Taiwan detects two Russian warships off its coast
TAIPEI: Taiwan sighted two Russian frigates sailing off its eastern coast on Tuesday (Jun 28) and deployed surveillance ships and aircraft to monitor their movements, the island’s Ministry of National Defence said. The Russian warships were “detected sailing from south to north in the waters off our eastern coast” asContinue Reading
Former Singapore Idol judge Ken Lim gets fresh charges of insulting womenâs modesty
SINGAPORE: A former Singapore Idol judge, already accused of molesting a woman, was given fresh charges on Wednesday (Jun 28) of insulting the modesty of three women. Ken Lim Chih Chiang, 59, was handed five new charges, taking the total number he faces to six. The total number of allegedContinue Reading
South Koreans become a year younger under new age-counting law
Getty ImagesSouth Koreans have become a year or two younger as a new law aligns the nation’s age-counting system with international standards.
The law scraps a centuries-old system that deems South Koreans one year old at birth, counting time in the womb.
The entire population also aged by a year every first day of January instead of their birthdays under the old system.
The switch to age-counting based on birth date took effect on Wednesday.
President Yoon Suk-yeol pushed strongly for the change when he ran for office last year. Non-standardised age-counting methods created “unnecessary social and economic costs”, he said.
For instance, disputes have arisen over age-based insurance pay-outs and determining eligibility for government assistance programmes.
Three in four South Koreans were also in favour of the change, according to a poll by local firm Hankook Research in January 2022.
Lawmakers voted to scrap the traditional counting methods last December.
The legal ages for buying cigarettes and liquor will remain unchanged, as well the legal age for mandatory military service and school admissions.
The old system, which considers the time spent in the mother’s womb as a person’s first year of life, was also used by other East Asian countries, but most have dropped it.
Japan adopted the international standard in 1950 while North Korea followed suit in the 1980s.
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Taiwan to âshoot down and destroyâ mainland Chinese balloons if they pose a risk
Taiwan will shoot down mainland Chinese balloons if they are seen to present a threat, the island’s military has said. The statement from the Taiwanese defence ministry on Tuesday (Jun 27) came as new reports emerged of Beijing’s “spy balloon” programme in the region, with latest findings by the BBCContinue Reading
Cabinet sets Yellow Line ticket prices
The cabinet on Tuesday approved the Yellow Line monorail fares with collection starting on July 3, said government spokesman Anucha Burapachaisri.
According to five drafted Mass Rapid Transit Authority of Thailand (MRTA) regulations, the fares on the 30.4-kilometre-long Yellow Line will start at 15 baht and be capped at 45 baht.
However, since the Yellow Line is interlinked with BTS’s Green Line at Samrong Station, the Airport Rail Link at Hua Mak Station, and the MRTA’s Blue Line at Lat Phrao Station, fares for trips which involve a train transfer will be calculated differently.
Passengers who switch from a line that is also operated by the MRTA won’t have to pay a flag fall charge when they transfer to the Yellow Line. Those who are switching from a line run by other operators will not have to pay a flag fall charge as long as they transfer within 30 minutes.
The MRTA board also has full authority to develop other promotional tickets, such as student tickets, ticket sets, and monthly tickets, as well as other fare discounts and waived promotions that encourage people to use the train.
According to Mr Anucha, other issues relating to fare collection along the Blue and Purple lines will be included in the new MRTA regulations.
The Yellow Line monorail, linking Lat Phrao in Bangkok to Samrong in Samut Prakan, has been up and running for a free trial run since June 3.
Thai chicken dishes rated
Two Thai meals are among the 50 Best Rated Chicken Dishes in the World, as ranked on the TasteAtlas global food mapping site.
TasteAtlas ranked khao mok kai (a Muslim-style dish of chicken and saffron-scented rice) at 38 with 4.3 out of 5 stars, while kai yang (grilled chicken) was at 46 with 4.2 stars.
Jujeh kabab (grilled chicken) from Iran was rated the world’s best chicken dish with 4.8 stars. TasteAtlas said the dish is a staple of Iranian cuisine and has two popular variations, one which uses boneless chicken while the other is prepared with meat left on the bone. The chicken is usually cut into larger chunks, marinated in various marinades and saffron, skewered, and then grilled.
The second-best-rated chicken dish is dak galbi (South Korean stir-fried chicken), followed by murgh makhani or butter chicken from India, tikka (roasted marinated chicken in yoghurt and spices) also from India and ayam goreng (fried marinated chicken) from Indonesia.
Ranked sixth is tsitsila tabaka (pan-fried chicken) from Georgia. This was followed by frango assado com piri piri (roasted chicken) from Portugal, tajine zitoune (stewed chicken) from Algeria, fricasé de pollo (stewed chicken) from Cuba and pollo a la brasa (roasted chicken) from Peru.
No let-up in speaker stalemate
Pheu Thai covets role as more talks loom
Pheu Thai MPs reiterated at their latest meeting that the next House speaker must be a candidate from their party and said the demand would be relayed to the Move Forward Party (MFP) during their talks on Wednesday.
This will also reportedly be among the key issues raised at a planned meeting of the eight prospective coalition parties on Thursday.
Pheu Thai executives and MPs held separate meetings to discuss the matter on Tuesday.
Party leader Cholnan Srikaew said a team of negotiators held talks with the MFP and proposed that the two parties get 14 cabinet seats each, with the MFP entitled to the prime minister’s position and Pheu Thai taking the House speaker role.
The MFP accepted the proposal for consideration but has yet to give a definitive answer, Dr Cholnan said.
He said the party’s executive committee supports the proposal, and it was presented at the meeting of party MPs on Tuesday.
Most of the MPs present agreed Pheu Thai negotiators must stand firm on the proposal at Wednesday’s planned talks, he said.
Deputy Pheu Thai leader Phumtham Wechayachai said most party MPs want the negotiators to thrash the proposal out with the MFP, even though this does not represent the party’s official stance.
Chusak Sirinil, another deputy leader of Pheu Thai, said the House speaker must remain neutral and be acceptable to all parties given the role they play in ensuring House sessions proceed smoothly.
“This is not a battle for the House speaker position. Pheu Thai still recognises the need for the MFP to establish a government with [its leader] Pita Limjaroenrat as prime minister.
“But we believe a House speaker who is a Pheu Thai-chosen candidate would be able to ensure the House meetings go smoothly,” Mr Chusak said.
According to sources at the MFP, the party decided on Tuesday that Padipat Santiphada, a Phitsanulok MP and member of the party’s executive committee, would be nominated for House speaker.
Previously three other candidates were strongly tipped for the post — deputy party leader Natthawut Buaprathum, party-list MP Parit Wacharasindhu, and Teerajchai Phunthumas, a Bangkok MP.
MFP secretary-general Chaithawat Tulathon said earlier the new House speaker should hail from the MFP, which won the most House seats in the May 14 election.
He said the two parties would act in line with the mandate of voters and work together to form a coalition government.
According to Senate Speaker Pornpetch Wichitcholchai, His Majesty the King will preside over the state opening of parliament on July 3, and the House of Representatives will convene on July 4 to select the speaker and two deputies.
Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister and Palang Pracharath Party leader Prawit Wongsuwon met party executives and 40 newly endorsed MPs on Tuesday at the Foundation for the Conservation of Forests in Five Adjoining Provinces at the compound of the 1st Infantry Regiment in Bangkok.
According to sources, Gen Prawit stressed the need for all party MPs not to break ranks and to vote in the same way for both the new House speaker and prime minister.
But the attendees did not discuss who should be nominated for speaker, the sources said.
Akanat Promphan, secretary-general and a party list MP of the United Thai Nation Party (UTN) — of which Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha is the chief strategist — said the party would not vote for the MFP’s candidates for either the House speaker or prime minister.
The UTN will not support any party that seeks to amend Section 112 of the Criminal Code, or the lese majeste law, Mr Akanat said, referring to the MFP.
He said none of the outgoing coalition parties would nominate candidates for House speaker, to the best of his knowledge.
He also denied speculation that Pheu Thai would ask the UTN to vote for its candidate for that position in parliament.
Pheu Thai happy with councillors’ work
Pheu Thai has rated the performance of its Bangkok councillors as satisfactory over the last year as it still licks its wounds after its underwhelming showing in the May 14 general election.
The party celebrated its Bangkok city councillors’ first year in office on Tuesday and insisted it delivered some of its pledged campaign policies.
The city councillor election was held on the same day Chadchart Sittipunt, an independent candidate, was elected Bangkok governor on May 24 last year.
Of the councillor seats up for grabs in 50 districts, Pheu Thai claimed the lion’s share with 21 seats.
It was the first time the councillor and governor elections had been staged since the May 22, 2014 coup that toppled the Pheu Thai-led administration.
The councillor poll victory was initially thought to foreshadow a major victory for Pheu Thai in the capital in the upcoming national election.
However, Pheu Thai was defeated in the general election when it only won a single seat in Bangkok. The Move Forward Party (MFP) captured the rest.
On Tuesday, Phuangphet Chunlaiad, Pheu Thai’s top election supervisor for Bangkok, said the party’s overall performance in the past year was quite satisfactory after its councillors were able to ease or resolve problems faced by city residents. She was also confident the new government being formed with Pheu Thai as a coalition partner would accelerate tackling the city’s woes via smooth coordination with related ministries.
The party has proposed setting up an extraordinary committee to study the Green Line’s overdue payment of around 50 billion baht that the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) owes to Bangkok Mass Transit System Plc (BTSC).
Wirat Meenchainunt, a Pheu Thai councillor for Min Buri district in Bangkok, said Pheu Thai councillors had performed their duties as per the Public Administration of Bangkok Metropolis Act 1985 and followed up on the work progress of City Hall with the council’s 12 working teams.
In the past year, Pheu Thai councillors have made progress on all the party’s five main campaign pledges, though electric train fares have yet to be brought down pending the settlement of a legal dispute, according to Mr Wirat.
Viput Srivaurai, the party’s councillor for Bang Rak district, said the party was driving policies to inject a development fund of 200,000 baht into each community — or about 50 hospitals in 50 districts — and promoting soft power to expand Bangkok’s economic value. About 2,000 communities have participated in the fund.
10m criminal records removed
The Royal Thai Police (RTP) is in the process of cleaning up its criminal records, with about 10 million innocent people set to be removed from its database.
Pol Gen Surachate Hakparn, the deputy national police chief, said on Tuesday that the RTP recently issued a new regulation for its criminal record database to better align it with the principles of human rights.
The new fingerprint regulation was announced on April 27 and enforced on May 27.
It effectively orders the Office of Police Forensic Science’s Criminal Records Division only to retain the records of criminal convicts and remove the fingerprints of those who are accused but later proven innocent, as well as people whose cases have not yet reached a final decision, and those who are given jail terms of one month or less or who receive suspended jail terms.
“Our criminal database has recorded the fingerprints of 13,079,324 people, but with the improved regulation, only 3,708,359 criminals will be kept in our fingerprint database,” Pol Gen Surachate said.
“We have to be fair to the 10 million or so people who were not [ultimately] convicted.”
He said the previous regulation required all police to request the removal of civilians’ names from the Criminal Records Division if they are acquitted, but the process was slow and ineffective.
Pol Gen Surachate described the new rule as a top-down policy that divides the criminal records database into three groups.
The first covers criminal suspects whose cases have not yet been finalised. Their records must not be shown to the public, and they can only be used for police investigations or if the person applies to become a civil servant.
The second group refers to non-criminal offenders who are handed sentences of less than one month in prison, who receive a suspended jail term or a fine, or who committed a crime due to negligence. Their records will only be used for investigations by police or other organisations.
The third covers criminal convicts sentenced to more than a month in jail.
Commentary: No, AI alone doesnât prove the case for universal basic income
WHAT’S REALLY NEEDED
The reality is that jobs and wages likely to remain the mainstay of income for most, at least for the foreseeable future.
Given that AI, like most major innovations before it, will displace and transform a large number of jobs, what is needed most is an effective system for retraining and reskilling. In Singapore, the SkillsFuture ecosystem comprising training providers and grants, performs this role. It is a function that will be increasingly critical for individuals and society in the age of AI.
We will need stronger safety nets for temporary unemployment and perhaps even for income loss during transitions from one job to another. The plan to introduce re-employment support in Singapore is timely.
More broadly, we will need stronger assurance for citizens, particularly in a global city with high living costs. This could take various forms from housing and healthcare subsidies to wage supplements and other forms of transfer payments.
Collectively, they need to add up to a package that gives citizens peace of mind, even as we all must apply ourselves to contribute meaningfully to society in our AI future.
Terence Ho is Associate Professor in Practice at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. He is the author of Refreshing the Singapore System: Recalibrating Socio-Economic Policy for the 21st Century (World Scientific, 2021).
Brian Lim is APAC General Manager of Primer AI. He is also an industry advisor to Singapore University of Technology and Design Social AI Studio, and member of MIT Technology Review Global Insights Panel.