Category World News

Vladimir Kara-Murza, a journalist in Kiev, Ukraine, claimed the Kremlin orchestrated two suspected poisonings in 2015 and 2017.

The bearded, bald 43-year-old may not be as outspoken as opposition leader Alexey Navalny, who nearly died from similar nerve agent poisoning in 2020.

However, Kara-Murza, a Harvard-educated historian, has been key in persuading Western governments to impose personal sanctions on numerous Russian officials.

He was given a 25-year sentence in Moscow in 2023 for “treason,” and while incarcerated, he won a Pulitzer Prize for his columns for The Washington Post.

Kara-Murza, who was released last year as a prisoner swap, settled in Germany and continued to campaign against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s administration and the Ukrainian conflict.

However, many on both sides of Europe’s thorniest armed conflict were stung by Kara-Murza’s remarks about the ethnicity and alleged bloodthirst of Russian servicemen last week.

In an interview with the French Senate on Thursday, Kara-Murza explained why the Russian Ministry of Defense recruits ethnic minorities and how, “[ethnic] Russians find it psychologically difficult to kill Ukrainians.

Because of the similarities between ethnic Russians and Ukrainians, we are similar people, practice the same religion, and share hundreds and hundreds of years of shared history, Kara-Murza said.

Russians and Ukrainians are ethnic Slavs whose statehood dates back to Kyivan Rus, the largest state in medieval Eastern Europe torn apart by Poles and Lithuanians.

It is allegedly simpler to kill Ukrainians to someone who belongs to a different culture, Kara-Murza continued.

His statements sparked a flurry of annoyance among Indigenous rights advocates and observers.

A former Russian diplomat claimed that “ethnicity measurement is a dead end” when assessing a person’s level of cruelty.

Boris Bondarev, who resigned from his position at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in protest of Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, claimed that the Kremlin does not specifically “recruit minorities; rather, it recruits people from the poorest regions, which are, in general, ethnic autonomies.

In the fourth year of the conflict, a multiethnic society’s activist Itelmen nation of Kamchatka, Dmitry Berezhkov, said, “Only a dull man could say that.”

He continued, “Russian liberal opposition figures, who are primarily middle-class urbanites, “drown as soon they tread on the thin ice” of issues involving ethnic minorities.

More than two-thirds of Russia’s 143 million people are ethnic Russians. The rest are minorities, ranging from the millions of Ukrainians and Tatars to the smaller, regionally autonomous Indigenous groups in Siberia and the Arctic.

The minorities coexist and mingle with ethnic Russians in rural, frequently inhospitable regions, even in those that are rich in hydrocarbons, rare earths, or diamonds.

They all rely on the Kremlin-funded television networks more than urban dwellers, frequently have no access to the internet, and watch the signing bonuses and salaries of Ukrainian servicemen as a way to escape the agony their families endure.

Recruits can expect to make up to $50,000 when they sign up for the position and earn several thousand dollars per month, which is a lot for anyone from those regions, regardless of their ethnic background.

No matter whether they are Russian or Buryat, they will never make money from it, Bondarev said.

In response to a wave of criticism, Kara-Murza claimed on Facebook on Monday that the accusations were “lies, manipulations, and slander” and that they were nothing more than lies.

The comment further tarnished Kara-Murza’s reputation, according to Berezhkov.

He claimed that “Kara-Murza’s words] used to be mistaken and could be taken as a mistake, but they are now his position.”

Another proponent of minorities rights thought Kara-Murza’s attack was a “signal for future voters” in the liberal, post-war Russia that Kremlin critics hope to resurrect.

Oyumaa Dongak, a Turkic-speaking province near China’s Tyva, believes Kara-Murza and other exiled Russian opposition leaders are “competing” with Putin.

She told Al Jazeera, “We are the ones who defend]ethnic] Russians,” not him.

Kara-Murza claimed in 2024 that the Western sanctions against Moscow following the 2022 invasion are “unfair and counterproductive” and hurt Russians in general. He desired that the West stop imposing harsher sanctions and concentrate instead on individual officials.

According to a Ukrainian observer, Kara-Murza does not want ethnic Russians who might elect opposition leaders to vote in the election to feel collectively responsible for the atrocities committed in Ukraine.

“People don’t feel bad,” he said. People won’t confess their guilt but will hate anyone who hits them, according to Kyiv-based analyst Vyacheslav Likhachyov, who has been criticized daily with moral condemnation.

He said, “The stories about the atrocities of Chechen executioners and Buryat rapists are and will continue to be popular.”

According to staged videos of them “storming” Ukrainian strongholds, Ramzan Kadyrov’s pro-Kremlin leader in Chechnya dubbed the “TikTok army.”

Their primary function in the conflict is primarily to protect occupied areas, terrorize ethnic Russian service members who refuse to fight, and torture them.

However, in Ukraine in 2022, Buryats, Buddhist natives of a sparsely populated and impoverished area close to Mongolia, have gained notoriety.

Some Buryat soldiers who tortured, raped, and killed civilians in Bucha and other towns north of Kyiv, according to human rights organizations and Ukrainian officials’ personal information.

A community activist claimed that ethnic Buryats are difficult to distinguish from other minority servicemen with distinctive Asian characteristics because Ukrainians frequently refer to them as “Buryats.”

Aleksandra Garmazhapova, who assists Buryat men escaping mobilization and fleeing abroad, said, “All Caucasus natives are seen as Chechens, and all Asians are considered Buryats.”

However, overwhelmingly Russian service members allegedly committed alleged war crimes in Bucha.

Garmazhapova was saved when Ukrainian forces began shelling Russian positions and his captors fled to a basement.

Millions of Catholics on the African continent mourn Pope Francis’ death, which was witnessed thousands of miles away from the Vatican.

Due to the large number of African Catholics, who he was credited with promoting a liberal embrace of all races and his vocal support for poor and underprivileged communities, he was a key figure on a continent that was sometimes called the “future of the Catholic Church.”

Pope Francis reinforced recent Vatican conventions by reviving his predecessors’ engagements by visiting 10 African nations while serving as papal leader. Popes rarely left the Vatican before the 1960s.

Leaders in other parts of Africa are also grieving his passing. The late pope was referred to as “exemplifying servant leadership by his humility, his unwavering commitment to inclusivity and justice, and his deep compassion for the poor and the vulnerable,” according to Kenya’s president William Ruto.

How, during his reign, the late Pope Francis placed Africa first:

Pope Francis’ numerous trips to Africa

Pope Francis visited 10 countries during the course of his papacy, making five trips to Africa.

He made the decision to travel to countries that were at war or in low-level conflict. He also emphasized those who are dealing with problems with the economy and the climate. In an effort to bring peace, the pontiff did not shy away from holding mass in ghettos or kissing the feet of conflicting leaders.

In his 25 years of service, Pope John Paul II’s visits to more than 25 African nations modeled on those of Pope John Paul II, who altered how the Vatican communicated with the continent. Pope Benedict XVI spent two days in three African nations, including Nigeria.

When and where did Pope Francis travel to?

East Africa (Uganda, Kenya, and the Central African Republic (CAR)) in 2015

In November 2015, the pontiff made a six-day visit to three African nations, which was filled with colorful welcomes and significant mass gatherings.

• The pope is still revered and remembered in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, for holding the mass in Kangemi, a low-income neighborhood. He criticized what he called “modern forms of colonialism” there and argued that the nation’s urban poor were underrepresented and excluded. He also criticized wealthy minorities, who, according to him, “hoard resources meant for everyone.”
• The pope enjoyed traditional dances from various ethnic groups as a colorful welcome to Uganda. As he passed through the crowds of people gathering to catch a peep, he blessed dozens of children who had been thrust into his open-sided popemobile. Additionally, he spoke with more than 700 disabled people and went to a facility where disabled children are treated.

Healing a shattered nation

The pope then made an unprecedented move in the CAR, entering a Muslim neighborhood as a result of months-long religious unrest.

Before then, Christians could not enter the PK5 neighborhood in Bangui, but as the pope made his way to a mosque there, crowds of Christians followed him there. As they embraced one another, those who had lost touch sobbed.

In his speeches, Pope Francis urged both sides to “lay down their arms” and referred to Africa as “the continent of hope.” After the visit, the warring factions would come to terms with a peace deal, but true peace would need to wait five more years.

2017-2019 North Africa (Egypt, Morocco)

Pope Francis traveled to Cairo, the largest Christian community in the Middle East, for two days in April to support the Coptic minority there. In Egypt, Coptic Christians have long been the target of hate and deadly attacks. Additionally, Francis addressed Muslim clerics there.
• The pope also urged religious tolerance and inclusion during his March 2019 trip to Morocco, which King Mohammed VI had invited him to. He urged Morocco to uphold the rights of immigrant and refugee refugees.

2019 Indian Ocean (Malawi, Madagascar, and Mauritius)

Pope Francis turned his attention to Southern Africa, particularly those in the Indian Ocean, in September of that year.

• In a region where climate change has intensified storms and destructive cyclones, he demanded that there be end to poverty and better protection of the environment in Mozambique and Madagascar.

South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in 2023.

The pope’s visit to the DRC symbolically called for peace and reconciliation in the troubled central African nation in the midst of ongoing conflict and a humanitarian crisis brought on by armed factions looking to control the country.

The pope had to postpone the trip due to ill health, so the DRC, which has the largest number of Catholics in Africa, was very important to him. Congolese welcomed him in the thousands.

South Sudan’s humble display

The pope in South Sudan demanded that Salva Kiir’s rival president and his deputy, Vice President Riek Machar, maintain peace. Since gaining its independence from Sudan in 2011, the nation, which is the youngest in Africa, has faced difficulties. Between factions loyal to the two leaders, which erupted right away, and until 2013, leading to the displacement of millions of South Sudanese.

The pope had expressed an unusual level of humility five years prior to their arrival in South Sudan, where he had had to lower himself with great difficulty to kiss the leaders’ feet while they were on a spiritual retreat to the Vatican. In order to protect the interests of the people, he urged them to adhere to peace agreements that had already been signed.

The nation has once more been in the grip of conflict since January. He wrote to the two leaders again in a letter in late March, calling for peace and dialogue as the pope was already dealing with more serious health issues.

Did the pope and the African bishops have a good relationship?

Yes, Pope Francis had friendly encounters with various African bishops and their organizations. Some people have also criticized him for his position on same-sex unions, though.

The pope authorized the same-sex couples’ blessing in the Church in an unprecedented way in December 2023. He forbade the practice of such blessings as long as they are not performed simultaneously with other civil unions and don’t fall under the normal rites of the Church.

African bishop organizations reacted strongly to this. Due to their religious and cultural beliefs, many nations on the continent are vehemently opposed to same-sex or other non-conforming gender categories.

The Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), a group that opposed the rule and called the union of same-sex or non-heterosexual people “unacceptable,” issued a statement. Under Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo of the DRC’s leadership, the group stated that “these acts…must not be approved under any circumstances.”

Bishops from Asia also urged the Vatican to reverse its decision.

Pope Francis responded to the criticism by stating that, in addition to the union, his focus should always be on the people’s blessings. He said, “We are all sinners; why create a list of sinners who may enter the Church”:

In the most recent attack in Indian-administered Kashmir in a quarter century, rebels allegedly killed at least 26 tourists in the picturesque tourist resort of Pahalgam, sparking fears of an escalation in tensions between India and Pakistan.

The attack in Kashmir’s southern district of Anantnag prompted anger across India. The region, which has been wracked by a three-decade armed rebellion, is at its peak tourist season as hundreds of thousands of tourists travel there.

Soon after the attack, teams of police and paramilitary troops rushed to the spot to evacuate the wounded tourists and launch a manhunt for the attackers. Prime Minister Narendra Modi cut short a visit to Saudi Arabia by resuming his meeting with India’s top security officials on Wednesday morning to prepare its response. Meanwhile, Indian Home Minister Amit Shah and other top security officials rushed to Kashmir.

The attack also unfolded as India is hosting US Vice President JD Vance, who arrived on Monday and is scheduled to leave on Thursday.

What we know about the attack, the victims, the attackers, the setting for the killings, what this means for Kashmir and the area, and how India might react.

What happened?

One of the most popular tourist destinations in the area is Pahalgam, which means “valley of shepherds” in Kashmiri, which is located about 50 kilometers [31 miles] from Srinagar’s main city.

On Tuesday, witnesses told Al Jazeera that the area was bustling with tourists. A group of armed men in camouflage clothing reportedly emerged from a nearby forest at around 2:45 pm, a source said, requesting anonymity to discuss details that security forces have not directly disclosed.

The attackers “opened indiscriminate fire at Baisaran meadow, a scenic uphill area accessible only by foot or pony rides”, the official said. The sudden volley of bullets rang out in the minds of many tourists.

Simran Chandani, a tourist from Nagpur in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, said that she was not sure she would survive the attack.

She said Pahalgam was “mini-Switzerland” at the time the attack started, “we were about to leave after having tea and a popular pre-packaged, ready-to-eat noodle snack,” adding, “We were already prepared.”

Then it all changed. She recalled, adding that primarily men were shot upon, “We thought the balloon had burst, people were pushing each other, and we saw a rush of people coming down.”

She joined the others in trying to escape. Chandani said, “I was running in the name of God.”

How many people were killed, and what do we know about them?

More than a dozen people were hurt in the attack, causing at least 26 fatalities.

The tourists killed were almost all civilians, and an Indian Navy officer from the northern state of Haryana on his honeymoon.

A 68-year-old former banker from Andhra Pradesh’s southern state of Pandurangapuram was killed as well. His wife was also there. The deceased also included a realtor from the southern state of Karnataka, an accountant from the eastern state of Odisha, a cement dealer from Uttar Pradesh in the north, and a&nbsp, Gulf-returnee from the southern state of Kerala.

One Nepalese national was killed as well.

Who claimed responsibility for the attack?

The Resistance Front (TRF), a group thought to be an offshoot of Pakistan’s Lashkar-e-Taiba, was named in a statement issued in the name of the attack.

The statement linked the attacks to the thousands of residency permits being handed over to Indian citizens, permitting them to live and work in Kashmir. Al Jazeera was unable to independently verify the statement’s veracity.

The Indian government had stripped Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status in 2019, asserting more federal control and splitting the former state into two union territories. The decision caused the region’s political unrest and opened the door for the Indian government to grant non-Kashmiris residence permits, which had previously been prohibited.

Indian officials told Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity that they suspected that four attackers took part in the killings – two of them from Pakistan, and two from Indian-administered Kashmir.

Have there ever been previous attacks on tourists?

Even amid Kashmir’s unrest, direct attacks on tourists have been rare.

Six foreign tourists were kidnapped by the Al-Faran armed group in Pahalgam in 1995. One was killed, another escaped, and the remaining four were never found.

At Nunwan in Pahalgam in 2000, 21 Hindu pilgrims were killed.

A year later, 13 people, including 11 pilgrims and two locals, were killed near Sheshnag lake in the same area. In a shooting incident in the Anantnag district in 2017, eight pilgrims were killed. In June last year, eight Hindu pilgrims were killed in the southern part of Jammu’s Kathua when their bus was attacked and fell into a gorge after the driver lost control.

However, it’s likely that Tuesday’s attack is the deadliest tourist attack since Nunwan’s attack in 2000.

Overall, Kashmir has not seen death in an attack on this scale since the bombing outside Jammu and Kashmir’s state legislature in October 2001, in which 35 people were killed.

Survivors and elected officials in the area were shocked by the attack’s nature and scale.

“We went to Pahalgam, and I was sitting on the chair in the meadow when I heard three shots, which created chaos”, said&nbsp, Vinu Bai, a 65-year-old tourist from the western state of Gujarat who was being treated with a bullet injury in the district hospital in Anantnag. “Everyone began to run. The bullet in the chaos hit my arm”.

We believed Kashmir to be peaceful, but we were unaware that this would occur.

Iltija Mufti, a young politician associated with a local opposition group, said Pahalgam was usually patrolled heavily by Indian security forces. She said it was “incredibly shocking” for an attack like this to occur in a place like Baisaran.

“There’s no place for such an attack to take place in our society”.

How has the Indian government responded?

On Wednesday, India’s leaders met to discuss the country’s response.

Modi, who was earlier supposed to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for a state dinner in Jeddah, cut short his trip and rushed back to India.

“The terrorist attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir is absolutely unacceptable.” Condolences to those who have lost their loved ones. I appoint a quick recovery for the injured. All possible assistance is being provided to those affected”, PM Modi said in a tweet. “They will not be spared,” declares the statement “Those responsible for this heinous act will be brought to justice”!

Home Minister Amit Shah also rushed to Srinagar and met top security officials in the region. The government was criticized by Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the Indian National Congress, for “hollow claims” of normalcy in Kashmir since the special status was revoked in 2019.

“The whole country is united against terrorism”, Gandhi said. The government should now take responsibility and take concrete steps to prevent such barbaric incidents from occurring in Jammu and Kashmir and prevent innocent Indians from losing their lives in this way, according to the government’s statement.

Will Pakistan be subject to India’s retaliation?

Experts said that the government’s response could include some form of retaliation against Pakistan for the brutal attack.

“This is a war action. That’s how we are seeing it. The announcement was made shortly after Pakistan’s army chief’s speech, according to Tara Kartha, director of the New Delhi-based think tank Center for Land Warfare Studies (CLAWS). Kartha, who was formerly an official at India’s National Security Council Secretariat, was referring to last week’s address by Pakistani Chief of Army Staff Asim Munir, where he reiterated his support for the two-nation theory that led to India’s partition in 1947, and affirmed “difference from Hindus”.

Kartha claimed that Pahalgam’s actions matched Munir’s “invective-loaded” address on April 16 with the same tone. “Only if Pakistan condemns the attack in the strongest terms and promises action against terrorists in the next 48 hours will a serious crisis be averted”.

In the early hours of Wednesday, Pakistan responded.

“We are concerned at the loss of tourists ‘ lives in an attack in Anantnag district of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir. The Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that it condoled the deceased’s immediate family members and wished them a quick recovery. India and Pakistan both claim all of Kashmir, and each controls a part of it.

Some experts warned against an impulsive response, even though that statement is unlikely to ease tensions in India, where the government will be under intense pressure to respond to Pakistan.

India’s relative stability compared with its “highly volatile neighbour” should inform its response, said Saba Naqvi, a veteran political commentator based in New Delhi.

She referred to Modi’s Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), saying that “many people here believe that the BJP regime will simply drop bombs there and everything will be avenged.” “But it is not as simple as that”.

What does the attack mean for Kashmir?

Politicians and civil society in Kashmir have condemned the attack, claiming that it caused more harm to residents than to anyone else.

“This is a terrorist act. I don’t believe I can think of it as anything else. Whoever has done it only wants to harm Kashmiris, our economy, and a sense of political stability that had returned to place in the past couple of months”, Waheed ur Rehman Para, a Kashmiri legislator from the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP), told Al Jazeera.

Tourism accounts for nearly 7% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), making up the region’s economy. A rush of visitors to Kashmir also serves the political messaging of Modi’s BJP that it has succeeded in bringing peace and calm to the region.

Even so, things in the area were a lot more unusual than before the Pahalgam attack. Since 2019, the Indian government has cracked down on political activists and civilians alike, arresting thousands of people under draconian laws that allow it to keep them under detention for lengthy periods without a trial.

After nearly a decade, Kashmir’s first elected head was chosen in October of last year.

Omar Abdullah, a popular provincial politician who campaigned on the promise of reinstating the lost autonomy, clinched a landslide victory in these polls. However, the new laws of the union territory severely restrict his authority, with many of his authority now being held by a lieutenant governor chosen by the president.

Still, the Pahalgam attack has brought many hoteliers and tour operators to the defence of tourists and against those behind the killings.

“This must be avoided at all costs.” What is most difficult, more than anything else, for us at this hour is the heavy human loss this has imposed. Tourism is not a top priority right now, according to former hotelier of Pahalgam Abdul Wahid Malik, who was also the guild’s president.

A landslide in Ramban village, a gateway connecting the mountainous Kashmir region with the plains of Jammu, has disrupted traffic in and out of the landlocked valley, pushing airfares higher and making it difficult for fear-stricken tourists to leave the region, following Tuesday’s attack.

Malik provided four rooms for a tourist family at his hotel after learning that they were in trouble. “We are duty-bound to ensure their safety”, he said. “Our family has been devastated by the attack.”

Tourism and business operators in Kashmir called for a shutdown on Wednesday. The incident shocked other residents, as well.

“Kashmir is known for being warm and hospitable”, said Nadiya Farooq, 31, a resident of Srinagar.

Jakarta, Indonesia – Manoj Punjabi, Indonesia’s most commercially successful film producer, has won numerous awards over the course of a career spanning more than two decades.

But the billionaire founder and CEO of MD Entertainment does not hesitate when asked to choose his most treasured accolade.

“It is the one I won for Best Box Office Film at the Indonesian Box Office Movie Awards in 2016 because it was chosen by the viewers,” Punjabi told Al Jazeera in an interview at MD Entertainment’s headquarters in Jakarta.

“Even if I won an Oscar, it wouldn’t be the same because that is chosen by a jury and not by audiences.”

As the producer behind the highest-grossing Indonesian film of all time, KKN di Desa Penari, Punjabi is keenly aware that results count above all else in the entertainment business.

At the same time, the 52-year-old producer has developed a reputation for not shying away from taking risks.

Last year, Punjabi, the scion of a prominent Indian-Indonesian family with a long history of involvement in television and film, made what could be seen as the surprising decision to acquire an 80 percent stake in Indonesia’s NET.TV for some $100m.

By Punjabi’s own admission, the free-to-air television channel, which has a market share of less than 1.5 percent, had been “bleeding money” for years, racking up losses of about $250m over the previous decade.

Still, he saw an opportunity in TV in a world where entertainment options are increasingly dominated by paid-for streaming services such as Netflix, HBO Max, and Amazon Prime.

“First of all, Indonesians like watching for free. Paid TV does not work as well as other platforms, and it is very segmented,” Punjabi said.

“With free-to-air, everyone has access.”

Punjabi said economic and logistical factors in Indonesia, an archipelago of some 17,000 islands, have helped free-to-air TV to remain popular in the Southeast Asian country despite the rise of streaming services.

“In other countries, like India, you have a flats system with many people living in one building, so paid TV becomes very cheap. Over here, it is very scattered. With the infrastructure we have, free TV is very practical and easy. You just need an antenna, so it is more affordable and easily accessible,” he said.

“I thought free-to-air was a sunset market and platform, but in 2020, during COVID, I realised that free-to-air still exists and people are watching it. It is not a dying business, but a sunset business that has been stuck.”

James Guild, an assistant professor at Universitas Islam Internasional Indonesia, or Indonesian International Islamic University (UIII), agreed that there is considerable potential for free-to-air TV to expand.

“There are a lot of places in Indonesia where people lack access to good wi-fi or cannot afford the monthly subscription for a streaming service like Vidio, or can only afford limited data plans and are unable to stream a lot of content,” Guild told Al Jazeera.

“Old-fashioned television is also still good business, [and] there is certainly still money to be made selling advertising on free-to-air television stations in Indonesia,” Guild said.

In 2022, Punjabi made history when he produced KKN di Desa Penari, which eclipsed Titanic to become the highest-grossing film ever shown in Indonesian cinemas.

To date, he has also produced seven of Indonesia’s 20 highest-grossing movies and has been widely credited with reviving interest in the genre of Indonesian horror.

Punjabi’s family started their entertainment business in Indonesia in the 1980s.

He recalls rushing home from school every day so he could watch the raw, unedited footage of the films his family were producing.

Punjabi’s grandfather emigrated to Indonesia following the partition of British India in 1947.

Like his father, he was born and raised in Indonesia.

“I’m Hindu, but I’m a proud Indonesian with an Indian background,” he said.

But in the late 1980s, when Punjabi was 17, everything came crashing down.

There was “a family crisis”,  Punjabi said, which resulted in his parents selling their home and “adjusting their lifestyle”.

“I think my ambition came from that. I never wanted to be like that again. Because you have a certain standard, and then you go down. It hurts and you feel it,” he said.

After brief stints working at a pulp and paper factory and a garment factory, Punjabi founded MD Entertainment in 2002.

In 2024, he was ranked 34th on Forbes’ list of Indonesia’s 50 richest people, with an estimated net worth of more than $1.5bn.

“When you are on that list, you feel a kind of pressure, but in a good way,” Punjabi said.

“To be at that stage, you are thankful, but you have to be more tough, and that is tiring. So that list makes me feel pressured in that way, it makes me motivated to do better, and I hope it doesn’t stop here.”

Asked about his legacy, Punjabi said he hopes that MD Entertainment will still be around in a century and will branch out beyond Indonesia.

“How I am going to do it is still in the pipeline, but there is something iconic that I want to offer audiences, not just in Indonesia or Southeast Asia,” he said.

When it comes to sources of inspiration, Punjabi listed Titanic, Slumdog Millionaire, My Beautiful Life, The Dark Knight, and Casino Royale among his favourite films.

“I’m obsessed with James Bond and Die Hard. I am an action freak, and those are the movies that I kept watching. I’ve watched the James Bond movies 50 to 70 times, particularly You Only Live Twice and Octopussy from the 1960s. Casino Royale blew my mind,” he said.

As for NET.TV., now called MD TV, Punjabi has ambitious plans to raise the quality of free-to-air TV, which has historically not had the best reputation.

“I want to change the game in terms of how we tell stories, be it movies, soap operas or series,” he said.

Punjabi said free-to-air television in Indonesia has often suffered from poor lighting, sets and locations, cliched narratives, and heavy-handed product placement.

“I want to change the look and the storytelling. People think the quality is going down, but with my concept, I hope it will bring in audiences,” he said.