for Malaysia
Time
Nov. 20, 2015
A leaked memo sounds warning on the eve of a major summit to be attended by President Obama
Ten prospective suicide bombers are at large in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s capital and largest city, according to a leaked police memo cited by the Guardian. Another eight thought are in the western part of the country. Continue reading “18 Would-Be Suicide Bombers Are at Large in Malaysia, Police Believe”
By Anthony Faiola, William Booth and Emily Badger
Washington Post
November 21 2015
PARIS — The government abruptly shut down the metro system in Brussels, canceled sporting events and warned shoppers to stay away from malls as Belgium placed the capital on maximum alert early Saturday, citing a “serious and imminent” threat of attack.
Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel said Saturday morning that officials had identified shopping centers, public transportation and major events as targets of a possible attack, involving multiple assailants, similar to the deadly assault that struck Paris last Friday.
In Brussels, armed troops stood guard in front of hotels and at major intersections. There was a scattering of shop closures. At least four of the Islamic State militants who attacked Paris came from the same immigrant neighborhood of Molenbeek in the Belgium capital.
Police continue to hunt for one of the Parisian attackers, Salah Abdeslam, a 26-year-old French national who lived in Brussels and may have returned after the attacks.
The new threat alert in Brussels comes after European countries agreed Friday to new steps aimed at securing Europe’s frontiers, as further evidence emerged that extremists in the terrorist attacks in Paris were using the region’s porous borders to slip between the continent and the battlefields of the Middle East. Continue reading “Brussels is put on high alert as officials warn of ‘imminent threat’”
The Malaysian Parliament must take a stand on Monday whether it wants to have a “cari makan” Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), especially as it is poised to continue its “derailed” investigations into Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s RM2.6 billion “donation” and RM50 billion 1MDB twin mega scandals.
PAC Chairman Datuk Hasan Arifin has compounded his faux pax with a ban on all PAC press conferences on the ground that he is victim of a diabolic plot by the media to present him in the worst possible light.
Why should the media have such an animus towards him and not others, as no other UMNO/BN leader, whether Minister or other parliamentary personality, had ever lodged such a serious complaint of collective bias against the parliamentary media.
Does the fault lie in the media or in Hasan himself? Continue reading “Parliament must take a stand on Monday whether it wants to have a “cari makan” Chairman of PAC, especially as it is poised to continue its “derailed” investigations into Najib’s RM2.6 billion “donation” and RM50 billion 1MDB twin mega scandals”
The latest development in the decades-old tragedy of the Tamils in Sri Lanka was the one-day hartal last Sunday in the whole of the entire northern province of Sri Lanka, an area mainly inhabited by Tamils, which was brought to a standstill in support of about 300 Tamil prisoners in Sri Lanka who had renewed their hunger strike for the immediate release of all prisoners of war and political prisoners involved in the Tamil war of independence.
All private and public activities, except for medical services, came to a standstill. Students did not attend schools. Roads remained deserted except for the army and police.
The 300 Tamil political prisoners had suspended their hunger strike launched on Oct. 13 demanding freedom for all prisoners at the request of Tamil National Alliance members of parliament, who had urged them to give the government more time to respond to their demand for freedom.
The “War of independence” refers to the armed campaign by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam for an independent Tamil homeland in the north and east of the island of Sri Lanka. The LTTE was defeated in 2009, but alleged LTTE members are still being held in prison, many of them detained without trial. Some have been detained for up to 20 years. Continue reading “Justice, Truth and Reconciliation for the Tamils in Sri Lanka”