what's your story. i mean when i was a women especially of victims of violence in rooms would take part and send us your story you are trying to already understand this new culture. or another venue to another year you want to become a citizen. in for margaret's your platform for reliable information. this is d.w. news asia coming up on the program final campaign rallies kick off in thailand as a divided country heads to the ballot box but some plain the vote may be rigged plus. as japan is slammed for its transgender laws we speak to a tokyo based activist who's fighting to keep her marriage status.

i'm melissa chan and welcome to news asia good to have you with us voters in thailand will head to the polls on sunday after five years of military rule a decade ago major street protests divided thailand on the one side with the yellow shirts backing the military and the monarchy on the other side the red shirts they backed the former prime minister who was overthrown in a coup after years of turmoil the army seized power in two thousand and fourteen and its leader is now running against a slate of old and new faces sunday's vote is being framed as a contest between democrats and dictators bastian heartache has been on the campaign trail. not tones wrong wrong wrong it's

something of a political rock star in thailand. a son of one of the country's richest families he set up his own political party a year ago. his declared goal and military rule bring back democratic rights and create a more equal society. these ideas resonate especially with young voters. this is the first time i get to fight i'm part of the new generation and when i see chinatown i believe he's also from the new generation. he has good policies and i believe he can make things happen. my father in law he has good ideas beliefs and equality of all human beings and he's determined. no region will send more employees to the new parliament than

thailand's poor rural northeast. most voters here are still stand supporters of the previous democratic government that the country's military junta ousted in two thousand and fourteen who has political arm the polling structure and party has been working hard at making inroads here. the military government has been trying to win over voters in this part of the country basically by handing out money many of the people we spoke to here however told us they still support parties affiliated with former prime ministers taxing seen a lot and his sister yingluck but few are willing to speak out on camera they say they're afraid. afraid of him highland military dictator general prayuth chan or cha he took power by force in two thousand and fourteen to end the political turmoil hyland had been caught up in for more than

a decade since then he's been trying to present himself as the people's friendly uncle. i think the country's become a lot more peaceful there are no riots no fighting that's what i like everything is quiet. but to achieve that. suppressed democratic rights jailed critics and tried to take out political adversaries. now he wants to rebranded from dictator to democratically elected prime minister with the help of a constitution that gives him a very undemocratic. no. i think you can say that the home to has one in terms of electoral engineering they've engineered the cost of tuition they've engineered political party laws and of course they control the monopoly of violence they control the military ok but what the hotel doesn't

have is control over people's emotions over voters who really want change so the military's party is trying hard to sell a dictator who has been mostly preoccupied with consolidating his power as an agent of renewal. i bought it i just stand by just going on last ten years ago then it's something change so thailand have to keep going so we're not stuck with. pass so everybody wants a new one new come under new policy. new politics the question is will thai voters be happy with the result these heavily skewed elections produce and what will happen if not. for large scale protests to a counter by a rival military faction everything is in the cards pile and could be in for turbulent times yet again.

the fight for l.g.b. t.q. rights that stands for the rights of lesbian gay bisexual transgender and queer are questioning is a global movement and today i want to take a closer look at the t.v. part of the l g b t q t for transgender you can see the community's flag behind me the term describes people whose gender identity differs from the sex assigned at their birth their visibility is increasing around the world but they still face many challenges in everyday life including in asia this week human rights watch released a report critical of japan in particular its policy to require transgender people to undergo sterilization if they want their new gender identity legally recognized . asia has the story of an american woman who has personally experienced the impact

of japan's. policies and who in a society that values conformity is trying to move the needle on both same sex marriage and gender equality. this tall texan has made japan her home a country where she doesn't quite fit in ellen is transgender and lives in tokyo with her wife majority and their three children she kicked off her transition last year officially changing her gender name in the u.s. but she's hit a brick wall getting japan to recognize her new identity after officials realized she was married. in our case we've been married already for twenty years almost so our marriage is on the books so we will merge but it's become a same sex marriage so that's that's a problem for them. ellen's case is a direct challenge to japan's prohibition on same sex marriage. but the

government's position at the moment their options are to say ok we allow your marriage in which case they have a set a precedent for same sex marriage or to say no we don't allow your marriage in which case they have to unilaterally cancel our marriage without our consent and it's not clear that they even have the legal capacity to do that. the family remains close as their status hangs in legal limbo dorie insists changes to their family unit shouldn't spell it and we are. quite aware that not still at this time with that she is an amazing parent to the children and an amazing partner and she is someone who i admire very much i love this so much that the mother was just because our love relationship is complicated it doesn't mean that we need to divorce that. this is a permanent resident ellen doesn't risk deportation if her marriage status changes but she may face of legal battle to keep the family union she entered into. in the

studio now is ellen mccready herself i want to thank you for joining us tell us a little bit more about your case so it's been sitting in the ministry of justice for months now and so i was contacted recently by a japanese politician who took an interest in the case and she told me that there are two camps within the ministry of one camp wants to just say ok marriage is fine same sex marriage president probably the other camp apparently is considering just disavowing my gender transition entirely. so that would be a solution for them in the sense that it wouldn't just same sex marriage anymore right yeah very interesting now i want to talk a little bit about your personal situation though since you transitioned what are some of the challenges you faced including things you didn't expect yes so it's. it's been surprisingly easy perhaps in japan so well in the sense that on a daily level people are quite friendly people are polite there's no aggression

it's not like being you know you don't have a fear of violence in general but. you know some people have moved away from you some people have disappeared but overall it's been very easy and very for me and some people have moved away so i want to follow up on it to talk about your family that we saw in the report how supportive looks like very supportive your wife has been and there was one that we saw but you have two other children yes so so one that one of my children is living with his grandmother in the u.s. going to high school and my middle son was extremely supportive he wrote me a beautiful daughter after i told him about my transition and he said. he said in the letter literally he said ok after you told me a about this and you left my room i just stood there for twenty minutes and cried because i just thought how hard it must have been for you and i was like. so it was really great everyone's been

really wonderful so your immediate family it's been really good and very supportive now going back to the the laws and the regulations in japan i want to understand something better apparently if you switch genders in japan there is a requirement that you must be sterilized first of all explain what the thinking is behind that is it just from like people thinking that a person assigned to another gender shouldn't have the opposite genders reproductive organs what's going on there and does that affect you with your case so if you ask me to explain the thinking that's a bit hard because it seems completely irrational to me so the full set of requirements as you probably know is that you have to be sterilized you cannot have children under twenty you cannot be married and of course you also have to have a diagnosis of gender dysphoria and so on right ok so the marriage criteria and the child criterion seem to relate to their rationale is about maintaining family

stability got it. the first sterilization requirement i also take to have something to do with that but i think the whole thing is really about the family registry system there ok and then in terms of the impact on you then and your and your case then can you explain a little bit more so that the option of the japanese government to disallow my gender transition comes directly from that since i haven't had the surgery and i have minor children obviously and i'm married i would literally satisfy one of the it's so they could just in principle say ok your country does what it does but we don't do that we don't recognize it that's very fascinating and very very quickly how long do you think it'll take before this gets resolved in any way. i literally have no idea but i hope soon. ellen mccready thank you very much thank you thank you for having me. that's quite extraordinary for more stories and news

head to our web site that's ford slash asia and you can check us out on facebook as well we leave you now with pictures from thailand as voters and politicians have paired for the big election on sunday we'll see you next time. if you ever have to cover up a murder the best way is to make an accident. raring to. snap like this from. the streets.

we make up of what we watch as. the under budget we are the civil service or. the want to shape the continent's future. of african youngsters as they share their stories their dreams and their challengers. the seventy seven percent of. platforms africa. after five years of military rule it's time to go to the polls what's the election in thailand mean for the country's economy which barely keeps up with its neighbors in southeast asia. also on the show after years of death and destruction of aleppo's industry is slowly making a comeback. welcome to do business asia. good to have you with us

thailand is heading to the polls this sunday after nearly five years of military rule the economy has recovered since the coup in twenty four team growing four point one percent last year and while the upcoming election means political uncertainty most international investors are optimistic including german car parts manufacturer g f. o. it's the moment michel vika turned his team have worked hard for over the past two years the grand opening of s g f first manufacturing plant in asia including the traditional bali who. is a global leader in the production of drive shaft couplings a medium sized company from the variable started thailand operations with sixteen employees its main customers are auto makers from china japan.