The man’s charge sheets state he pinned his mother to the bed and molested her and raped her “despite her pleas for him to stop”, Deputy Public Prosecutor Sellakumaran Sellamuthoo told the court.
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Man on trial for raping his mother
No S’poreans injured in Saudi terrorist attacks: MFA
SINGAPORE – The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has said that there are “no reports of any Singaporeans injured or directly affected” by the suicide bombings in Saudi Arabia on Monday (July 4).
Four bombs were set off in three locations in Saudi Arabia,…
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'King of Selfies' Chow Yun Fat lives up to his title at Cold War 2 news conference
The 61-year-old superstar actor also cracked jokes about his co-stars Aaron Kwok and Eddie Peng at the press conference.
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Singapore leaders condemn recent terror attacks as "senseless" and against Islam
SINGAPORE – The recent spate of bomb blasts in a number of Muslim-majority countries were against Islam and do not represent Muslims around the world, Minister Yaacob Ibrahim has said.
In a Facebook post on Tuesday (July 5), the Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs strongly condemned the recent series attacks, describing them as “senseless acts of terror” which ignore the sanctity of human life.
“The attacks on Muslim majority cities and countries, claiming lives of Muslims during the Holy month of Ramadan, confirm that their heinous acts are against Islam and do not represent Muslims all over the world,” he wrote.
In the post, Mr Yaacob expressed shock and sadness at the recent incidents in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Turkey, Bangladesh and Indonesia.
In Saudi Arabia, at least seven people were killed in three suicide bomb attacks, including one at the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, which is considered one of Islam’s holiest sites. These attacks came just days after gunmen stormed a cafe in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka on Friday (July 1), taking diners hostage and killing 20 of them.
Malaysia’s police chief, Khalid Abu Bakar, also confirmed on Monday (July 4) that the grenade attack on a nightclub in Puchong, near Kuala Lumpur, was the first successful attack by the Islamic State group on Malaysian soil.
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AFP, Reuters
Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam also took to Facebook to express his thoughts on the recent attacks, where he also highlighted the recent suicide truck bomb attack which left more than 200 dead in attack.
“The holy month of Ramadan is meant to be a period of charity and compassion. Instead, ISIS sees Ramadan as an opportune time to take away innocent lives, declaring that they would make it ‘a month of pain for infidels everywhere.’ Even Muslims have not been spared. Our hearts and prayers are with the victims and their loved ones,” he wrote.
In another Facebook post, Singapore’s top Muslim leader, Mufti Mohamed Fatris Bakaram, said that the attacks were committed by “misguided people” who blemished the religion of Islam.
“The fact that the attacks took place during Ramadan … show clearly these attacks have nothing to do with Islam. These are outrageous and evil attacks against humanity,” he wrote.
In his post, he also pointed out instances in Singapore of Muslims coming together to help others, as well as Singaporeans from other religious faiths joining in communal iftars (breaking of fast) held at mosques.
“This is the embodiment of the true teachings of Islam and all religions. This is the spirit that we should continue to harness that can help further strengthen us as a society,” he urged.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has issued a travel notice reminding Singaporeans to remain vigilant when travelling overseas and register with the foreign ministry so that they are contactable should a need arise.
MFA also called on travellers to stay current with media coverage of local events and be aware of their surroundings at all times. “Factor recent developments into your travel plans and activities.”
The ministry also reminded Singaporeans to take precautions to ensure their personal safety, follow the instructions of local authorities in an emergency, and to stay in touch with family and friends.
Singaporeans overseas who do require emergency consular assistance can call the MFA duty office at +65 63798800/8855, email mfa_duty_officer@mfa.gov.sg, or get in touch with the nearest Singapore overseas mission.
Gunmen take hostages in Dhaka cafe
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Reuters, AFP
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AFP, The Star/ANN, NSTP
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Tuesday, July 5, 2016 – 18:19
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Superstars Chow Yun-fat and Aaron Kwok in town to promote Cold War 2
SINGAPORE – Hong Kong superstar Chow Yun-fat wants to prove he is the undisputed king of selfies.
Taking his title very seriously, the acting veteran declared he could snap a selfie with every person present in the press conference in under three minutes. The 61-year-old then bounded off the stage to prove it, making his way round the room to snap selfies with stunned journalists.
Chow’s famously easygoing manner was on full display as he teased his co-stars Aaron Kwok and Eddie Peng, at a press conference on Tuesday (July 5) at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre to promote their new movie Cold War 2.
Superstars Chow Yun-fat, Aaron Kwok and Eddie Peng in Singapore to promote Cold War 2
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AsiaOne, Encore Films
The highly anticipated sequel to the 2012 box-office smash Cold War, which grossed over US$50 million (S$68 million) worldwide, sees an all-star cast reprising their roles, with superstar Chow joining them.
The police action-thriller centres on the feud between Kwok’s character Sean Lau, the newly appointed chief police commissioner, and Tony Leung Ka-fai’s character, Waise Lee, the former deputy commissioner of police.
Peng reprises his role as the son of Leung. He plays an intelligent and manipulative villain, working with powerful forces to take down Kwok’s character.
Chow lends even more star power to the already stellar cast with his character Osward Kan, an influential senior counsel in the Hong Kong government.
The chemistry between Chow and his co-stars Aaron Kwok and Eddie Peng was overwhelmingly evident as they bantered among themselves and shared jokes about what happened on set.
Taiwanese actor Peng, 34, recounted how Kwok was so engrossed in his role that he “rough handled” him during a scene.
In the scene, Peng is handcuffed with his hands behind his back, while Kwok shoves him into the backseat of a police car.
“He pushed me against the car door, then threw me into the backseat, and nearly slammed the door on my feet,” says Peng in Mandarin.
Kwok, 50, breaks into laughter, explaining that the director had not yelled cut yet so he had to continue acting. Caught up in the scene, he decided to shove Peng into the police car, forgetting that Peng’s hands were bound. Peng landed face first into the backseat of the car.
“I feel like he did it on purpose, now that I think about it,” Chow interrupts, with mock seriousness, as his co-stars burst into laughter.
Cold War 2 opens on Friday (July 8).
xiuhuil@sph.com.sg
Chow Yun Fat continues to charm S’pore
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Instagram, Internet screengrabs, Shin Min Daily News
HK singer Aaron Kwok returns after 3-year absence
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Marina Bay Sands, AsiaOne
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Tuesday, July 5, 2016 – 18:26
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Chow Yun-fat claims he is 'selfie king', goes around taking photos with stunned audience
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Bangladesh hunts for six accomplices of cafe attackers
DHAKA – Bangladeshi police hunted on Tuesday for six members of a domestic Islamist group they suspect helped gunmen attack a Dhaka cafe, as officials began questioning families of the militants for clues as to what turned them into killers.
Gunmen stormed the restaurant in Dhaka’s diplomatic zone late on Friday and killed 20 people, most of them foreigners from Italy, Japan, India and the United States, in an assault claimed by Islamic State.
It was one of the deadliest militant attacks in Bangladesh, where Islamic State and al Qaeda have claimed a series of killings of liberals and members of religious minorities in the past year. The government has dismissed those claims, as it did the Islamic State claim of responsibility for Friday’s attack.
Police believe that Jama’atul Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), an outlawed domestic group that has pledged allegiance to Islamic State, played a significant role in organising the band of privileged, educated young men who carried out the attack.
“Six members of JMB have been shown as accused in the case. We are trying to arrest them because they could be the mastermind,” Saiful Islam, a senior police officer involved in the investigation, told Reuters.
Gunmen take hostages in Dhaka cafe
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Reuters, AFP
The JMB has been accused of involvement in many of the killings over the past year and Islam said police were interrogating more than 130 of its members already in custody in the hope of gleaning clues.
“We don’t know who is the mastermind behind the attack. We just know that these boys were guided to launch an attack on the restaurant,” he said.
“There is no evidence of foreign links.”
Police killed six of the attackers when they regained control of the restaurant, 12-hours after the attack began.
Two other suspects are in hospital.
MAJOR ESCALATION
Police on Tuesday also registered a case against five of the six dead attackers, Islam said, which they need to do to begin formal investigations which includes questioning of their families.
The five named in the case filing were Nibras Islam, Rohan Imtiaz, Meer Saameh Mubasheer, Khairul Islam and Shafiqul Islam.
It was not immediately clear why the sixth man had not been named in the police report.
The attack marked a major escalation in the scale and brutality of violence aimed at forcing strict Islamic rule in Bangladesh, whose 160 million people are mostly Muslim.
It has shocked the country, as have details emerging about the well-to-do lives of some of the gunmen, five of whom appeared in photographs posted on an Islamic State website, clutching guns and grinning in front of a black flag.
At least three of the gunmen were from wealthy, liberal families who had attended elite Dhaka schools, in contrast to the traditional Bangladeshi militant’s path from poverty and a madrassa education to violence.
Three of the attackers had been missing since the beginning of the year, police have said, and little is known about where they went.
Two had attended a private university in Malaysia, one of whom, Nibras Islam, was not particularly religious, according to a student who played football with him at a private college in Dhaka between 2009 and 2011.
“We are in touch with investigators in Malaysia and they are sharing all the information but as of now we have not found any links with international militant groups,” Islam said.
One of the dead gunmen was from a poor family and had studied at a madrassa and another hailed from a lower-middle class background, said another senior police official who declined to be identified.
Police said on Saturday five of the attackers were known to authorities and they had previously tried to arrest them. But police have since said little about when and how the men came to be radicalised.
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Tuesday, July 5, 2016 – 18:21
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SMRT found cracks in 26 trains delivered by China manufacturer
SINGAPORE – Twenty-six of 35 new trains delivered by a China manufacturer in 2013 were found with cracks, SMRT Corporation has revealed, after an investigative report emerged showing photos and video footage alleging that the defective trains had been…
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Legend of Tarzan swings and misses
The latest adaptation of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ colonialist story proves it cannot be given a modern overhaul, writes critic Sam Adams.
The Legend of Tarzan, the latest big-screen version of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ vine-swinging he-man, is a sincere and well-intentioned attempt to wrestle with the legacy of European colonialism in Africa. It is also a movie in which a man punches a gorilla.
You could say it’s at war with itself, but it’s a war involving soldiers who are never quite sure who they’re fighting, and who are as likely to slip in the mud and break their own necks as they are to get off a clean shot.
Directed by David Yates and written by Adam Cozad and Craig Brewer, Legend would more accurately, if less economically, be called The Legend of the Legend of Tarzan.
When we pick up the story in the late 19th Century, John Clayton (Alexander Skarsgård) is already an international folk hero, an English nobleman raised by apes and returned to his native land.
As George Williams (Samuel L Jackson), an American soldier of fortune who’s come to persuade John to return to the Belgian Congo, puts it, he is “Africa’s favourite son”.
The irony of that epithet being bestowed by a black Civil War veteran is not lost on The Legend of Tarzan.
And indeed, for a time, it seems as if Yates and company have a handle on how to reshape Edgar Rice Burroughs imperialist fantasy for the modern age.
The opening sequence, in which a fastidious Belgian commander leads his soldiers through the jungle mists, is full of redolent images: the bodies of dead troops hung on makeshift crosses, their own rifles used as crossbars; an African tribesman starring indomitably into the lens, a colonist’s white linen hat perched incongruously atop his head.
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Defects on SMRT trains 'not safety-critical', to be repaired by manufacturer: LTA
The Land Transport Authority and public transport operator SMRT addressed queries on a Hong Kong report that said defective “China-made” trains were shipped back to their manufacturer.
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Doing nude scenes was a 'tough decision', says Korean actress Kim Tae Ri
In Korean rookie actress Kim Tae Ri’s big-screen debut, she had to be totally fearless and uninhibited.
The 26-year-old former model, reportedly picked from a pool of 1,500 auditionees, stars in Korean director Park Chan Wook…
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