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Enjoy up to 50% OFF when you shop at #GUESS today! Get an additional 10% OFF with purchase of 2 or more items!
Yang Yin, 42, pleaded guilty last month to two counts of criminal breach of trust after admitting to misappropriating S$1.1 million from elderly widow Chung Khin Chun.
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BEVERLY HILLS – Boxing icon Manny Pacquiao issued staunch support for Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday (Sept 8) after the Asian strongman clashed with United States leader Barack Obama over the country’s bloody crime crackdown.
Mr Duterte and Mr Obama have traded blows in a bruising diplomatic bust-up this week, culminating in a stand-off at an Asian summit over the crackdown in the Philippines that has left 3,000 dead.
Pacquiao, elected to the Senate this year and a political ally of Mr Duterte, did not hesitate to wade into the row on Thursday as he spoke to journalists in Beverly Hills.
Asked for his views on the diplomatic furore – which at one point saw Mr Obama cancel a meeting with Mr Duterte after the Filipino leader referred to him as a “son of a whore” – Pacquiao’s position was clear.
“My President apologised for what he said,” Pacquiao said. “My President sometimes says words that people around him don’t like. But I always support my President.”
Asked if he backed Mr Duterte’s anti-crime policies – which have seen an average of 44 people die every day in the Philippines at the hands of police and shadowy death squads – Pacquiao replied: “Of course.” “We want to stop all the drugs in the Philippines. We want to stop that. We’re taking seriously fighting against illegal drugs.”It’s easy to say comments about the Philippines. But to be there and fight illegal drugs is not easy,” added Pacquiao, noting that he backed the restoration of capital punishment in his homeland.
Speaking at a summit in Laos, Mr Obama had urged Mr Duterte to conduct his crime crackdown “the right way” with respect for the rule of law.
The US leader’s remarks came after Mr Duterte had given a fiery address to leaders of the 18-nation East Asia group, including Mr Obama, which descended into a tirade about US military killings in the Philippines when it was an American colony between 1898 and 1946.
TAIPEI – Ai Fukuhara, a Japanese Olympic medalist, and Chiang Hung-chieh, a member of Taiwan’s 2016 Olympic table tennis team, were reportedly married earlier this month.
Japanese table tennis star Ai Fukuhara and Taiwanese table tennis player Chiang Hung-chieh recently tied the knot in Japan, a Japanese newspaper said on Thursday.
Fukuhara, an Olympic medalist, and Chiang, a member of Taiwan’s 2016 Olympic table tennis team, were married earlier this month, Japanese newspaper Nikkan Sports reported on Thursday.
As of press time, the news had yet to be confirmed by either Fukuhara or Chiang, both 27.
Chen Ching-yeh, secretary-general of Taiwan’s Chinese Taipei Table Tennis Association, said the association was not aware of the reported marriage, adding that it is a private matter and not for the association to comment on.
Sources close to the matter told local Chinese-language Apple Daily that Chiang is planning to hold a wedding ceremony in Taipei or Hsinchu before the end of the year.
The reported marriage came five months after the Japan’s No. 1 table tennis star announced on April 6 that she was officially dating Chiang.
Soon after, a Japanese tabloid reported news of the relationship and said they would soon be married. They have reportedly been dating for a year.
Previous reports in August claimed that Japan’s table tennis officials had ordered Fukuhara to delay the marriage, as they wanted her to concentrate on her training and to lead Japan’s women’s table tennis team at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
The reports said that Japanese officials also had objections over the marriage as it would be a “status-gap marriage,” a Japanese term referring to a couple having a significant disparity between their incomes, social status and personal values.
Japan’s table tennis association later refuted the reports about officials urging Fukuhara to delay the marriage as ungrounded.
Fukuhara is Japan’s top female table tennis player and was at one point ranked No. 4 worldwide. She has an estimated annual income of 100 million Japanese yen, while Chiang only has a world ranking of 79 and was eliminated in the first round at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics.
Child prodigy
As the youngest player ever to become a member of the Japanese national team, she is known as “child prodigy” in table tennis and enjoys high popularity in Japan.
She is also famous in China and speaks fluent Mandarin Chinese, as she has been playing table tennis in China since a very young age.
Chiang, a Hsinchu native, now plays for a table tennis team under Taiwan Cooperative Bank Co. He won the men’s doubles gold medal with his partner Huang Sheng-sheng at ITTF Kuwait Open in Feb. 2015.
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HONG KONG – The driver of a van sustained head injuries after his vehicle crashed into a Dragonair plane at the Hong Kong International Airport on Thursday (Sept 8) afternoon.
The rare accident occurred at about 4pm in the afternoon as flight KA691 was departing for Penang.
The Airbus A330 was heading slowly for the runway when the van drove under the plane and straight into one of its engines, reports said.
The service van from China Aircraft Services was stuck under the plane’s engine, Apple Daily reported.
Plane was making its way to runway to take off for Penang before collision with van pic.twitter.com/zzw06gIkNB
— Brittyn Clennett (@BrittynClennett) September 8, 2016
The driver, a man, suffered injuries in the head and shoulder. He was conscious when rescued from the vehicle and taken to North Lantau Hospital, police told the South China Morning Post.
In video footage of the crash, the van appeared to zoom straight at the plane, which was inching out from the apron where it was parked.
The vehicle made a sharp turn to the right before crashing into the aircraft.
Five fire engines and two ambulances were called to the scene.
Passengers were asked to disembark and the flight finally departed at 7.44pm according to Hong Kong International Airport’s website.
Other flight departures were not seriously affected, reports said.
This article was first published on September 8, 2016.
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Lock down 21 January. The Singapore Laneway Festival is back for the seventh year – and it’s the perfect time to gambol all day and party till midnight.
Check out these #LanewaySG 2017 lineup predictions! Who’s on your list?
Tickets are available through SISTIC at http://www.sistic.com.sg/events/lane0117 now!
We’re just a week away from their highly-anticipated announcement, so here’s who we think will be revealed as part of Laneway Festival Singapore’s class of 2017 in Singapore.
Out of all our potential picks, you can also vote on who you’d like to see at Gardens by the Bay come January 21st!
Who else do you think will be coming down?
TORONTO – Double Oscar-winner Denzel Washington and a motley band of gunslingers opened the Toronto film festival Thursday, blazing trails in a much-anticipated remake of the 1960 Western “The Magnificent Seven.”
The film festival, which runs through September 18, is the largest in North America and has become a launchpad for Oscar-conscious studios and distributors, attracting hundreds of filmmakers and actors to the red carpet in Canada’s largest city.
Nearly 400 feature and short films from 83 countries will be screened at the festival.
Director Antoine Fuqua’s film is a reimagining of the Western classic that starred Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson – which in turn was a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s Japanese-language epic “Seven Samurai.”
In the latest version, Washington plays Sam Chisolm, a bounty hunter who leads his crew to liberate a Wild West town from the clutches of an evil industrialist played by Peter Sarsgaard (who also appears at the festival in “Jackie”) and his private army of henchmen.
While initially motivated by cash offered by townswoman Emma Cullen (played by Haley Bennett), these swashbucklers end up taking a principled stand against greed and hegemony to save the fledgling town.
Fuqua told AFP during post-production in April that he hoped to dispel a mythology of the American frontier propagated by Hollywood, that it was populated by ranchers, lawmen and outlaws battling for money or land on behalf of White America.
The real Wild West’s racial makeup was actually a melting pot of Europeans, Chinese, Mexicans, Native Americans and blacks.
“Westerns change for the times they’re in,” Fuqua told a press conference ahead of the gala screening of the film in Toronto.
“We made our film based on the world we live in right now,” he said.
“If we were sticking to just one way of doing something, all Westerns would be all white guys looking like John Wayne.”
The action-packed film also stars Chris Pratt as a card shark and explosives enthusiast, Ethan Hawke (also at the festival in “Maudie”) as a sharpshooter, Vincent D’Onofrio in the role of a tracker, and South Korea’s Lee Byung-hun as a knife-throwing assassin.
Washington and Fuqua have collaborated before, notably with Hawke on “Training Day,” which also premiered at the Toronto festival and went on to earn Washington a best actor Oscar in 2001 for his performance as a rogue cop in Los Angeles. (Washington earned his first Oscar in 1990 for his supporting role in the civil war drama “Glory.”)
The two also paired up in 2014 for Fuqua’s adaptation of the 1980s television series “The Equalizer,” about a loner who dispenses justice from the barrel of a gun. The film earned mediocre reviews and nearly US$200 million at the box office.
Pressed about the subtle racial complexity of the film in a time of racial tension in America, Fuqua quipped: “I just wanted to see Denzel Washington on a horse… that would be an event.”
More seriously, he added: “Denzel walks into a room, the room stops. Clint Eastwood walks into a room, the room stops. Is it because he’s a gunslinger or the colour of his skin? We’ll let the audience decide.”
Toronto film festival co-director Piers Handling said of the film: “It’s an interesting metaphor for what’s going on in America right now.”
This year’s Toronto film festival also shines a spotlight on American politics, youth radicalization, racism, feminism and alien arrivals.
Films being positioned for accolades include the new Denis Villeneuve sci-fi movie “Arrival,” and Oliver Stone’s “Snowden” about former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden’s enormous 2013 leak revealing the extent of government snooping on private data.
Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone’s performances as a jazz musician and an aspiring actress in the bewitching musical “La La Land,” which opened the Venice film festival, has also stirred up a frenzy.
“American Pastoral,” Ewan McGregor’s directorial debut looking back at an ideal family torn by the upheavals of the 1960s, is generating tremendous buzz, as is “Lion” – the true story of a boy separated from his family who goes searching for home 25 years on.
BEVERLY HILLS, United States – Manny Pacquiao said Thursday he would welcome the opportunity of a second fight against Floyd Mayweather but questioned whether the American could be lured out of retirement for a money-spinning rematch.
Speaking at a press conference to launch his comeback fight against Jessie Vargas in Las Vegas on November 5, the Filipino boxer said he would be ready to fight Mayweather again if there was a demand for it from fans.
“If the fans want it, and he wants it, then I’m open to it. I’m open to any fight,” Pacquiao told reporters in Beverly Hills.
However Pacquiao – who abruptly ended his own retirement in August following what was billed as his farewell bout against Timothy Bradley in April – said he suspected only money would tempt Mayweather to get back in the ring.
“You know in his heart, he doesn’t have concern for the fans. His only concern is to make money,” former welterweight world champion Pacquiao said.
“My concern is not only to make money but how I entertain the people, how I entertain the fans,” he added.
Mayweather outpointed Pacquiao in a unanimous decision victory in their May 2015 superfight, the highest-grossing bout in history which grossed more than $500 million according to most estimates.
Pacquiao, who later said he was troubled by a shoulder injury during the fight, insisted however that he believes he won a battle which largely failed to live up to its billing.
“I respect and honour the decision of the judges in the Mayweather fight. But if you ask me, I tell you frankly, in my heart, I believe I won that fight,” said Pacquiao.
SEOUL – A seismic tremor was recorded in an area around North Korea’s known nuclear site on Friday, and was suspected to be the fifth nuclear test by the isolated nation, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said.
US, European and Chinese seismological agencies reported that the tremor was recorded at 0030 GMT at surface level.
A South Korean government official said it was a suspected nuclear test, Yonhap reported, and Seoul called for an emergency National Security Council meeting.
The China Earthquake Networks Center said the tremor was a suspected explosion.
Japan’s top government spokesman also said there was a high possibility the seismic event indicated that North Korea had conducted a nuclear test and that relevant ministries had been instructed to gather information.
Two months ago, US-based 38 North, a North Korea monitoring project, said satellite images showed a high level of activity at North Korea’s nuclear test site, called Punggye-ri.
Speculation has intensified that North Korea may conduct a fifth nuclear test after the United States blacklisted its leader, Kim Jong Un, on July 6 for human rights abuses.
North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test in January, resulting in tough new UN sanctions. It has conducted a series of missile tests this year, including a submarine-launched missile.
The January test was recorded with a magnitude of 5.1, according to the US Geological Survey.
North Korea has been under UN Security Council sanctions since it first tested an atomic device in 2006.
Aljunied GRC MP Chen Show Mao has stepped down as the Workers’ Party’s (WP’s) treasurer, just three months after starting a second term in the post he had held since 2014.
He challenged WP chief Low Thia Khiang for the post of secretary-general at the Central Executive Council (CEC) election in May and lost, but was persuaded to continue as treasurer.
Sources said he reluctantly agreed to remain but would have preferred to hand over, given his unsuccessful bid for the top WP post. Mr Low confirmed that Mr Chen had resigned as treasurer when contacted by The Straits Times.
Mr Chen, who quit at a CEC meeting on Tuesday, is still a council member.
Deputy treasurer and Non-Constituency MP Dennis Tan has succeeded Mr Chen, and former Punggol East MP Lee Li Lian, a council member, is now deputy treasurer.
Mr Low declined to reveal what transpired at Tuesday’s CEC meeting when he was asked about Mr Chen’s reasons for stepping down as treasurer and whether CEC members tried to persuade him to stay.
“I am only sticking with the facts that Mr Chen is no longer treasurer. As for his reasons for stepping down, it’s more appropriate that you ask him,” he said on Wednesday after his Meet-the-People Session in Hougang Avenue 6.
When contacted yesterday, Mr Chen declined to elaborate on his decision, saying simply that he has “little comment to add on the subject”.
But a party insider said the resignation had nothing to do with his leadership challenge.
Mr Low, who had never faced a contest since becoming secretary-general in 2001, retained the post in May with 61 votes to Mr Chen’s 45.
ziliang@sph.com.sg
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