Day: August 15, 2021

BANGKOK – Thai riot police fired tear gas and sprayed water cannons Sunday as more than 100 anti-government protesters marched on an army base in the capital Bangkok where Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha has his residence.

The group of mainly young demonstrators pelted the police lines that blocked their way, hurling rocks, fireworks and small explosives known as “ping-pong bombs.”

Televised images of a Thai police station showed a traffic control booth in flames.

Sunday marked the fourth time in the past seven days that protesters and police have fought in the Din Daeng area of the city.

Demonstrators are calling for Prayuth’s resignation over his perceived bungling of the government’s coronavirus vaccination program. Thailand has seen infection rates surge in the past few weeks while vaccination rates remain low.

But the protests are also part of a wider push for sweeping political change that includes the resignation of the government, a new constitution and – most contentious of all – fundamental reform of the powerful but opaque monarchy.

Elsewhere, Sunday saw thousands of protestors gather in vehicles and on motorbikes for a mobile anti-government rally. They met in three locations to hear speeches before slowly driving around the city. By staying in vehicles they hoped to minimize participants’ potential exposure to COVID-19.

One of the main organizers, veteran activist Nattawut Saikua, appealed to those taking part to keep it peaceful, saying violence would alienate many potential supporters.

Source: Voice of America

MANILA– Philippine activists slammed Japan yesterday, for its continued refusal to express remorse and apology, over wartime sex slavery 76 years after the end of World War II.

Lila Pilipina’s (League of Filipino Women) spokesperson, Sharon Cabusao-Silva, said, hundreds of Filipino women, who served as domestic and sex slaves to Japanese soldiers still demand justice.

Lila Pilipina is an organisation of Filipino comfort women and their sympathisers in the Philippines, fighting for recognition, apologies and reparations from the Japanese government, for its unaddressed sexual slavery crimes against Asian women.

The Japanese occupation of the Philippines occurred between 1942 and 1945.

Hundreds of thousands of women from around Asia, including China, South Korea, Indonesia and the Philippines, among others, were abducted and forced to work in Japanese wartime military brothels, during World War II.

In the Philippines, there were more than 200 women, who came out in the open in the 1990s, to tell their harrowing experience with the Japanese military.

Silva said, many of the wartime victims in the Philippines have died, without seeing justice, and there are only 12 of them alive now, mostly in their 80s and 90s, and in worrying health condition.

Like other Asian “comfort women,” a euphemism for those who were forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese military brothels during World War II, the Filipino “comfort women” also demand an official apology from the Japanese government, as well as, compensation and inclusion of the comfort women issue in Japan’s historical accounts and textbooks

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK

SINGAPORE– Singapore saw the first giant panda birth on its land yesterday, said a press release by the Wildlife Reserves Singapore (WRS) Group, today.

The cub, 13-year-old Kai Kai and 12-year-old Jia Jia’s firstborn, weighs in at an estimated 200 grams, though its gender is yet to be determined. WRS said, the cub was born at River Safari, with the help of Chinese experts. Despite being a first-time mom, Jia Jia’s maternal instincts kicked in as soon as the cub was born, said WRS, adding, mom and baby are in an off-exhibit den, to give them time to nurse and bond.

“Jia Jia’s first pregnancy and the birth of a cub is a significant milestone for us, in the care of this threatened species in Singapore. This is the result of good animal care, assisted reproductive science and sheer perseverance on the part of our staff, coupled with valuable advice from China’s panda experts. The work continues now with supporting the first-time mother to raise her newborn cub,” said Cheng Wen-Haur, WRS’s Deputy CEO and Chief Life Sciences Officer.

Kai Kai and Jia Jia displayed signs of being in heat in Apr, when entering their seventh breeding season. Working closely with the China Conservation and Research Centre for Giant Panda (CCRCGP), WRS’ animal care team initiated the breeding plan for 2021.

To make the most of the once-a-year breeding season, CCRCGP experts advised Singapore’s vets to perform artificial insemination before the end of the receptive period. The procedure was carried out by the in-house veterinary team at WRS’ Wildlife Healthcare and Research Centre, using frozen semen collected from Kai Kai before the mating season. Jia Jia’s pregnancy was later confirmed through an ultrasound scan.

The birth of the giant panda cub is “a joyful boost to the ongoing National Day celebrations this year,” said WRS.

As part of WRS, River Safari is home to one of the world’s largest collections of freshwater vertebrates. It is also home to giant pandas, as part of a joint collaboration between China Wildlife Conservation Association and Wildlife Reserves Singapore, to promote giant panda conservation.

Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK