity of our aviation sector,” federal aviation minister, Kinjarapu Ram Mohan Naidu, said.

So what is going on?

Hoax bomb threats targeting airlines are often linked to malicious intent, attention-seeking, mental health issues, disruption of business operations or a prank, experts say. In 2018, a rash of jokes about bombs by airplane passengers in Indonesia led to flight disruptions. Even fliers have proved to be culprits: last year, a frustrated passenger tried to delay a SpiceJet flight by calling in a bomb hoax alert after missing his check-in at an airport in India’s Bihar.

These hoaxes end up wreaking havoc in one of the world’s fastest-growing aviation markets. More than 150 million passengers flew domestically in India last year, according to the civil aviation ministry. More than 3,000 flights arrive and depart every day in the country from more than 150 operational airports, including 33 international airports.

Last week’s hoaxes peaked even as India’s airlines carried a record 484,263 passengers on a single day, 14 October. India has just under 700 commercial passenger planes in service, and an order backlog of more than 1,700 planes, according to Rob Morris of Cirium, a consultancy. “All this would certainly render India the fastest growing commercial aircraft market today,” says Mr Morris.

Bomb threats to airlines inconvenience passengers, as seen with these travellers boarding another Vistara flight from Turkey

Consider the consequences of a bomb threat alert on an airline.

If the plane is in the air, it must divert to the nearest airport – like the Air India flight that diverted last week to Canada or a Frankfurt-bound Vistara flight from Mumbai that diverted to Turkey in September. Some involve fighter jets to be scrambled to escort planes reporting threats like it happened with a Heathrow-bound Air India flight over Norfolk and a Singapore-bound Air India Express last week.

Once on the ground, passengers disembark, and all baggage and cargo and catering undergo thorough searches. This process can take several hours, and often the same crew cannot continue flying due to duty hour limitations. As a result, a replacement crew must be arranged, further prolonging the delay.

“All of this has significant cost and network implications. Every diverted or delayed flight incurs substantial expenses, as grounded aircraft become money-losing assets. Delays lead to cancellations, and schedules are thrown off balance.” says Sidharath Kapur, an independent aviation expert.

The dramatic rise in bomb threats on social media from anonymous accounts has complicated efforts to identify perpetrators. The motives remain unclear, as does whether the threats come from a single individual, a group, or are simply copycat acts.

More than 150 million passengers flew domestically in India last year

Last week, Indian authorities arrested a 17-year-old school dropout for creating a social media account to issue such threats. His motivations remain unclear, but he is believed to have targeted four flights – three international – resulting in two delays, one diversion and one cancellation. Investigators suspect that some posts may have originated from London and Germany after tracing IP addresses.

Clearly, tracking down hoaxers presents a significant challenge. While Indian law mandates life imprisonment for threats to airport safety or service disruption, this punishment is too severe for hoax calls and would likely not withstand legal scrutiny. Reports suggest the government is considering placing offenders on a no-fly list and introducing new laws that could impose a five-year prison term.

Ultimately, such hoax threats can cause serious anxiety for passengers. “My aunt called to ask if she should take her booked flight given these threats. ‘Should I take a train?’ she asked. I told her, ‘Please continue to fly’,” says an aviation consultant, who preferred to remain unnamed. The threats continue to disrupt lives and sow fear.

– Soutik Biswas

(BBC News)

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“Year of killing and broken assumptions has taken Middle East to edge of deeper, wider war”

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Millions of people in the Middle East dream of safe, quiet lives without drama and violent death. The last year of war, as bad as any in the region in modern times, has shown yet again that dreams of peace cannot come true while deep political, strategic and religious fault lines remain unbridged. Once again, war is reshaping the politics of the Middle East.

The Hamas offensive came out of well over a century of unresolved conflict. After Hamas burst through the thinly defended border, it inflicted the worst day the Israelis had suffered.

Around 1,200 people, mostly Israeli civilians, were killed. Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, phoned President Joe Biden and told him that “We’ve never seen such savagery in the history of the state”; not “since the Holocaust.” Israel saw the attacks by Hamas as a threat to its existence.

Since then, Israel has inflicted many terrible days on the Palestinians in Gaza. Nearly 42,000 people, mostly civilians have been killed, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Much of Gaza is in ruins. Palestinians accuse Israel of genocide.

The war has spread. Twelve months after Hamas went on the offensive the Middle East is on the edge of an even worse war; wider, deeper, even more destructive.

The death of illusions

A year of killing has stripped away layers of assumptions and illusions. One is Benjamin Netanyahu’s belief that he could manage the Palestinian issue without making concessions to their demands for self-determination.

With that went the wishful thinking that had comforted Israel’s worried Western allies. Leaders in the US and UK, and others, had convinced themselves that Netanyahu, despite opposing a Palestinian state alongside Israel all his political life, could somehow be persuaded to accept one to end the war.

Netanyahu’s refusal reflected almost universal distrust of Palestinians inside Israel as well as his own ideology. It also torpedoed an ambitious American peace plan.

President Biden’s “grand bargain” proposed that Israel would receive full diplomatic recognition by Saudi Arabia, the most influential Islamic country, in return for allowing Palestinian independence. The Saudis would be rewarded with a security pact with the US.

The Biden plan fell at the first hurdle. Netanyahu said in February that statehood would be “huge reward” for Hamas. Bezalel Smotrich, one of the ultra-nationalist extremists in his cabinet, said it would be an “existential threat” to Israel.

The Hamas leader, Yahya Sinwar, presumed to be alive, somewhere in Gaza had his own illusions. A year ago, he must have hoped that the rest of Iran’s so-called “axis of resistance” would join, with full force, into a war to cripple Israel. He was wrong.

Sinwar kept his plans to attack Israel on 7 October so secret that he took his enemy by surprise. He also surprised some on his own side. Diplomatic sources told the BBC that Sinwar might not even have shared his plans with his own organisation’s exiled political leadership in Qatar. They had notoriously lax security protocols, talking on open lines that could be easily overheard, one source said.

Far from going on the offensive, Iran made it clear it did not want a wider war, as Israel invaded Gaza and President Biden ordered American carrier strike groups to move closer to protect Israel.

Instead, Hassan Nasrallah, and his friend and ally, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, restricted themselves to rocketing Israel’s northern border, which they said would continue until a ceasefire in Gaza. The targets were mostly military, but Israel evacuated more than 60,000 people away from the border. In Lebanon, perhaps twice as many had to flee over the months as Israel hit back.

Hassan Nasrallah, seen here on a placard held by a young man in Beirut, after his death, was key to Iran’s “axis of resistance”

Israel made clear it would not tolerate an indefinite war of attrition with Hezbollah. Even so, the conventional wisdom was that Israel would be deterred by Hezbollah’s formidable fighting record in previous wars and its arsenal of missiles, provided by Iran.

In September, Israel went on the offensive. No one outside the senior ranks of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Mossad spy agency believed so much damage could be inflicted so quickly on Iran’s most powerful ally.

Israel remotely exploded booby-trapped pagers and radios, destroying Hezbollah’s communications and killing leaders. It launched one of the most intense bombing campaigns in modern warfare. On its first day Israel killed about 600 Lebanese people, including many civilians.

The offensive has blown a big hole in Iran’s belief that its network of allies cemented its strategy to deter and intimidate Israel. The key moment came on 27 September, with the huge air strike on the southern suburbs of Beirut that killed Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah and many of his top lieutenants. Nasrallah was a vital part of Iran’s “axis of resistance”, its informal alliance and defence network of allies and proxies.

Israel broke out of the border war by escalating to a bigger one. If the strategic intention was to force Hezbollah to cease fire and pull back from the border, it failed. The offensive, and invasion of south Lebanon, has not deterred Iran.

Iran seems to have concluded that its open reluctance to risk a wider war was encouraging Israel to push harder. Hitting back was risky, and guaranteed an Israeli response, but for the supreme leader and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, it had become the least bad option.

On Tuesday 1 October, Iran attacked Israel with ballistic missiles.

A repository of trauma

Zohar Shpak is still reliving the Hamas attack on 7 October


Kibbutz Kfar Aza is very close to the wire that was supposed to protect Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip. The kibbutz was a small community, with modest homes on an open-plan campus of lawns and neat gardens. Kfar Aza was one of Hamas’s first targets on 7 October. Sixty-two people from the kibbutz were killed by Hamas. Of the 19 hostages taken from there into Gaza, two were killed by Israeli troops after they escaped from captivity. Five hostages from Kfar Aza are still in Gaza.

The Israeli army took journalists into Kfar Aza on 10 October last year, when it was still a battle zone. We saw Israeli combat troops dug into the fields around the kibbutz and could hear gunfire as they cleared buildings where they suspected Hamas fighters might be sheltering. Israeli civilians killed by Hamas were being carried out in body bags from the ruins of their homes. Hamas fighters killed by Israeli soldiers as they fought their way into the kibbutz still lay on the neat lawns, turning black as they decomposed in the strong Mediterranean sun.

A year later the dead are buried but very little has changed. The living have not returned to live in their homes. Ruined houses have been preserved as they were when I saw them on 10 October last year, except the names and photos of the people who lived and were killed inside them are displayed on big posters and memorials.

Zohar Shpak, a resident who survived the attack with his family, showed us round the homes of neighbours who were not as lucky. One of the houses had a large photo on its wall of the young couple who lived there, both killed by Hamas on 7 October. The ground around the houses has been dug over. Zohar said the young man’s father had spent weeks sifting earth to try to find his son’s head. He had been buried without it.

The stories of the dead of 7 October, and the hostages, are well known in Israel. Local media still talk about their country’s losses, adding new information to old pain.

Posters marking the horror are fading

Zohar said it was too early to think about how they might rebuild their lives.

“We are still inside the trauma. We are not in post-trauma. Like people said, we’re still here. We are still in the war. We wanted the war will be ended, but we want it will be ended with a victory, but not an army victory. Not a war victory.

“My victory is that I could live here, with. My son and daughter, with my grandchildren and living peacefully. I believe in peace.”

Zohar and many other Kfar Aza residents identified with the left wing of Israeli politics, meaning that they believed Israel’s only chance of peace was allowing the Palestinians their independence. Israelis like Zohar and his neighbours are convinced that Netanyahu is a disastrous prime minister who bears a heavy responsibility for leaving them vulnerable and open to attack on 7 October.

But Zohar does not trust the Palestinians, people he used to ferry to hospitals in Israel in better times when they were allowed out of Gaza for medical treatment.

“I don’t believe those people who are living over there. But I want the peace. I want to go to Gaza’s beach. But I don’t trust them. No, I don’t trust any one of them.”

Gaza’s catastrophe

Hamas leaders do not accept that the attacks on Israel were a mistake that brought the wrath of Israel, armed and supported by the United States down on to the heads of their people. Blame the occupation, they say, and its lust for destruction and death.

In Qatar, an hour or so before Iran attacked Israel on 1 October, I interviewed Khalil al-Hayya, the most senior Hamas leader outside Gaza, second only in their organisation to Yahya Sinwar. He denied his men had targeted civilians – despite overwhelming evidence – and justified the attacks by saying it was necessary to put the plight of the Palestinians on the world’s political agenda.

“It was necessary to raise an alarm in the world to tell them that here there is a people who have a cause and have demands that must be met. It was a blow to Israel, the Zionist enemy.”

Israel felt the blow, and on 7 October, as the IDF was rushing troops to the Gaza border, Benjamin Netanyahu made a speech promising a “mighty vengeance”. He set out war aims of eliminating Hamas as a military and political force and bringing the hostages home. The prime minister continues to insist that “total victory” is possible, and that force will in the end free the Israelis held by Hamas for a year.

His political opponents, including relatives of the hostages, accuse him of blocking a ceasefire and a hostage deal to appease ultra-nationalists in his government. He is accused of putting his own political survival before the lives of Israelis.

Many of Gaza’s once-thriving communities are now desolate

Netanyahu has many political enemies in Israel, even though the offensive in Lebanon has helped repair his poll numbers. He remains controversial but for most Israelis the war in Gaza is not. Since 7 October, most Israelis have hardened their hearts to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza.

Two days into the war, Israel’s Defence Minister, Yoav Gallant, said he had ordered a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip.

“There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed… We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly.”

Since then, under international pressure, Israel has been forced to loosen its blockade. At the United Nations at the end of September, Netanyahu insisted Gazans have all the food they need.

Benjamin Netanyahu and Joe Biden in July – Biden’s role, restraining Israel while also supplying weapons, risks dragging the US into a wider war

The evidence shows clearly that is not true. Days before his speech, UN humanitarian agencies signed a declaration just demanding an end to “appalling human suffering and humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza”.

“More than 2 million Palestinians are without protection, food, water, sanitation, shelter, health care, education, electricity and fuel – the basic necessities to survive. Families have been forcibly displaced, time and time again, from one unsafe place to the next, with no way out.”

– Jeremy Bowen : International editor, BBC News

(BBC News)

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