A 31-year-old man died on Wednesday (April 19) after being hit by other men at a carpark in the Clarke Quay area last Sunday (April 16).
The man, identified by Shin Min Daily News in a report on Thursday (April 20) as Mr Tan Jun Jie, was taken to Singapore General Hospital.
The incident occurred at a carpark at 3E River Valley Road on Sunday, Shin Min reported.
The late Mr Tan’s mother, a 52-year-old housewife who gave her name as Madam Huang Cuili, told Shin Min that her son suffered from bleeding in the brain after the incident and was in a serious condition.
He died in hospital at about 9.58am on Wednesday, the police said in a news release on Thursday.
The police have arrested nine suspects, aged between 20 and 30, in relation to the case.
Three have been charged for rioting with a deadly weapon, while three more will be charged for the same offence.
If found guilty, they can be jailed for up to 10 years and caned.
Investigations against the last three suspects are ongoing.
This article was first published on April 20, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
Hai Sing Catholic School has taken “appropriate disciplinary measures” and carried out counselling after two of its secondary school students were shown in a fight in a video clip posted online.
In the clip first published by citizen journalism site Stomp, a boy is shown raining punches on another, before getting him in a headlock on the ground.
The incident happened at the school canteen at about 3pm on Monday (April 17), Shin Min Daily News reported on Thursday (April 20).
The boy who was being beaten up reportedly called the police after the incident.
A spokesman for Hai Sing Catholic School told The Straits Times on Thursday (April 20) that the school ” has addressed the matter with appropriate disciplinary measures and counselled the students involved”.
“We have also been working with their parents to help our students learn from the incident,” said the spokesman.
“As the matter is currently under police investigation, we are unable to comment further.”
This article was first published on April 20, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
For many professional mixed martial artists in Asia, making it to ONE Championship is a golden ticket to the global stage. Undefeated strawweight Jeremy “The Jaguar” Miado is the latest warrior to get that ticket, and is the next one to test his fortunes against the best in the business.
The 24-year-old Filipino will make his ONE promotional debut at ONE: KINGS OF DESTINY this coming Friday Night, 21 April. Opposing him inside the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila, Philippines, will be fellow countryman, Robin “The Ilonggo” Catalan, in an eagerly-anticipated strawweight affair.
Miado expects this bout, his seventh professional contest, to be a coming out party of sorts.
“This is my big opportunity to show people who I am, and to introduce my name to ONE,” he states. ”I am very proud they are giving me this chance. For now, I will do my best.”
Despite his newcomer status, Miado has a lengthy history with combat sports. At the age of 20, he took up boxing to follow in the footsteps of his childhood idol, Manny Pacquiao. On the Bicol Region’s amateur circuit, he amassed an impressive 32-2 record.
After 34 amateur fights, the Filipino saw his professional boxing prospects dry up, due to lack of promotional opportunities. As a result, he made a major change in his life two years ago — he moved to Manila to train at Sucuri MMA and try his hand at MMA.
So far, it turned out to be the best move he could have made. After all, success has quickly followed him.
Ever since making his debut in January 2016, “The Jaguar” has mauled all six of the opponents lined up across from him, including a first-round TKO and a second-round submission victory. Miado has also proven to be a durable fighter, with his other four victories coming by way of decision. He has also claimed some MMA gold, having won the Blaze FC Strawweight strap.
While Miado looks to make an impression with ONE fans and earn another win, his opponent will have entirely different motivations entering the contest. At 5-2, Catalan is also looking for his first victory inside the ONE cage. He last competed at ONE: UNION OF WARRIORS in March 2016, where he suffered a first-round submission loss in his promotional debut. The 26-year-old is ready to put that memory far behind him.
Making “The Ilonggo” particularly dangerous is his ability to finish, as all but one of his wins have come by way of TKO or submission. That is something Miado is extra cautious of.
“My opponent is a good wrestler and striker, but I am focusing on my ground [skills]. I am a striker, but I know what his skills are,” he says. “I think his game plan will be to use his wrestling to take me down. I am practicing my sprawl and wrestling. That is my expectation.”
With a professional career still in its infancy, Miado is a big dreamer. In addition to wanting to blaze an MMA trail that rivals his boxing idol, there are also goals of becoming a world champion. The first step to accomplishing both will be to get his hand raised on Friday Night.
“My goal is to be a ONE champion. I want to be at the top here,” he says. “Eduard Folayang was my idol when I started MMA, and now he is the ONE Lightweight World Champion, so it shows I can do it. I will be going for the belt. Soon, people will know who I am.”
“The Jaguar” has his golden ticket. At ONE: KINGS OF DESTINY, he plans to make the most of it.
Over the years, a slew of wide-ranging measures have been introduced to clamp down on smoking in Singapore.
While smoking among adults here fell from 18.3 per cent in 1992 to 13.3 per cent in 2013, the rate has since stagnated at that level.
Also, smokers are starting younger.
The average age at which they first lit up was 16 years old in 2013, down from 17 in 2001.
To combat youth smoking, several measures can be considered, some of which have been affirmed in overseas studies. Here is a quick look at them:
1. LIMITING TOBACCO SALES POINTS
Cigarette packets displayed on a shelf behind the counter in a minimart.Photo: The Straits Times
This is an emerging frontier in tobacco control.
The density and proximity of tobacco sellers in a given area, such as near schools, have been shown in studies to affect adolescent lifetime smoking and experimental smoking.
Some parts of the United States have already started to draft laws or proposals requiring a minimum distance between tobacco shops, and to cap the number of such retailers in a specific area.
In Singapore, there are more than 4,700 tobacco retail outlets as of last year – more than 40 times the number of McDonald’s restaurants islandwide.
2. A NOT-FOR-PROFIT MODEL
The Cathedral square in Oslo, Norway. In Norway, only a government-run chain sells alcoholic beverages, and it is not-for-profit. Photo: Reuters
The Cathedral square in Oslo, Norway.
In Norway, only a government-run chain sells alcoholic beverages, and it is not-for-profit. PHOTO: REUTERS
Taking a leaf out of how alcohol sales are managed in Nordic nations such as Sweden and Iceland, the retail set-up of tobacco shops could go down the same route.
In those countries, only a government-run chain sells alcoholic beverages, and it is not-for-profit.
Strict rules come with their sales, for example, underaged teenagers cannot enter the alcohol shop and even those lingering outside may get questioned.
As a result, alcohol consumption has declined significantly in both countries in the past decades.
3. COHORT BAN
A cohort ban would involve banning people of a certain age onwards from smoking.Photo: The Straits Times
This involves banning people born after a certain year, such as 2000, from smoking.
Generally referred to as the “Tobacco Free Generation” movement, it first surfaced in Singapore in 2010, backed by doctors, and has since gained some traction in other countries.
It is described as an “end-game” strategy to stamp out smoking once and for all, starting with the next generation.
But some ministers, including those in Singapore, had voiced doubts that it can be implemented effectively and in a practical manner.
The issue of undemocratic age discrimation has also been brought up in other quarters.
4. TOTAL BAN
A Bhutanese girl walks with her brother along a road in Paro. Photo: AFP
Bhutan is the only country in the world today to completely prohibit tobacco sales, cultivation and manufacturing in 2004.
It may appear to be a straightforward measure – much akin to banning chewing gum in Singapore – but smoking, being addictive, poses more complex problems.
In Bhutan’s case, it was a blanket ban that is meant to target people of all ages.
Despite that, more teenagers were found to be smoking in 2013, compared to 2006.
Two cases of locally-transmitted Zika virus infection here have been confirmed in the Glasgow Road area, the National Environment Agency (NEA) said in a statement yesterday.
Both cases are residents of the area.
The new cluster was notified yesterday, and vector control operations as well as outreach efforts have begun in the area, the statement said.
The agency added that it had been conducting preventive inspections in the area.
An additional case has also been confirmed at Poh Huat Road West (Nouvelle Park), thus expanding the original cluster at Poh Huat Terrace and Terrasse Lane, which was first reported on April 11.
The number of cases reported at the Flower Road/Hendry Close cluster remains at two.
An NEA spokesman said: “Residents and stakeholders are urged to maintain vigilance and continue to eliminate mosquito breeding habitats, as there could still be asymptomatic or mild, undiagnosed cases which might result in further transmission of the virus if there are mosquitoes in the vicinity.”
NEA has been conducting preventive inspections in the vicinity even before the cluster at Glasgow Road area was notified to detect and destroy any potential mosquito breeding habitats, the statement added.
Updated information on Zika and current clusters can be obtained from www.nea.gov.sg/zika and www.nea.gov.sg/zika-clusters.
This article was first published on April 21, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
Residents of a village in Surat Thani’s Phanom district believe they have found a footprint of the Lord Buddha preserved in limestone on a mountaintop.
Sathaporn Saripat, head of Moo 1 village in Tambon Klong Sok, said the footprint was noticed recently while he was leading a survey of watershed forests as part of a plan to develop community tourism.
He said the impression left in the soft stone near a cliff on Khao Phru Ching Mountain resembles an oversized human footprint. It is 10 to 12 inches long, four or five inches wide and three inches deep.
Sathaporn said he had asked government officials to examine the find. If they say it qualifies to be regarded as an example of the Buddha’s footprint, he said, the villagers will promote the location as a pilgrimage and tourism destination.
Asia has thousands of “natural” Buddha footprints imbedded in rock, chiefly in Japan and Sri Lanka, usually appreciated for their symbolic value rather than as literal relics. The most revered example in Thailand is at Wat Phra Phutthabat in Saraburi.
Robin Catalan may not have known it as a child, but he was destined to become a mixed martial artist.
The man known as “The Ilonggo” comes from a family full of wushu fighters, including older brothers and fellow ONE Championship talents Rene, Ruel, and Rabin, so it was only a matter of time before he would follow their lead.
“Watching my brothers fight made me fall in love with martial arts training,” he says. “I use [the pressure that comes with training with them] to challenge myself, as I strive to achieve what they have already accomplished.”
That served as his initial motivation to get involved in the martial arts, but Catalan did not dismiss other athletics during his childhood. In fact, he participated in a variety of different physical activities, including basketball and track, but there was just something about martial arts that made sense to him.
“The main difference for me is that the martial arts skills I have learned will stay with me for life,” he says. “These are practical skills that I can use and apply in real life.”
Catalan has participated in boxing, wushu, and Muay Thai competition, and he found a tremendous amount of success in the latter when he claimed the IFMA World Muay Thai Championship. A move into MMA was the next logical step.
In 2012, he made his professional debut, scoring a TKO at a local show. About four years later, he made his way to ONE, and has done so all while training alongside his older brothers at their Catalan Fighting System gym in Makati.
Not only has this provided the 26-year-old with an opportunity to train alongside his older brothers, but it has allowed them to further nurture their relationship as siblings.
“It is important, because training along with family members gives us a chance to bond,” Robin explains. “It is also very helpful since they help correct my mistakes.”
That family vibe has also set the tone for the entire business, as other gym members feel like relatives, too.
“Our team is very family-oriented, and we have a strong bond between each one of us,” he continues. “We are all working together to achieve the same goal.”
Catalan’s immediate goal is on Friday Night, 21 April, when he meets promotional newcomer Jeremy Miado at ONE: KINGS OF DESTINY, which airs live from the Mall Of Asia Arena in Manila. “The Ilonggo” has not competed in over a year due to a few nagging injuries, so he is extra motivated to return in impressive fashion.
While he had those nagging injuries, he leaned on his friends and family for support. It is their support, and their shared passion for the martial arts, which has been the difference in Catalan’s life.
“I have learned the importance of discipline, of how to respect others,” Catalan says. “I have also learned to never forget where I have come from.”
The National Parks Board (NParks) said it has been working with Hash House Harriers to reduce the practice of marking out running routes, after a “hashing” group left flour at Woodleigh MRT Station on Tuesday (April 18) and sparked a security scare.
Responding to queries from The Straits Times, Mr Wong Tuan Wah, group director of conservation at NParks, said NParks has been working with Hash House Harriers to “reduce the need of using markers when they run in NParks-managed areas”.
ST understands that this is not in reaction to Tuesday’s incident, but instead is part of ongoing discussions.
Advance runners from Hash House Harriers groups mark out a trail using flour, chalk or toilet paper so that the runners after them can pick up the “clues” and follow the route.
One man was arrested and two others are assisting with police investigations after flour left at various parts of Woodleigh MRT Station on Tuesday (April 18) led to the station being closed for more than three hours and police and Singapore Civil Defence Officers being deployed.
“NParks regularly meets up with Hash House Harriers (HHH) to advise on the rules regarding ‘hash’ running in our managed areas,” said Mr Wong on Thursday.
He added that chalk and flour are prohibited in NParks-managed areas as the substances “are more difficult to clean up, might seep into and cause damage to the environment”.
If consumed, these substances might also have detrimental effects on wildlife.
“Only toilet or tissue paper are allowed to be used as markings, and they must be cleaned up immediately after the event,” he said.
“If they are not cleaned up, enforcement action could be taken.”
Under the Parks and Tree Act, those who litter in parks and nature reserves can be fined up to $5,000.
Mr Ken Ong, chairman of the Hash House Harriers, Singapore, told ST that using toilet paper to mark trails within NParks areas was an agreement reached between NParks and the hashing community.
“The condition imposed is that we will have to remove all traces of the paper latest by noon the next day,” he said.
“Usually, we have one of the members setting the trail pick up all the paper as soon as the last runner has gone by, within the very same day.”
When asked about Tuesday’s incident, where runners from the Seletar Hash House Harriers sprinkled flour at Woodleigh MRT Station, Mr Ong said: “Those men from Tuesday Hash were setting a trail for their fellow members, marking it with flour.”
He added that his group, which runs on Mondays, “almost always set our runs in non-urban areas, thereby avoiding sensitive locations like MRT stations and such”.
In a statement issued on Wednesday (April 19), the Seletar Hash House Harriers apologised to the public and authorities for the alarm and inconvenience caused.
They explained that three of its members had chosen to use the MRT underpass for members to go from Bidadari towards Woodleigh Close “as this provided the safest route to cross Upper Serangoon Road”.
This article was first published on April 20, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
A child in China who jumped from about 10 storeys using an umbrella as a parachute miraculously survived, reports said.
The seven-year-old jumped holding an umbrella after seeing a cartoon character parachute from a window doing the same thing.
While his apartment in Suzhou, Jiangsu is on the fifth floor, the height is equivalent to 10 storeys as the residences are penthouse duplexes, Chinese reports said.
But it was not the umbrella that saved him. His fall was broken by a power line, witnesses said.
His injuries were serious, but were no longer life threatening after emergency surgery, his doctor said.
He understood from relatives that the boy, who was not named, was watching a cartoon where a character used an umbrella as a parachute to jump from a height.
The boy was caught on a power line about two storeys from the ground before falling to the ground.
There have been other cases where children in China have hurt themselves while trying to imitate cartoon characters, Sohu.com said.
A similar incident was reported in Urumqi in Xinjiang last month when a five-year-old girl used an umbrella to jump from the 11th floor.
She landed on a platform on the fourth floor and was taken to the intensive care unit.
Last December, a girl tried to climb down the water pipes outside her apartment and fell five storeys. She was badly hurt.
She had missed her mother and wanted to go and look for her, but the front door was locked. She got the idea of climbing down the pipes from cartoons she had watched, the report said.
In another case in March last year, a 10-year-old girl used a saw on her five-year-old sister’s face after seeing it in a cartoon on television. The younger child was cut in the nose and face.
This article was first published on April 20, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
Cambodian athlete Chan Rothana might enter the cage at ONE: KINGS OF DESTINY on Friday Night, 21 April, with just six professional MMA bouts to his credit, but he has spent a lifetime fighting.
Whether it is war, poverty, or the martial arts he inherited from his father, fighting is all he has known, so another battle at the Mall of Asia Arena in Manila will not faze him.
The traditional art of Yutakhun Khom has been in his family for generations, but it was endangered by a political regime that sought to banish it. Chan learned the skills in order to fight, so it could be kept alive in the most effective way — competition success. Using these skills in over a hundred kun khmer bouts, he already had a wealth of experience before first stepping into the MMA cage.
“Regarding the standup techniques, my experience in kun khmer helped me to be efficient in MMA,” he reveals. “For the ground technique, we have some wrestling in Yutakhun Khom. [It is] not as elaborate as in BJJ, but I had some basics when I first fought in MMA.”
After just one bout, the Phnom Penh fighter inked a deal with ONE Championship, and he has been entertaining fans and displaying his martial heritage ever since.
This time out, at ONE: KINGS OF DESTINY, he meets China’s Xie Bin, an aggressive 19-year-old from Tianjin Top Team who has strong wrestling and extensive BJJ training. The teen holds a 2-2 record, and won his last fight against Mario Satya Wirawan at the promotion’s last Manila show, ONE: AGE OF DOMINATION, in December.
“Xie Bin a young, talented fighter,” the Phnom Penh native says. “He is well-rounded in all aspects of the game, and it will not be an easy fight for both of us.”
Chan, 4-2, opts to train at Tiger Muay Thai in Phuket, Thailand, for his ONE battles, which allows him to focus on his own preparation, rather than coaching others at his home gym of Selapak.
Although he sees his future as passing on his knowledge to the next generation, right now he still has the hunger and drive to succeed, and show that Yutakhun Khom is not just a thing of the past.
“If I stay in Cambodia, I cannot train 100 per cent,” he explains. “International training camps offer a very large range of quality sparring partners in all MMA aspects. I am very lucky to be able to go to a training camp, thanks to the FightForCambodia.org Foundation, which finances it.”
With his mind on his own performance, Chan knows he still has what it takes to move up the ranks in ONE. Plus, he is determined not to be a stepping stone for Xie.
“He wants to show he can beat an experienced guy like me,” Chan stated. “On my side, I want to to make a statement about my future. I want to go as far as possible and get a chance [to fight] for the belt.”
Chan is motivated not only to climb the divisional ladder, but to get back in the win column after tasting defeat at the hands of Ma Hao Bin in his last promotional outing at ONE: HEROES OF THE WORLD last August.
“Something went wrong during my preparation, and I was not 100 per cent. [I was] getting exhausted at the end of round one,” he remembers. “Ma won the decision, but I know I should have won that fight. That is life, and I learn. Now I am preparing very well for this fight, with the help of my team.”
If that was not motivation enough, Chan has even more at stake. For him, competition provides a better life for his family, and showcases his nation to the world. Most importantly, it keeps his national traditions alive, and helps to spread the art of Yutakhun Khom. Victory is the most efficient medium.
“My dad is one of the two Grand Masters alive [in Yutakhun Khom], so I need to succeed for him and make him proud.”
