“HUGE CRISIS” Bhutto Zardari, the son of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and former president Asif Ali Zardari, said he would like to see his father become president again. “And I am not saying this because he is my father. I am saying this because the country is inContinue Reading
SINGAPORE: The Singapore Police Force (SPF) is investigating possible offences at two separate events related to the Israel-Hamas war, including a public gathering along Orchard Road.
Both events took place on Feb 2.
A group of about 70 people had assembled along Orchard Road at about 2pm and marched towards the Istana, carrying umbrellas with watermelon images in support of the Palestinian cause.
They may have committed an offence for organising a public assembly without a permit, said the police in a media release on Tuesday (Feb 13), noting that the Istana is a particularly security-sensitive area designated as a Prohibited Area.
“Furthermore, their actions advocate the political causes of other countries and have the potential to stir up tensions and lead to public disorder,” said SPF, adding that several police reports were lodged by members of the public.
According to social media posts, participants of the Letters for Palestine event walked from Plaza Singapura to the Istana to deliver letters addressed to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
The second case that police are investigating involves an online video of a private event “where a subject was seen live streaming publicly and chanting ‘from the river to the sea'”. Others were seen chanting “Palestine will be free” in response.
The phrase “from the river to the sea” is associated with calls for the destruction of Israel, SPF noted, adding that the use of such slogans can lead to racial tensions in Singapore and may be an offence.
The investigations come amid heightened global tensions as the Israel-Hamas war drags on.
Singapore police also said they are aware of calls to protest against Israel at the Singapore Airshow, such as gathering for a sit-in and pasting stickers related to the conflict.
The Singapore Airshow, to be held from Feb 20 to Feb 25, features displays by international aerospace and defence companies, including those from Israel.
Police warned that organising or participating in a public assembly or procession without a permit is illegal.
Affixing posters, placards or other documents including stickers on any properties without permission also constitutes an offence.
In a Facebook post, Second Minister for Home Affairs Josephine Teo said that the police’s advisory “is not meant to prevent anyone from expressing their concerns, or even their strong views on this issue”.
“But there are ways of doing so that do not break our laws or cause a deep rift in our society,” she added.
“Remember, we cannot hope to end conflicts by starting more conflicts of our own. Instead, we can respectfully share our views and contribute to humanitarian relief efforts. Let us continue to care for those affected by the ongoing conflict and in so doing, maintain our own unity.”
The US Department of the Air Force (DAF) plans a sweeping reorganization of the Air Force and Space Force for “great power competition” with China, a “reoptimizing” drive of at least 24 organizational changes to be implemented over the next year, senior US officials said.
The service’s budget request for fiscal years 2024 and 2025 does not include any funds for the re-optimization and budget reprogramming authorities will allocate funds as required, US Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall was quoted as saying in a Breaking Defense report.
The bulk of the reorganization will target the US Air Force, with 15 significant changes ranging from a different approach to nuclear weapons management to new warrant officer programs.
Considerable changes will involve how the Air Force deploys its airmen by adjusting how its wings are structured while others will target education and training, with plans to expand the Air Education Training Command and rename it Airman Development Command.
Moreover, the Breaking Defense report says that the US Air Force is looking to embark on more large-scale exercises to simulate the conditions of a fight with a peer adversary such as China.
Under the reorganization, the US Air Force’s secretariat civilian leadership will set up three new offices: an Integrated Capabilities Office, an Office of Competitive Activities and an Office for Program Analysis and Evaluation.
Chief of Space Operations General Chance Saltzman, meanwhile, elaborated on the Space Force’s planned changes including a revamp of service readiness standards to reflect that space is now a contested domain rather than a “benign environment.”
In its current form, the US Air Force may not be up to great power competition with near-peer adversaries like China due in part to an outdated mindset, institutional complacency, a prolonged focus on counterterrorism and counterinsurgency and generalized neglect.
In a March 2019 Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA) study, Mark Gunzinger and other writers state that after the Cold War, the US Department of Defense (DOD) shifted its force planning priorities from deterring a Soviet invasion of Western Europe toward conducting two major regional conflicts that closely resembled the 1991 Operation Desert Storm against Iraq.
Gunzinger and others mention that US planning at the time assumed US forces could deploy to secure theater bases close to a regional aggressor and quickly achieve air superiority in strike and other capabilities. However, they point out that while those assumptions were reasonable in the 1990s, DOD planning has lagged behind the evolving threat environment.
They say that China and Russia have developed anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) multi-domain complexes to support their revisionist national objectives, which include passive and active air and missile defenses, early warning and target-tracking sensors, increasingly advanced combat aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) and hypersonic weapons.
In a December 2023 article for The National Interest (TNI), John Venable notes that the US Air Force would struggle to repeat its 1991 Operation Desert Storm success against a near-peer adversary like China for multiple reasons.
In terms of manpower, Venable states that the active-duty US Air Force missed its 2023 fiscal year recruiting goals by 11% while its Air Reserve component fell short by 30%.
He notes that those numbers would have been worse if the US Air Force had not changed its policies regarding drug use, body composition, age and other factors, which imply lowered standards for recruits.
He also argues that the drive for efficiency in the 1990s and racial diversity in the 2020s have made a mockery of the flight school screening process. He adds that lax promotion policies mean even poor performers graduate and advance.
Venable also alleges post-Cold War atrophy, noting that at the height of the Cold War, the US Air Force had 4,468 fighter and 331 bomber aircraft, with eight out of ten mission-capable.
However, he asserts the US Air Force currently has just 1,932 fighter and 140 bomber aircraft, with only six out of ten fit to fly combat missions, Venable claims that in a conflict with China, the US Air Force could only generate 32% of the fighter and bomber capacity it could in 1987.
He also notes falling flight hours for US pilots. Venerable claims that at the height of the Cold War, the average US fighter pilot flew more than 160 sorties/200 hours a year, but in 2022, US fighter pilots averaged just 74 sorties/129 hours a year. Venable also claims they averaged less than two of the three mission simulator sorties they are supposedly required to receive monthly.
Despite those challenges, the US Air Force has initiated operational and techno-centric improvements to restore its earlier edge.
In a January 2023 CSBA study, Thomas Mahnken and others state that the US Air Force has embraced Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) with a focus on enhancing battlespace connectivity and advanced command and control (C2), implementing the Advanced Battle Management System (ABMS) to replace legacy systems and evolve into a comprehensive C2 program that leverages digital networks and technologies for modern warfare.
Mahnken and others say that the ABMS aims to integrate sensors, manage data, ensure secure processing and facilitate connectivity, with demonstrations showing capabilities like defeating cruise missiles and enabling joint and partner nation information-sharing.
They also note that the US Air Force is adopting the Agile Combat Employment (ACE) strategy to disperse operations across more resilient and versatile airbases, working with smaller, unmanned systems like the XQ-58 Valkyrie to adapt to threats from adversaries and enhance operational flexibility and survivability in contested environments.
Still, Raphael Cohen and other writers mention the danger of strategic myopia in a 2023 RAND report, noting that a renewed focus on China does not mean an exclusive focus on the Indo-Pacific and that a resurgent Russia does not mean a sole focus on Europe.
Cohen and others maintain that the US should keep a global view to counter increasing Chinese and Russian influence in the Middle East, Africa and Latin America, recognizing the connection between counterterrorism and great power competition to prevent proxy wars with its near-peer adversaries in those secondary fronts.
SINGAPORE: Commuters were more satisfied with taxi and private-hire car services in 2023, according to an annual survey conducted by the Public Transport Council (PTC).
Passengers surveyed gave a mean satisfaction score of 8.2 out of 10 – an improvement from the score of 8 in 2022.
“Among the service attributes, there was significant improvement in satisfaction levels for waiting time and ease of booking for both taxi and private hire car services,” the PTC said on Tuesday (Feb 13) when it released the results of the survey.
The satisfaction score for waiting time, which saw the biggest drop in 2022, showed the greatest improvement this round for both taxis and private hire car services.
Other service attributes included in the survey were ride comfort, driver’s knowledge of routes, customer service provided by the driver, safety and taxi stand accessibility.
Most categories recorded a higher satisfaction score in 2023 compared with the previous year.
SINGAPORE: Misguided by a sense of justice, a man devised a plan to snatch S$40,000 (US$29,700) out of the hands of another man, even roping in his nephew to help.
The plan failed and 51-year-old Tate Lim, was jailed for seven months on Tuesday (Feb 13), while his nephew, Ivan Lim Teng Tze, 29, was jailed three months and two weeks. Ivan Lim had driven a man to grab the victim’s money.
The uncle and nephew each pleaded guilty to a charge of being part of a conspiracy to commit attempted snatch theft, which involved the use of force.
Ivan Lim had an unrelated charge of breaching COVID-19-related regulations in 2021 taken into consideration for his sentencing.
In December 2022, the victim, then 33-year-old Yin Yang, agreed to exchange S$40,000 in cash for yuan into his bank account through an intermediary known as “Cyan”.
The victim was supposed to exchange the money with a woman known as Wang Mengmeng, with Ms Wang receiving Singapore currency while the victim received yuan.
On Dec 25, 2022, the victim, Ms Wang and another man met in person. The intermediary, Cyan, claimed he was unable to make the meeting.
Cyan then instructed Ms Wang to transfer the agreed sum to specified bank accounts. She complied.
However the victim did not receive any money and refused to hand over his cash. Both the victim and Ms Wang then headed to Jurong East Neighbourhood Police Centre to lodge police reports.
Meanwhile, Tate Lim learned about the failed transfer and formed a plan to have the S$40,000 snatched from the victim, as he felt that the money had been “wrongfully withheld” from Ms Wang, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Huo Jiongrui. Court documents did not state how Tate Lim was related to Ms Wang.
Tate Lim roped in his nephew and another man, Muhamad Sahlifi Suleiman, to help with the scheme.
Sahlifi brought in another man, Amzar Daiyan Abdul Ghafor, who agreed to snatch the money in exchange for S$1,000. A group of the men then waited outside Jurong East Neighbourhood Police Centre for Mr Yin.
When Mr Yin emerged, Ivan Lim tailed him in a car, driving Daiyan to a block in Bukit Batok Street 52, where the victim alighted from his private hire.
At about 6.34pm, at the void deck’s lift lobby, Daiyan attempted to grab the money from the victim but failed. Instead, he punched the victim in the face. The victim suffered minor injuries.
In sentencing submissions, Mr Huo noted that the two accused had not committed their offences out of greed, but rather a “sense of misplaced vigilante justice”. Nevertheless, he said that such acts should not be encouraged.
Sahlifi’s case is still pending before the courts.
KUALA LUMPUR: Former Malaysia prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, 98, has been admitted to hospital again, his office said, confirming media reports after the ex-premier of more than two decades missed a court hearing on Tuesday (Feb 13). The nonagenarian has been in and out of hospital in recent years. HeContinue Reading
The IEA is an intergovernmental organisation that provides analysis, data, policy recommendations and solutions to help countries in their transition to sustainable energy. Singapore joined the IEA as an association country in 2016.
Dr Tan said: “The IEA Regional Cooperation Centre in Singapore will deepen our partnership with the IEA.
“The centre will be the first energy-focused international organisation in Singapore and will be a strategic asset for the IEA in the Asia Pacific.
“It will energise the region’s decarbonisation journey, while continuing to provide advice on energy security and resilience.”
Chief executive of EMA Ngiam Shih Chun said the centre will further strengthen EMA’s ability to work with the IEA to support the region’s energy transition pathways.
“EMA and IEA have worked closely over many years to enhance the region’s capacity on key energy initiatives such as energy efficiency, infrastructure financing and cross-border power interconnections through the Singapore-IEA Regional Training Hub and the Singapore-IEA Forum at the annual Singapore International Energy Week,” added Mr Ngiam.
IEA’s executive director Fatih Birol noted that the new office will allow it to “significantly increase (its) engagement with Southeast Asia and beyond”, adding that the region is “one of the most dynamic and fastest growing regions in the world”.
“Through the centre, we stand ready to accompany all of the countries in the region as they strive to provide affordable, reliable and modern energy for all their citizens,” added Dr Birol.
Special colour to pay tribute to His Majesty who celebrates 72nd birthday this year
PUBLISHED : 13 Feb 2024 at 18:12
Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has called on the public to join civil servants and state enterprise staff in wearing yellow shirts every Monday to show loyalty to His Majesty the King in tribute to his 72nd birthday this year.
Speaking after Tuesday’s cabinet meeting, Mr Srettha, dressed in yellow attire, said that in celebration of His Majesty’s sixth-cycle birthday on July 28, he had instructed state officials to don yellow shirts bearing the 6th cycle emblem every Monday and at other times deemed appropriate.
He also urged those in the private sector and the general public to wear the emblematic yellow shirts, and said state agencies should decorate their buildings with the corresponding flag.
The government announced earlier that it would be organising activities to commemorate His Majesty’s 72nd birthday.
The activities include a royal barge procession on the Chao Phraya River to pay homage to the royal kathin (robe-giving) rite to observe the end of Buddhist Lent this year, a mass ordination of monks dedicated to the King’s birthday and the minting of special commemorative coins.
Starting next week, relics of the Lord Buddha and his chief disciples Sariputra and Moggallana will be enshrined in Thailand for worship in celebration of His Majesty’s birthday.
Brought from India, the relics will be on display at Sanam Luang for people to pay their respects from 9am to 8pm, from Feb 22 to March 19.
After that, they will be moved to Chiang Mai, Ubon Ratchathani and Krabi so that people in various regions can pay homage. Later, the relics will be returned to India.
Among the wackiest things to come from Donald Trump’s mouth recently is the former US president trying to take credit for China’s US$7 trillion stock reckoning.
“I mean, look, the stock market almost crashed when it was announced that I won the Iowa primary in a record,” Trump told Fox News on February 11. “And then when I won New Hampshire, the stock market went down like crazy.”
In reality, China’s spectacular stock rout has been playing out since 2021, well after Joe Biden moved into the White House. But there is one investor crowd taking notice of the growing odds Asia might soon be grappling with a Trump 2.0 presidency: currency traders.
Trump’s threats to impose tariffs exceeding 60% on Chinese goods has the cost of hedging the yuan soaring to the highest levels since 2017.
In China, “the most frequently asked questions among local investors include implications for China should Donald Trump become the next US president,” says Goldman Sachs economist Maggie Wei after a series of recent meetings with mainland mutual funds, private equity funds and asset managers.
Even today, well before Trump might have a chance to shake up global trade anew, “the outlook for trade flows going forward is likely one of moderation,” says Rubeela Farooqi, economist at High Frequency Economics. The downshift is thanks to “expectations of slower demand and growth going forward, both domestically and abroad.”
The specter of a supersized trade war is the last thing the global economy needs as 2024 unfolds. Any added headwinds from the West would compound the domestic troubles that have knocked Chinese stocks sharply lower, namely a deepening property crisis, weak retail sales, sputtering manufacturing activity and deflationary forces.
The threat of significantly higher taxes on Chinese-made goods destined for the US could slam business and household confidence. Executives might be even less inclined to add new jobs at a moment when youth unemployment is at record highs.
Trade war worries also might make China Inc less willing to fatten paychecks. This could imperil President Xi Jinping’s hopes of recalibrating economic engines toward a consumer demand-led growth model.
It also could lead to a big spike in exchange rate volatility and put downward pressure on the yuan. That’s precisely what Xi and Premier Li Qiang don’t want in 2024. For one, it could increase default risks of property developers with offshore debt. For another, it could set back Xi’s success to date in deleveraging the financial system.
Then there’s the upcoming US election. The one thing on which President Joe Biden’s Democrats and Republicans loyal to Donald Trump agree on is being tough on China. And a weaker yuan falling ahead of the November 5 contest could provoke Washington in unpredictable ways.
In the meantime, the mere threat of a bigger trade war could spook investors currently piling into US stocks. If Trump were to add another 60% tariff on top of those that he imposed during his 2017-2021 presidency, American consumers would bear the brunt through costlier goods.
Trump’s initial trade war neither catalyzed a US manufacturing boom nor narrowed the US trade deficit with China. Meanwhile, the US government had to throw billions of dollars of federal aid to US farmers as China scrapped purchases of American agricultural goods in retaliation.
A big spike in US tariffs would necessarily be inflationary, complicating the US Federal Reserve’s hopes of cutting interest rates. Prolonging the period of high US bond yields would undermine corporate America while also reducing household disposable spending.
The inflationary impact of a Trump 2.0 presidency could shake up the economic trajectory of nations everywhere, not least in export-oriented Asia. An analysis by Bloomberg Economics reckons that a 60% tax on all Chinese imports would effectively shrink a vital $575 billion trade relationship to a trickle.
All this leaves Xi’s Communist Party with decidedly mixed feelings about whether China would fare better under another four years of Biden or a second Trump term.
On the surface, at least, Biden is endeavoring to restore ties with Xi’s party, a pivot on full display last November when Xi visited San Francisco for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit, a grouping dedicated to trade promotion.
Biden, though, has so far refused to lift the Trump-era tariffs that so enraged Xi’s economic team. The Biden administration also has gone at China’s soft targets with surgical precision, including limiting its access to cutting-edge technology like high-end semiconductors and the gamut of chipmaking equipment.
The last two years also saw the US devise a screening program to curb investments in China’s efforts to raise its game in quantum computing and artificial intelligence. Though Biden has taken the rhetorical tone down a notch, his policies have arguably exacted greater damage than Trump’s.
This includes investing hundreds of billions of dollars in domestic tech capacity that the Trump administration neglected. The US building new economic muscle at home worries Xi more than 1980s-style policies around which China can generally easily navigate. Here, think of Trump’s failed effort to kill giant Chinese telecom gear maker Huawei.
Looked at through this prism, there’s an argument that China might prefer Trump redux. As Zhu Junwei of Grandview Institution notes, there’s a reason the Beijing think tank’s research suggests 60% of Chinese prefer Trump because of how his unruly presidency might further dent America’s global standing.
Either way, Xi’s party is bracing for an US election cycle sure to see Democrats and Republicans trying to one-up each other at China’s expense.
Increased data security measures are sure to emerge as the year unfolds. The icy reception Shou Zi Chew, CEO of ByteDance-owned TikTok, received on Capitol Hill recently dramatized the race to curb services and transactions across industries.
China’s electric vehicles (EVs) market could face its own onslaught of data security speed bumps from either a Biden or Trump administration.
In a speech in late January, Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said there are “competitive structural dynamics” in the US-China relationship. But, he claimed, this competition “doesn’t have to lead to conflict, confrontation or a new Cold War.”
It already seems too late for that. But as November 5 approaches, currency traders are becoming increasingly antsy, as seen in recent spiking volatility. The gap between nine-month implied volatility on the offshore yuan and measures of six-month volatility is the highest in nearly seven years.
As that electoral contest approaches, strategists at Deutsche Bank expect the US dollar will stay mainly within 2023 ranges even if the US Federal Reserve begins cutting interest rates, as many investors expect. “The market is likely to start adding to a dollar safe-haven premium through the year as election risks build,” Deutsche Bank argues in a note.
There’s an argument, too, that the dollar might be doomed if Trump gets another shot at naming a Treasury secretary. In 1971, then-US president Richard Nixon’s Treasury chief famously said that “the dollar is our currency, but it’s your problem.” This seems even truer now than in 1971 and the sentiment could be supersized during a Trump 2.0 presidency, if his first term was any guide.
While running for president in May 2016, Trump even hinted at defaulting on US debt. Trump told CNBC “I love debt. I love playing with it.” When asked what he might do if the budget deficit grew too fast, he said: “I would borrow, knowing that if the economy crashed, you could make a deal. And if the economy was good, it was good. So, therefore, you can’t lose.”
In April 2020, the Washington Post detailed how Trump officials, looking to punish China, mulled canceling debt held by Beijing. However, Treasury officials succeeded in talking Trump out of a stunt that likely would have made the 2008 Lehman Brothers crisis seem like a hiccup.
But who knows what tricks Trump may have up his sleeve in a second term? The risk is hardly a non-negligible worry for Japan, China and other top Asian central banks sitting on more than $3 trillion of US Treasury securities.
The US entered 2024 with its national debt topping $34 trillion and Moody’s Investors Service warning it might yank away America’s only remaining top rating.
That came three months after Fitch Ratings downgraded the US to AA+ as Republicans and Democrats wrestled over funding the government and 12 years after a Standard & Poor’s downgrade amid partisan bickering over the debt ceiling.
More recently, Moody’s warned that “the greatest near-term danger to the dollar’s position stems from the risk of confidence-sapping policy mistakes by the US authorities themselves, like a US default on its debt for example. Weakening institutions and a political pivot to protectionism threaten the dollar’s global role.”
Moody’s adds that “although we expect that politicians will eventually agree to raise or suspend the debt limit and avoid a default on government debt, greater polarization in the domestic political environment over the last decade has weakened both the predictability and effectiveness of US policymaking. Sanctions further inhibiting the free flow of the dollar in global trade and finance could encourage greater diversification.”
Team Biden has raised concerns of its own over a “weaponized” dollar as Washington squares off with Russia over Ukraine. Those allegations emerged after the Biden administration, as part of sanctions, moved to freeze hundreds of billions of dollars of Moscow’s foreign reserves.
Yet at least one thing is clear: Asia’s markets will find themselves in harm’s way as Trump and Biden try to prove on the campaign trail who is tougher on China. But as the rival candidates flex and joust, there is much more at stake than the US presidency.
Follow William Pesek on X, formerly Twitter, at @WilliamPesek
Thai foreign minister on visit to Washington
PUBLISHED : 13 Feb 2024 at 17:31
WASHINGTON, DC – US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken has shown support for Thailand setting up a humanitarian corridor along the border with war-torn Myanmar, and acknowledged the kingdom’s strategic importance in the region, according to Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara.
The visiting Thai minister met Mr Blinken on Tuesday to discuss issues including security, the economy and Thailand’s humanitarian initiatives regarding Myanmar.
“The meeting was very successful. The US has shown strong interest in Asean and sees Thailand’s strategic importance in the region,” said Mr Parnpree.
“We also talked about the Myanmar situation, with Mr Blinken agreeing to the Thai idea of a humanitarian corridor. He said the US stood ready to support us. I’m sure there will be further discussion about more collaboration on dealing with the Myanmar crisis,” he said.
Mr Parnpree said he shared with Mr Blinken concern about cybersecurity at the Thai-Myanmar border and said both sides would be involved in collaborative prevention.
During his trip, the foreign minister also met US senator Chris Van Hollen, chairman of the subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific and international cybersecurity policy.
They discussed ways to enhance US-Thailand bilateral relations and exchanged views about Myanmar, with Mr Van Hollen also reportedly speaking positively about Thailand’s humanitarian initiative.
Mr Van Hollen meanwhile expressed concern about the eight remaining Thai hostages held captive in the Gaza Strip by Hamas. Mr Parnpree said he asked the US official to help coordinate their release.
Mr Parnpree also met with US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo; Amos J Hochstein, deputy assistant to President Joe Biden and senior adviser for energy and investment; and senator Tammy Duckworth, a member of the committee on foreign relations.
Ms Duckworth and Mr Parnpree discussed ways of promoting defence cooperation including raising quotas for Thai military personnel to attend a US military academy, cooperation in modernising the military and other potential areas of cooperation.
Ms Duckworth also expressed her support for the senate resolution marking the 190th anniversary of Thai-US diplomatic relations.
“The meeting was very important to strengthen our longstanding relationship and strategic partnership with the US,” Mr Parnpree said.