---
title: Tricontinental and the International Peoples' Assembly moved Hands Off Asia from a March slogan to a July declaration and August U.S. rallies as if it were a continent speaking.
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/briefs/20260916-2318Z-hands-off-asia-singham/
description: On 16 September 2026 Newsweek published Didi Kirsten Tatlow's investigation of the Hands Off Asia campaign.
section: Watch briefs
---

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[Watch briefs](https://propagandaarchive.org/briefs/) · September 16, 2026

# Tricontinental and the International Peoples' Assembly moved Hands Off Asia from a March slogan to a July declaration and August U.S. rallies as if it were a continent speaking.

- **Filed:** September 16, 2026, 23:18 UTC
- **Actor:** Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research under Vijay Prashad and the International Peoples' Assembly, financed through Neville Roy Singham's U.S. nonprofit chain, with BreakThrough News as a same-network amplifier
- **Target:** Asian and U.S. audiences asked to hear opposition to U.S. bases, the Quad, AUKUS, and data-center buildout as a single people's sovereignty demand rather than as a funded campaign line
- **Source:** Unidentified Source blurred: contractors, cutouts, buried disclosure
- **Confidence:** **high** Multiple independent open sources, low disagreement about the facts
- **Techniques:** [Narrative laundering](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/narrative-laundering/) [Manufactured consensus](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/manufactured-consensus/) [Glittering generalities](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/glittering-generalities/) [Card stacking](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/card-stacking/) [Disclosure theater](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/disclosure-theater/) [Transfer](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/transfer/)
- **Where:** United States, China, Sri Lanka, Asia
- **Channels:** Vijay Prashad X post launching Hands Off Asia, March 2026, as reconstructed by Newsweek 16 SeptemberBeijing launch event on the anniversary of the fall of Saigon, per NewsweekHands Off Asia conference, Colombo, 16-18 July 2026, IPA with Tricontinental supportTricontinental Asia newsletter reprinting the Colombo Declaration, 29 July 2026BreakThrough News conference write-up, 17 July 2026U.S. rallies and closed meetings in Philadelphia and New York, August 2026, per NewsweekHouse Foreign Affairs Subcommittee hearing Trojan Horses, 15 September 2026, 2172 RayburnNew York Times map of the Singham nonprofit chain, 5 August 2023

## Summary

On 16 September 2026 Newsweek published Didi Kirsten Tatlow's investigation of the Hands Off Asia campaign. The piece dates the slogan to a March 2026 X post by Vijay Prashad, director of the U.S.-registered Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, which the article describes as funded by Shanghai-based Neville Roy Singham. A Beijing launch on the anniversary of the fall of Saigon was followed by a mid-July Colombo conference and a 29 July Tricontinental newsletter reprinting the Colombo Declaration. BreakThrough News, 17 July, recorded Prashad, former Nepali prime minister Prachanda, Sri Lanka's environment minister, and Cuba's ambassador on the opening dais. On 15 September the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on South and Central Asia held Trojan Horses: Covert Foreign Malign Influence Operations in America, with witnesses naming the same nonprofit chain. Score the slogan, the declaration text, the conference billing, and the hearing calendar as high. Score any claim that every U.S. protest against bases or data centers was ordered from Zhongnanhai as not in this file.

## Analysis

The last two briefs in this vault covered an Israeli ministry UN-week site and an America PAC Senate ad buy. This cycle rotates to a U.S.-registered institute-and-assembly stack whose copy travels as Asian popular will.

Primary layers agree on the campaign objects and split on command. Tricontinental itself, 29 July 2026, published Hands off Asia: The Colombo Declaration for People's Sovereignty and Solidarity over the names Atul Chandra, Tings Chak and Shiran Illanperuma. The declaration defines the slogan as no U.S. or allied bases, no AUKUS, no Quad, no war on Iran, no genocide in Palestine, an end to the encirclement of Asia, no IMF conditionalities, no tariff coercion, and a socialist horizon. BreakThrough News, 17 July, billed the Colombo opening with Prashad, Prachanda, Sri Lanka's environment minister Dammika Patabendi, and Cuban ambassador Patricia Lazara Pego Guerra, and quoted Prashad hoping the gathering would drive momentum to end the U.S. hyper-imperialist military buildup. Newsweek, 16 September, reconstructed the earlier pipe: a March X post from Prashad, a Beijing launch on the Saigon-fall anniversary, scores of sites and accounts tying hundreds of organizations to groups Singham has funded, August meetings in Philadelphia and New York, and a Justice Department investigation plus congressional subpoenas of Tricontinental and two other groups. The House subcommittee hearing on 15 September put the same chain on the record as a Trojan-horse case. The New York Times, 5 August 2023, had already mapped hundreds of millions of dollars through American nonprofits that mix progressive advocacy with Chinese government talking points, and placed Singham in Shanghai sharing premises with Maku Group. Score those dated texts, the dais list, and the hearing as high. Score operational control by a named CCP office, and any claim that local electricity or base grievances are fake, as not shown.

Mechanism is narrative-laundering first. A U.S.-registered institute, a people's assembly, and a declaration written like a NAM communique stand in front of a funder who lives in Shanghai and has not registered under FARA. Manufactured-consensus is the architecture: one slogan, many letterheads, a minister and an ambassador on the opening stage, then U.S. street dates so the line looks independently discovered. Glittering-generalities do the sentence work. Sovereignty, solidarity, people's culture, and socialist horizon are virtue words. Swap any of them for a testable metric — who paid for the hall, which PLA facilities are exempt from hands off, which Asian government can criticize Doha or Beijing in the same register — and the slogan no longer carries the week. Card-stacking is the missing denominator. The declaration names U.S. bases, AUKUS and the Quad. It does not name Chinese bases, dual-use ports, or the Party documents that treat Taiwan as a core interest. Disclosure-theater is the nonprofit skin: 501 forms and About pages exist; they do not travel with the rally graphic. Transfer pastes the prestige of a former prime minister, a sitting minister, a Cuban ambassador, and an institute masthead onto a campaign line.

This is propaganda where origin is a funded institute-assembly pair, institutional form is a sovereignty declaration, and the design goal is to move identification so a payer question reads as a loyalty question about Asia. Gray does not cancel the method. It is not a finding that every base opponent is a cutout, that IMF conditions have no Asian critics, that the 2023 Times map was invented, or that a grand jury equals a conviction. A same-method test applies in reverse. A U.S. contractor that stood up a People's Assembly for a Hands Off Beijing declaration, put allied ministers on the dais, omitted American bases, and treated a funding question as proof of Chinese encirclement would be this brief with the nouns swapped.

Literacy counter: keep three objects apart. One: a dated declaration and a dated conference program. Those can be read. Two: a funded institute and a Shanghai-resident donor whose nonprofits have been mapped since 2023. That is the pipe. Three: the instruction that circulating Hands Off Asia is how a continent speaks, and that asking who paid is itself encirclement. If the payload is two or three, the slogan is doing method work. If the payload is one, put the declaration, the 2023 Times map, and the hearing witness list on the same screen.

## Tells

- A people's declaration that names only one power's bases and alliances
- A U.S.-registered institute and a Shanghai-resident donor standing behind an Asian sovereignty slogan
- Ministers and ambassadors on an opening dais used as proof the continent has spoken
- Nonprofit About pages that do not travel with the rally graphic or the X slogan
- A funding question pre-labeled as encirclement or McCarthyism before the ledger is opened

## Literacy counter

Keep three objects apart. One: a dated declaration and a dated conference program. Those can be read. Two: a funded institute and a Shanghai-resident donor whose nonprofits have been mapped since 2023. That is the pipe. Three: the instruction that circulating Hands Off Asia is how a continent speaks, and that asking who paid is itself encirclement. If the payload is two or three, the slogan is doing method work. If the payload is one, put the declaration, the 2023 Times map, and the hearing witness list on the same screen.

## Evidence

1. [Tricontinental Asia, 29 July 2026: Colombo Declaration text defining Hands Off Asia](https://thetricontinental.org/asia/hands-off-asia-colombo-declaration/)
2. [BreakThrough News, 17 July 2026: Colombo dais list and Prashad hyper-imperialist-buildup line](https://breakthroughnews.org/2026/07/17/hands-off-asia-conference-aims-to-build-common-resistance-against-hyper-imperialist-interventions-in-the-region/)
3. [Newsweek, 16 September 2026: Tatlow reconstruction of slogan, Beijing launch, U.S. rallies, subpoenas](https://www.newsweek.com/how-social-posts-made-in-china-sparked-anti-us-protests-in-america-12444410)
4. [House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing page: Trojan Horses, 15 September 2026, 2172 Rayburn](https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/committee-activity/hearings/trojan-horses-covert-foreign-malign-influence-operations-in-america)
5. [New York Times, 5 August 2023: Singham nonprofit chain mixing advocacy with Chinese talking points](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/05/world/europe/neville-roy-singham-china-propaganda.html)
6. [Bitcoin Policy Institute, 29 June 2026: Singham ground game against U.S. AI infrastructure](https://www.btcpolicy.org/articles/foreign-influence-campaign-against-american-ai-part-ii-singham-ground-game)
7. [Fox News, 14 September 2026: hearing preview naming CodePink, People's Forum, BreakThrough and Singham totals](https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trojan-horses-america-congress-probes-influence-networks-tied-china-iran-cuba)