BOMBORRA ...

Outrage as Sharia Court Allows Rapist to Marry 13 yo Victim

Webmaster — Fri, 24 May 2013 07:50:48 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — Complications arising from overlapping state laws with religion are never-ending, particularly with Islam. Much of Borneo and the former British colonies on the island were Christian before what is now the state of Sabah and Sarawak (aka East Malaysia) entered a federation with Muslim Malaysia. As Malaysia evolved so did internal [...]

Water, the Great Regional Threat

Webmaster — Thu, 23 May 2013 02:30:53 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — For decades, long-range forecasters have been predicting that water – and a lack of it – loomed as the biggest threat to regional security. Booming populations, food security, the occasional drought and competition among neighboring countries for dwindling resources made for a pessimistic outlook. Much of this was pushed down the [...]

Filipino Dynasties Tighten their Grip

Webmaster — Wed, 22 May 2013 04:13:02 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — The Ampatuan clan was never going to be thrown out of power, despite being accused of killing 58 people, including 32 members of the media in one of the worst massacres in modern Philippine history. The latest count in the country’s mid-term elections has family members, including three wives of senior clan [...]

ASEAN Urges a Youthful Lead

Webmaster — Tue, 21 May 2013 08:07:15 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — Concern in Southeast Asia about the formation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by the end of 2015 is mounting. Members of the ten-member Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) have in recent years been big on rhetoric but evasive on details for such an enormous undertaking. Read more from [...]

The great Cambodia land grab

Webmaster — Mon, 20 May 2013 02:02:17 +0000

Locals are fighting a losing battle as rubber companies take over their land and, as a report last week reveals, international banks are helping to pay for the plunder Luke Hunt Reports ASIAWATCH — Ask Sreap Samoen where are the communal grazing lands? Where can local villagers fish and grow crops? The 50-year-old woman with [...]

East Timor Floats Cambodia’s LNG Options

Webmaster — Fri, 17 May 2013 04:19:52 +0000

By Luke Hunt AsiaWATCH — A push towards using massive offshore refining pontoons for processing crude oil and LNG is gaining momentum and forcing governments, including Cambodia, to rethink their growth strategies after pinning their economic hopes on traditional oil and gas jobs. It’s a global phenomena but one that is finding its mark in [...]

Malaysian Elections Produce more Losers than Winners

Webmaster — Fri, 17 May 2013 04:04:00 +0000

Note: This article first appeared in Spectrum. By Luke Hunt AsiaWATCH — Malaysia’s latest attempt at staging a clean and fair election again fell widely short of expectations but this time around the polls have laid bare the nation’s odious racial divisions and left an increasingly agitated electorate with little but political chaos to look [...]

Floating LNG Upsets Outlook

Webmaster — Wed, 15 May 2013 05:29:00 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — A push towards massive offshore refining pontoons for processing crude and liquefied natural gas (LNG) is gaining momentum and forcing governments – which had pinned their economic development plans to traditional oil and gas jobs – to rethink their strategies. It’s a global phenomena but one that is making its mark in Southeast Asia where [...]

Undercover, Hacked and Killed in the Line of Duty

Webmaster — Mon, 13 May 2013 14:42:19 +0000

Max Kolbe reviews recent events in news The BBC courted controversy after one of its reporters apparently posed as a PhD student, hooked-up with a group of students from the London School of Economics (LSE) en-route to North Korea and went there in order to make an undercover documentary. Undercover journalism is shunned in most [...]

Global Witness says IFC and Deutsche Bank Back Vietnamese Land Grabs

Webmaster — Mon, 13 May 2013 13:16:48 +0000

FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — Indochinese governments have faced fierce criticisms from their own people and abroad over land grabbing in recent years. But the response from leaders in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos has been collective lip service while big corporations were allowed to go about their business. Complex corporate structures layered by a myriad of red [...]