1. religion and spirituality
2. buddhism

5th Waxing Day of Pyatho 1376 ME
Volume I, Number 86
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
Carolers visit Presidential Palace on Christmas Eve
Nay Pyi Taw, 24
Dec — On Christmas
Eve, carolers from the
Christian Youth for
Peace comprised of national races said a blessing for President U Thein
Sein at the Presidential
Palace in Nay Pyi Taw on
Wednesday.
Rev U Saw Doe Doe
Wah, the executive secretary of the Myanmar
Christian Council, and
the carolers led by U Pe
Zin Aung and U Lin Htet
sang Christmas songs and
made best wishes for the
country and President U
Thein Sein.
The reverend said
a blessing for the president, his wife Daw Khin
Khin Win and family
before a child presented
a Christmas gift to the
president.
The president and
family greeted the carolers warmly and presented
gifts to its members and
then posed for a photo
with them.
MNA
President U Thein Sein and wife Daw Khin Khin Win cordially greet carolers from Christian Youth for Peace at
Presidential Palace.—mna
Ministry vows to increase
budget for small-scale fish
farming next FY
By Khaing Thanda Lwin
Yangon, 24 Dec—
The Ministry of Livestock,
Fisheries and Rural Development plans to expand
its financial assistance for
local breeders in the next
budget year so as to help
boost the number of smallscale fish farming industries in the country.
The backyard fish
hatchery operation was
implemented as of the
2013-2014 FY. Under the
scheme, a total of 62 businesses were established
with an investment of K5
million each that year.
Currently, those fish
fry rearing facilities are
under construction and
they are expected to be
finished by the end of this
FY, Director U Hla Tun of
the Fisheries Department
said, also expecting that
the camps would fulfill local demand in the coming
breeding season.
The ministry provided
its aid to interested locals
from fishing regions only.
They entered into an agreement with the ministry to
distribute their products at
a low price and enhance cooperation on development
of the fishery sector in their
regions.
With the aim of encouraging the emergence of
good backyard fish farming
design, the ministry plans
to include a competition
in an expo scheduled to be
held next month, requesting them to actively take
part in it.
According to the Fisheries Department director,
marine product exports
have seen a steady decline.
An official from a local fisheries organization,
surmising the decline is
linked to less production and high local consumption, explained that
producers are distributing
their products in the country instead of exporting at a
time when local prices are
high.
GNLM
Yangon Mayor gives rare press conference to
local media
By Ye Myint
Yangon, 24 Dec—
Yangon Mayor U Hla Myint gave a rare press conference to local media at
Yangon City Hall, which
hosts offices of the Yangon
City Development Committee, on Wednesday, answering questions relating
to the works of the committee in the country’s biggest
city.
Accompanied
by
YCDC members and departmental heads of the
committee, the Mayor took
many questions from Yangon-based local media on
subjects ranging from the
upcoming YCDC elections
to construction of high-rise
buildings and installation
of concrete blocks to carve
out bus lanes on downtown
roads.
During the nearly twohour-long question-and-answer session, the Mayor
and his cabinet, who have
had little or no direct contacts with media before,
responded to all the reporters‘ questions, includ-
ing a tough one regarding YCDC’s response to
Michaungkan demonstrators who staged a protest
blocking a gate to Yangon
City Hall, in which YCDC
staff played loud music
from speakers to drown out
their chants.
Explaining why only
one voter per household
will be allowed to vote in
the YCDC elections due
for 27 December, the May-
or cited lack of voter registration resources as the
reason.
Yangon voters will
choose from among 293
candidates for 115 seats in
committee’s central, district and township levels
through the elections, the
first of their kind in about
six decades.
“About 200 reporters
are expected to cover the
elections as more than 180
have been registered at my
office”, said the secretary
of the Yangon municipal
election commission.
Responding to a question on the concrete blocks
placed on Yangon’s downtown roads for bus lanes,
the mayor called it an
undesirable but unavoidable situation stemming
from drivers’ lack of adherence to traffic disciplines,
(See page 2)
Yangon Mayor U Hla Myint, who is also chairman of Yangon City
Development Committee, answers questions at a press conference at City
Hall on Wednesday.—Photo: Ye Myint
2
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
national
President’s excellent awards added two more genres
Union Minister U Tin Naing Thein highlights selection of winners for President’s excellent awards.
mna
Nay Pyi Taw, 24
Dec—Two more awards
namely excellent awards
for township development
supportive committee and
for township development
affairs committee in addition to seven awards will
be presented to the winners,
Chairman of the President’s
Excellent Award scrutiny
committee Union Minister
U Tin Naing Thein told the
coordination meeting of the
committee in Nay Pyi Taw
on Wednesday.
The chairman said that
the committee will not give
one more award to the previous year’s winners but
will honour them with special honorary awards for
their more excellent performance than last year. He
noted that it is necessary to
invite outstanding students
and youth scouts for exchange of experiences.
Chairman of urban/
rural development and agriculture/livestock awarding
work committee Deputy
Minister Brig-Gen Kyaw
Zan Myint reported on arrangements for awarding
and progress of works.
Chairperson of social
awarding work committee
Deputy Minister Daw Su
Su Hlaing and Chairman of
economic awarding work
committee Deputy Minister
Dr Pwint Hsan and deputy
ministers participated in the
discussions.
Union Minister U Soe
Thane said that the president’s awarding programme
is to turn out more and
more outstanding persons
in the entire nation. So, he
stressed the need to select
the winners without bias.
Deputy Minister for
Information U Pike Htway
reported on plans of cooperation among ministries to
show the best scene of excellent award winners at the
prize presentation day.
Officials
discussed
making medals and arrangements for inspecting
the worksites.—MNA
Yangon, 24 Dec—
The
Yangon
Region
Government Office and
two business bodies on
Wednesday presented over
K9 million to the winners
of inter-region/state chief
ministers’ cup this year at
the prize award ceremony at the Yangon Region
Government Office here.
Yangon Region Chief
Minister U Myint Swe
recognized the participation of sports teams, referees, coaches and sup-
portive groups during the
tournaments, urging the
athletes to try to be a selected one at both national and international level
sport events.
The chief minister
said that athletes from
four corners of the country
took part in 27 sport games
which was held from June
to November in regions
and states with the aim of
emerging the outstanding
locals.
After the tournaments,
Yangon Region stood first
with 74 gold, 73 silver and
70 bronze medals, sources
said.
At the ceremony, the
chief minister also presented certificate of honour to
over 23 well-wishers who
donated cash and kind
to successfully organize
the Yangon Region Chief
Minister’s Cup held from
August to October.
MNA
Yangon Region government honours victorious
athletes, well-wishers
Yangon Mayor gives rare press...
(from page 1)
adding that the problem
will disappear following
the transport improvements
thanks to bus rapid transit
(BRT) and mass rapid transit (BRT).
Asked about the suspended Yangon new city
project, the Mayor replied
there are no immediate
plans to resume it.
In response to another question about building
more low-cost housing
for ordinary people, he
noted that construction of
192 apartments housed in
four six-story buildings is
underway in Shwepyitha
Township.
Moreover, a YCDC
official, at the press conference, revealed information
about construction of three
more bridges at Tamway
junction, 8th-Mile junction and the intersection
of Kaba Aye Pagoda road
with new University Avenue in Yangon.
GNLM
Myanmar, Thailand to
expand project areas of
alternative development in
Tachilek and Monghsat
Nay Pyi Taw, 24 Dec—
The government could reduce poppy cultivation area
from 57,800 hectares in
2014 to 57,600 hectares in
2014 while declining opium
production from 870 tons to
670 tons, Chairman of Central Committee for Drug
Abuse Control Union Minister for Home Affairs LtGen Ko Ko told the meeting
2/2014 of the committee at
the ministry on Wednesday.
In accord with the
guidance of Vice President
U Nyan Tun, he said the
CCDAC has drawn work
plans yearly, adding that arrangements are being made
to implement alternative development plans in Loilem,
Hopong and Loilem townships in Shan State in cooperation with UNODC under
the 2014-2017 country programme.
He noted that Myanmar and Thailand agreed
to expand the project areas
of alternative development
in Tachilek and Monghsat regions. Moreover, he
added that the government
coordinates with China to
implement the projects in
Tamoenye and Kaungkha
regions.
Vice-Chairman
of
the CCDAC Union Minister for Foreign Affairs
U Wunna Maung Lwin,
Secretary Chief of Myanmar
Police
Force
Police Maj-Gen Zaw Win
and officials discussed progress of international cooperation, future tasks, accomplishment of the meetings.
MNA
Chief Minister attends Kayin
New Year Day in Bago
Bago, 24 Dec—Chief
Minister of Bago Region U
Nyan Win on 21 December
attended the ceremony to
mark Kayin New Year Day
at the city hall in Bago, the
capital of the region.
Bago Region Minister
for Kayin National Races
Affairs U Saw Jubilee San
Hla put on the chief minister with Kayin national
costume.
The chief minister and
KNU general secretary
Pado Saw Kwe Htoo Win
made speeches.
Region Kayin national
literature and culture committee’s troupe, Kayin students of Bago University
and vocalist Kabyar Bwe
Hmu presented Kayin Don
dances and songs to the audiences. The region minister presented prizes to distinction winning students
in the 2013-14 academic
year matriculation examination.—MNA
MFF releases lineup for Myanmar women’s team
Yangon, 24 Dec—According to the Myanmar
Football Federation, the
line-up of Myanmar women’s football team has been
released recently to play
against Vietnam’s Champion Ha Nam FC in the turnup match at Youth Training
Centre in Thuwunna, Thingangyun Township, here,
on 27 December.
Under the leadership of head coach Daw
Thet Thet Win, assistant
coach Daw San San Thein
and goal coach U Ko Ko
Aung, the Myanmar women’s team has been lined
up with goalkeepers Mya
Phu Ngon and Khin Thida Aye, defenders Khin
Than Wai, Zin Mar Win,
Wai Wai Aung, Phu Pwint
Khaing, Zargyi Oo, Nang
Kyay Ngon, Aye Aye Moe
and Chit Chit, midfielders
San San Maw, Than Than
Htwe, Naw Ahlo Wah
Phaw, Khin Moe Wai and
Yupa Khaing, forwards Yi
Yi Oo, Khin Marlar Tun,
Win Theingi Tun, May
Thu Kyaw and Khin Nway
Nway Shwe.
Ha Nam FC secured
champion in the Vietnam’s
National Games. It stood
second in the Vietnam
Women National League
2014.—GNLM
Players of Myanmar women’s football team at training session.—mff
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
3
National
Vice President inspects rehearsal of Grand Military Review Parade
Vice President U Nyan Tun views rehearsal for 67th Anniversary Independence Day’s Grand Military Review Parade.—Than Oo (Laymyethna)
Nay Pyi Taw, 24 Dec
— Vice President U Nyan
Tun, who chairs the Committee for Organizing the
67th Anniversary Independence Day’s Grand Military
Review Parade, inspected
the preparations and rehearsal for the event in Nay
Pyi Taw on Wednesday
morning.
The vice president was
accompanied by Union
Ministers Lt-Gen Ko Ko,
Lt-Gen Wai Lwin, U Wunna Maung Lwin, U Aye
Myint Kyu, U Kyaw Lwin,
U Ye Htut, Chief of General Staff (Army, Navy and
Air) General Hla Htay Win
Senior General Min Aung
Hlaing delivers speech at
launching of new frigate
Nay Pyi Taw, 24 Dec
— Navy engineers are required to nurture a new
generation engineers while
building high capacity
warships for the country,
Commander-in-Chief
of
Defence Services Senior
General Min Aung Hlaing
said at the ceremony to
launch a new frigate, Kyansittha, held at the Naval
Dockyard Command Headquarters in Thanlyin in
commemoration of the 67th
Anniversary of the Myanmar Navy on Wednesday.
He said the newly-built high-capacity frigate installed with powerful weapons was built in
Myanmar design based on
Myanmar concept from beginning to end and he was
proud of the shipbuilders
and those who will perform
their duty aboard the frigate.
Also present at the
ceremony were the wife of
the Commander-in-Chief
of Defence Services Daw
Kyu Kyu Hla, Commander-in-Chief (Navy) Admiral Thura Thet Swe
and wife, Commander-in-Chief (Air) General Khin Aung Myint and
wife and senior military
officers from the Office of
the Commander-in-Chief
of Defence Services.
The navy chief presented a miniature the frigate to the senior general to
mark the launching ceremony.
The frigate was then
launched and the commander-in-chief and party
went aboard the warship
before taking salute from
the guards of honour and
warships led by frigate
Aung Zeya, which gave the
senior general a 19-gun salute.
Later, the senior general presented certificates
of honour and cash awards
to the commander of the
naval dockyard command
headquarters Commodore
Myint Oo, and Naval War
Vessel Group Commander
Cdr Zaw Latt.
The senior general inspected the warships and an
exhibition commemorating
the anniversary event.
The senior general
also visited Naval Training
Depot in Thanlyin Station
on Wednesday.
The senior general inspected training equipment
including
ship-handling
simulators, a model bridge
room and engine room, and
a planetarium and fulfilled
the requirements.
MNA
and Commander Maj-Gen
Maung Maung Aye.
Officials briefed the
vice president on arrangements for reception, transportation, security and information at the event.
The vice president,
then, viewed the parade
and display of flag bearers, military bands, parade
troops, the presidential salute and troop inspection,
salute for the national flag,
fallen martyr leaders and
defence services personnel,
two-minute silence in memorial to them, the independence day speech of the
president, making pledges
and the presidential salute
on parade, and he fulfilled
the requirements.
A total of 7,128 members from the Defence
Services (Army, Navy
and Air), Myanmar Police Force, Myanmar Fire
Brigade, Department of
Immigration and National
Registration, Customs Department, Myanmar Scout
Youths, Myanmar Red
Cross Society, Myanmar
Women’s Affairs Federation, Myanmar Maternal
and Child Welfare Association and troops representing the Nay Pyi Taw Council, regions and states will
participate in the parade.
The parade was organ-
ized annually on the Independence Day to remind
the public of their responsibility to preserve the independence that was regained
through the relentless efforts of all the national races and to exert efforts for
national development.
The grand military
review parades were held
at the Independence Monument in front of the city
hall from 1949 to 1953
and the then presidents
Sao Shwe Thike and Dr
Ba Oo attended the ceremony. From 1954 to 1962,
the grand military review
parades were held at the
grand military review stage
on Pyay road and the then
presidents Dr Ba Oo and
Mahn Win Maung took salute.
The Grand Military
Review Parade is the greatest public event to salute
the president and all the national races who fought for
and defended the priceless
independence and defence
services personnel who
sacrificed their lives and
limbs.
The fine tradition of
Myanmar which has been
lost for 50 years is to be
maintained starting from
the 67th Anniversary Independence Day.
MNA
Thura U Shwe Mann meets farmers in
Mandalay Region
Mandalay 24 Dec —
Speaker of Pyidaungsu
Hluttaw and Pyithu Hluttaw Thura U Shwe Mann
met farmers in Mandalay
region Wednesday.
The farmers from
districts of PyinOoLwin,
Kyaukse, Meiktila, Myingyan, NyaungU and
Yamethin in the region attended the meeting.
The meeting was held
at Sanpya village of Singaing township, and attended by chairman of regional Hluttaw, chairmen
of Hluttaw committee and
locals.
At the meeting, Thura
U Shwe Mann said that the
needs of farmers presented
by local representatives
will be discussed in the
next Hluttaw sessions before submitting them to the
Union government.
He also noted that
problem of land ownership
disputes are not the new
ones, but which have ex-
Speaker of Pyidaungsu Hluttaw and Pyithu Hluttaw Thura U Shwe Mann
visits MahaMuni Buddha Image in Mandalay.—mna
isted for 50 years, saying
it should be tackled during the remaining term of
more than one year of the
government.
The speaker, chief
minister of the region and
parliamentarians then vis-
ited Maha Muni Buddha
Image in Mandalay city on
23 December evening.
MNA
4
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
Local News
Zeyathiri Township gets self-reliant
village library
Nay Pyi Taw, 24 Dec
— As a gesture of hailing
the 67th Anniversary Independence Day, “Thuta
Alinn” library was opened
in Inthar Village, Zeyathiri
Township, on Wednesday.
At the opening ceremony, Township Administrator U Myat Thein Tun
explained the purpose the
self-reliant library, while
Deputy Director Daw Thin
Thin Zin of Nay Pyi Taw
Information and Public Relations Department spoke
about the advantages of
reading.
Well-wishers donated books and cash to the
library through the deputy
director and officials.
Short-term
course
improves
capacity of
law officers
Dawei, 24 Dec —
Taninthayi Region’s Advocate-General
Office
conducted a prosecutor
and law officer short-term
course at its hall in Dawei,
Taninthayi Region, on 23
December, with a speech
by Advocate-General of
the region U Soe Myint.
The course was aimed
at improving the capacity
of law officers and prosecutors. Region law officer
and deputy directors gave
lectures to the trainees.
Township law officers
attended the training course
on 23 and 24 December.
Po Shwe Thun (Dawei)
Mohnyin
PyinOoLwin
Mandalay
Taungtha
Pohbba Thiri
Nay Pyi Taw
Papun
Myanaung
The
government
and local people provid-
ed K2.2 million in funds
for construction of the 20
feet square, one-storey
building.—Shwe Kokko
Yangon
Thayetchaung Township gets
new law office
Dawei, 24 Dec — A
ceremony to inaugurate new
law office was held in Myoma Ward, Thayetchaung,
Taninthayi Region, on 23
December.
Region Minister for Finance U Than Aung, Region
Minister for Social Affairs
Dr Win Aung and Advocate-General U Soe Myint
formally opened the new
office. Chief Minister of the
region U Myat Ko unveiled
the signboard of the office.
Managing director U
Myint Soe of Thukha Chantha Co. handed over docu-
Dawei
Myitta
Today’s
Myanmar
News sites
ments related to the building
to Region Law Officer U
Khin Maung Maung.
Taninthayi Region government allotted K30 mil-
lion for construction of the
new office in 2014-15 fiscal
year. The office is of reinforced concrete.
Po Shwe Thun (Dawei)
Directorate of Water Resources Utilization
sinks tube-wells one after another
Taungtha, 24 Dec —
The union government is
emphasizing construction
of dams and reservoirs and
Myawady
sinking tube-wells in the dry
zone area of the nation.
A plan is under way to
sink 723 tube-wells in My-
ingyan District for 2014-15
fiscal year. Of them, Taungtha Township authorities
will sink 494 tube-wells in
urban and rural areas.
Myingyan
District’s
deputy commissioner U
Myint Thin Aung and officials inspected sinking of a
tube-well by Directorate of
Water Resources Utilization
in the farmland of U Aung
Moe in Kywehsin Village in
Taungtha Township. They
also viewed an already-sunk
tube-well in farmland of U
Myo Than in the same village. “Upon completion of
sinking tube-wells, local
farmers not need to rely on
rainwater in their cultivation
tasks,” the deputy commissioner told local farmers.
Zaw Min Naing (Myingyan)
Field staff to cultivate
Palethwe hybrid rice
on 3,000 acres of firm
Nay Pyi Taw, 24 Dec
— Deputy Director-General U Naing Kyi Win of
Agriculture Department
assigned duty of growing
Palethwe hybrid rice to
staff for 2014-15 cultivation season was held at
3000-acre model farm in
Dekkhinathiri Township,
Nay Pyi Taw Council
Area, on 23 December.
Officials
presented
certificates of assignment
and uniforms to 16 field
staff.
The deputy director-general,
Head
of
Nay Pyi Taw Agriculture Department U Tin
Oo Kyaing and officials
discussed cultivation of
Palethwe hybrid paddy
on 1,600 acres of field
through good agricultural
patterns (GAP).
Ko Pauk
(Okkar Myay)
Thursday, 24 December, 2014
5
Local News
Mohnyin police officers meet media
Major Han Win Maung explained criminal cases from
2012 to 2014 and people’s
participation in prevalence
of law and order.
Mohnyin is a township
where the district administrative office is open. Members of Special Anti-Drug
Squad have been assigned
in Mohnyin. However, the
township has no traffic police, with the commander
of Township Police Force
assigns such duty to his
members. The township
has inadequate number of
police, officials told media.
GNLM-001
Mohnyin, 24 Dec — A
press conference on public-centred policing pro-
cess was held at the hall of
Mohnyin Township Police
Force in Mohnyin, Kachin
Agricultural development
bank disburses loans to
farmers
Myanaung, 24 Dec
— Myanma Agricultural Development Bank in
Myanaung Township, Ayeyawady Region, disbursed
agricultural loans to local
farmers as of 22 December
for cultivation of summer
paddy, cold season crops,
beans and pulses.
Township Bank manager Daw Khin Myint Yi
said the bank will deliver K2,820.28 million to
the farmers from 57 vil-
lage-tracts in the township.
All loans will be disbursed
to them in January 2015, at
the rate of K100,000 per
acre of summer paddy and
K20,000 per acre of cold
season crops.
Plans are underway
to grow summer paddy on
9,800 acres of farmland.
Kunchaung, Ma Mya and
Kanyin Dams started to
irrigate farmlands as of 15
December for cultivation.
Win Bo (Township IPRD)
State, on 20 December.
Commander of township police force Police
Students get experiences from
pre-tests for examination
Myitta, 24 Dec — Pretests for grade-5 and grade-9
students were held at three
exam centres in post-primary schools and Basic
Education High School in
Nyaungdon, Taninthayi Re-
gion from 16 to 23 December. The activity was aimed
at enabling the students to
have experiences in entering the pre-test for 2014-15
academic year.
As part of efforts to
promote educational reform during the term of the
present government, the
Ministry of Education conducted the pre-tests for the
students.—Myitta Township IPRD
Social organization members vaccinate
people against elephantiasis
Head of Pobbathiri Township Information and Public Relations Department Daw
Theint Theint Myo gives lectures on librarianship to trainees for emergence of
village librarians in Pazunseik Village of the township on 24 December.
Shwe Ye Yint
People join December’s
sports activities
Papun, 24 Dec — A
December mass walk activity was held in Papun, Kayin State, on Saturday.
Local people together
with Pyithu and Amyotha
Hluttaws participated in the
traditional activity, walking
along the road from Myoma
Shwekyaung to the airport.
Locals joined the traditional sports event, race,
volleyball, table tennis,
boxing, Sepak Takraw and
chess events at the township sports ground. Officials presented prizes to the
winners.
Ko Nyo (Papun)
Local youth taking
part in traditional
boxing event as part of
December mass sports
activities in Papun
Township, Kayin State.
Myawady, 24 Dec —
Myawady Township Maternal and Child Welfare
Association,
Women’s
Affairs Organization and
Township Health Department jointly organized an
educative talk on elephantiasis disease and vaccination at the Dhammayon in
Ward 1 of the township,
Kayin State, on 23 December.
Health staff Daw San
San Myint explained advantages of vaccination.
Chairman of Township MCWA and officials
vaccinated about 150
people at their residences
in Ward 1.—Tun Tun Oo
(Myawady Town)
6
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
regional
Abe to be re-elected as Japan PM as special Diet session convenes
Tokyo, 24 Dec —
Japan is set to convene a
special three-day Diet session on Wednesday to reelect Liberal Democratic
Party leader Shinzo Abe
as prime minister, after a
landslide victory in the 14
December lower house
election gave him a fresh
mandate.
Abe is expected to
form a new Cabinet, with
many of the ministers likely to be reappointed, and
hold a news conference
later in the day to explain
his resolve to put priority on pulling the country
out of deflation with his
“Abenomics” economic
policies.
The prime minister
plans to tap former defence chief Gen Nakatani
as the new defence minister, replacing Akinori
Eto, who, according to LDP
sources, plans to decline an
offer to retain his post in the
wake of a political funds
scandal.
Nakatani, a veteran
LDP lawmaker, previously
served as head of the Defence Agency, the predecessor of the Defence Ministry.
Just days after joining
Abe’s revamped Cabinet in
September, Eto came under
fire over the revelation that
a sum of 3.5 million yen appeared in his political funds
report as a “donation” to
himself from his campaign
funds management body,
a move which opposition
lawmakers say is banned
under the law. He subsequently corrected the report,
saying it was a clerical mistake.
Eto, also an LDP lawmaker, has decided not to
remain as defence chief out
of fear the opposition camp
may exploit the scandal
to influence Diet deliberations on security legislation
scheduled for spring or later, the sources said.
Abe is seeking to remodel the country’s postwar security policy through
the legislation and to restart
nuclear power plants that
remain offline following the
Fukushima nuclear disaster
in 2011 amid heightened
safety concerns.
On the first day of the
special Diet session, the
House of Representatives
is scheduled to elect former
Foreign Minister Nobutaka
Machimura as its speaker,
replacing Bunmei Ibuki.
The LDP and its coalition partner, Komeito, retained a two-thirds majority
in the 475-member lower
Visitors pose for
photos during
the Christmas
season at the
parish on
Pham The Hien
Street in Ho
Chi Minh city,
Vietnam, on 21
Dec, 2014. As
Christmas is
approaching,
local parishes
attract many
visitors to come
and enjoy stone
grottoes brightly
decorated
amid merry
atmosphere.
Xinhua
Curfew in Indian state after
tribal militants kill 48
Guwahati, (India), 24
Dec — India imposed a
curfew in parts of the northeastern state of Assam on
Wednesday after suspected
tribal guerrillas killed 48
people in a series of attacks
in retaliation for an offensive against them.
Assam has a history
of sectarian bloodshed and
groups fighting for greater
autonomy or secession from
India.
Tuesday’s attacks in
four places by militants of
the National Democratic
Front of Bodoland within
the space of an hour were
the deadliest in months.
Villagers told police
the rebels came on foot,
armed with assault rifles
and wearing military uniforms.
“The militants first
came and asked for water.
Suddenly they opened fire
with their AK-47 rifles,” a
witness, who fled into jungle, later told reporters.
The guerrillas say they
are fighting for a separate
homeland for indigenous
Bodo people. They complain that the tea-growing
state has been flooded with
outsiders.
Indian security forces
launched a campaign last
month against the rebels
in their remote hideouts,
prompting a threat from
them to target settlers.
“They didn’t even
spare women and children,”
said a police officer, adding
there were at least 10 women among the dead in Tuesday’s violence. At least 13
children were killed.
Lalit Gogoi, deputy commissioner of the
worst-affected Sonitpur district, said the army had been
put on standby and a dusk to
dawn curfew imposed.
The single hospital in
Sonitpur was crowded with
scores of people with gunshot wounds.
Assam is one of seven
states in India’s northeast,
a region bounded by China, Myanmar, Bhutan and
Bangladesh. For long, residents have accused the federal government of plundering its natural resources and
ignoring development.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has vowed to
accelerate the development
of roads and railways in the
area.—Reuters
chamber in the election,
raising the chances of Abe
becoming one of Japan’s
longer-serving prime ministers, and tackling his longheld goal of amending the
pacifist Constitution.
Current LDP executives such as Secretary
General Sadakazu Tanigaki
are also expected to remain
in their posts to prepare for
quadrennial local elections
next spring, the sources
said.
On Wednesday morning, all the Cabinet ministers resigned in advance of
the special Diet session to
be held in the early afternoon to choose a new prime
minister.
As an unexpected
slump in gross domestic product data for the
July-September
period
prompted Abe to postpone
a second consumption tax
hike until 2017, he sought
voter approval for sticking
to Abenomics — a combination of bold monetary
easing, fiscal stimulus and
growth-oriented reforms.
Before the end of the
year, the new Cabinet is expected to approve an emergency economic package
to mitigate the impact of
the yen’s rapid slide, and a
draft budget in January for
the next fiscal year starting
in April 2015.
Abe has said his government will submit legislation to a regular Diet
session next year to legalize
the use of the right to collective self-defence, keeping
in time with a revision of
Japan-US defence cooperation guidelines pushed back
to the first half of 2015.
Kyodo News
Prime Minister Shinzo
Abe waves as he enters
his office in Tokyo on 24
Dec, 2014. Abe, leader
of the ruling Liberal
Democratic Party, will
be re-elected as prime
minister in a special Diet
session the same day after a landslide victory in
the 14 December lower
house election gave him
a fresh mandate.
Kyodo News
Cambodia, Thailand vow to enhance
security, peace along border
Phnom Penh, 24 Dec
— Cambodian Defence
Minister Tea Banh and
his visiting Thai counterpart Prawit Wongsuwan
on Wednesday pledged to
enhance security and maintain peace along the border
of the two countries.
“We agreed to increase cooperation in security and peace along the
border,” Tea Banh told a
joint Press conference after
the 10th meeting of Cambodia-Thailand General Border Committee.
He said the two neighbours will intensify cooperation in prevention and
suppression on human and
drug trafficking, labour exploitation, illegal logging
and all kinds of trans-border crimes.
“We also agreed to enhance cooperation in fight-
ing against terrorism and
cracking down on weapon
smuggling,” he added.
The two ministers also
pledged to improve the
livelihoods of the peoples
along the border through
facilitating daily trade activities and pushing for the
establishment of special
economic zones in border
provinces.
Prawit arrived in Cambodia on Wednesday morning for a two-day trip. He is
scheduled to pay a courtesy
visit to Prime Minister Hun
Sen on Thursday.—Xinhua
Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence
Minister Tea Banh (R) meets with his Thai counterpart
Prawit Wongsuwan (L) in Phnom Penh on 24 Dec,
2014. Prawit arrived here on Wednesday
for a two-day visit.—Xinhua
Dozens of tourists stranded by floods
in Malaysian national park
Kuala Lumpur, 24
Dec — Nearly 60 foreign
tourists are among almost
100 people stranded at a
resort in a Malaysian national park lashed by its
heaviest rainfall in more
than four decades, staff
said on Wednesday, and
authorities are sending
boats and a helicopter to
rescue them.
About 84 guests, including travellers from
Canada, Britain, Australia
and Romania, and 10 staff
members at the Mutiara
Taman Negara Resort, in
the East Coast state of Pahang, were marooned after
riverbanks overflowed, a
resort official told Reuters.
The local fire and rescue department was sending boats and looking for
a safe spot for a helicopter
to land, he said. The park,
a popular ecotourism destination spanning 434,300
hectares (1,075,000 acres)
of tropical rainforest, has
recorded its highest rainfall since 1971, following
major floods on the country’s east coast, state news
agency Bernama said.
Residents were warned to
avoid coastal areas and river mouths as tides were expected to reach their peak
over the next two nights,
Malaysian newspaper New
Straits Times said.
Eastern
peninsular
Malaysia is regularly hit
by flooding during the annual Northeast Monsoon.
This year nearly 60,000
people have been evacuated due to the floods, mostly from the east coast, according to the latest figures
by Bernama.
Reuters
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
7
world
Prosecutors seek detention of Korean
Air executive in nut case
Cho Hyun-ah,
also known as
Heather Cho,
daughter of
chairman of
Korean Air
Lines, Cho
Yang-ho,
bows in front
of the media
at the Seoul
Western District
Prosecutor’s
Office in Seoul
on 17 Dec, 2014.
Reuters
Seoul, 24 Dec —
South Korean prosecutors
requested on Wednesday a
detention warrant for a former Korean Air Lines executive who delayed a flight
because she was unhappy
about how she was served
nuts in first class.
The prosecutors have
been investigating the former executive, Heather
Cho, who is the daughter of
the airline’s chairman, on
charges of violating aviation law and another airline
official for abetting perjury.
“The prosecution this
morning requested a detention warrant,” an official at
the prosecutors’ office said,
adding the request would be
reviewed by the court.
Detention warrants are
issued when the court believes there is a risk of flight
or evidence tampering by
suspects while investigations are ongoing.
A probe by the Transport Ministry concluded
that Cho abused flight at-
tendants in the 5 December
incident at John F Kennedy
airport in New York, and
airlines officials may have
tried to cover up the incident.
Public outrage grew
when Korean Air initially issued what many in
the country took to be a
half-hearted apology that
instead appeared to rationalize Cho’s conduct in the
face of what it said was
inadequate performance by
the cabin crew.
Cho resigned from all
her posts at the airline and
subsidiaries and apologized after she came under
intense public outrage and
ridicule. The airline’s chairman Cho Yang-ho subsequently apologized and said
her daughter’s conduct was
“foolish”.
The plane pushed
away from the airport departure gate as the incident
was taking place on board.
The pilot then brought the
plane back to the gate to
expel the cabin crew chief,
after Cho complained about
being served macadamia
nuts by a flight attendant in
a bag and not on a dish.
The crew chief said
in a local television interview that Cho swore at him
and jabbed his hand with a
document folder, pointing
her finger at him while he
kneeled to apologize to her.
The prosecutors are
also investigating whether
Cho physically assaulted
any of the crew members.—Reuters
Two men arrested in Sydney by counterterrorism team
Sydney, 24 Dec —
Two men have been arrested
in Sydney as part of ongoing
counterterrorism investigations, Australian authorities
said on Wednesday, a day
after Prime Minister Tony
Abbott warned of heightened terrorist chatter following the Martin Place cafe
siege in which two victims
and a gunman were killed a
week ago. A man, 20, was
arrested at his residence on
Tuesday and charged with
possession of documents
connected with facilitating
a terrorist attack, an offense
that carries a maximum pen-
alty of 15 years imprisonment.
A second man, 21, also
arrested on Tuesday, was
charged with breaching a
Control Order, the maximum penalty for which is
two years imprisonment.
A Control Order is
to prevent someone with
terrorist links from being
in certain areas or leaving
Australia, associating with
certain people, owning and
using certain items, carrying out certain activities and
accessing certain forms of
technology, including the
Internet. “This operation is
an example of all agencies
recognizing how critical it
is to act at an early stage to
prevent innocent members
of the community being
subject to harm,” Australian
Federal Police Deputy Commissioner National Security
Michael Phelan said in a
statement. Tuesday’s arrests
are a part of ongoing investigations known as Operation Appleby conducted by
the Joint Counter Terrorism
Team. Since September, 11
people have been charged.
Abbott also warned on
Tuesday that authorities had
advised there had been “a
heightened level of terrorist
chatter in the aftermath of
the Martin Place siege” by
terrorist sympathizers and
reminded the public the terror threat level remains high.
Abbott urged the public
to remain alert and aware,
while giving assurances that
law enforcement agencies
are working to protect the
community.
His comments come
after the 16-hour cafe siege
that ended early on 16 December. The gunman in the
siege was a self-styled Islamic preacher.
Kyodo News
Tokyo’s Imperial Palace is lit up on 23 Dec, 2014, the
81st birthday of Emperor Akihito. The third annual
winter-time illumination, which began the same day,
will be in place until 4 January
between 5 pm and 9 pm. Kyodo News
Four more Fukushima
children suspected of
having thyroid cancer
Fukushima, (Japan), 24
Dec — Four more children
are suspected of having thyroid cancer in the latest survey on the possible health
impact of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident, sources close to the matter said
on Tuesday. The four, who
were 6 to 17 years old at the
time of the disaster at the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear
power station, had been diagnosed as not having the
cancer in the first survey
that was conducted within
three years of the incident,
they said.
The first survey covered all the 370,000 Fukushima children who were
aged 18 or younger at the
time of the disaster, and the
second survey that began in
April this year covers some
385,000, adding children
born a year after the incident. Researchers at Fukushima Medical University,
which has been taking the
leading role in the study,
will work to confirm if the
four have developed the
cancer and carefully study
if the cases are due to the influence of radiation, according to the sources.
If confirmed, they
would be the first cases of
an increase in thyroid cancer since the first survey.
The university takes
the results of the first survey
as the basic data in assessing whether cases of the
cancer may increase in the
future.
The Fukushima prefectural government said in
August that 57 children in
the first survey have been
confirmed with having thyroid cancer and 24 others
were suspected of having it.
The four lived in the
municipalities of Okuma,
Fukushima, Date and Tamura at the time.
The external radioactive exposure levels of three
of the four are estimated to
be up to 2.1 millisieverts
within four months of 11
March, 2011, the day of
the Great East Japan Earthquake that triggered the disaster, the sources said.
Kyodo News
Singapore rejects calls to join anti-Russian sanctions — Russian diplomat
Singapore, 24 Dec —
Despite strong pressure
from the United States,
Singapore has unequivocally said it will not join
Western sanctions over
Ukraine, Russian Ambassador to Singapore Leonid
Moiseyev told Tass on
Wednesday.
Singapore’s stance “is
quite consistent and principled — the imposition of
sanctions is prerogative of
the United Nations, the Security Council, and without
this sanctions are unlawful,” the ambassador said.
As a very attractive investment centre, Singapore
“proceeds from the premise
that sanctions violate the
freedom of trade, normal
international cooperation,”
Leonid Moiseyev added.
Although
Singapore denounced Moscow
for Crimea’s accession,
“economic relations with
Russia were not damaged
despite close ties of this
country with the US, first
of all in the military-political sector,” he added.
“On the contrary, the
year has turned out to be
successful on the bilateral track,” he added. Trade
was expected to grow 50%
this year to reach a record
high of $8 billion, the diplomat said.
Trade between Russia
and Singapore will grow
50% this year to reach a record high of $8 billion, Russian Ambassador to Singapore Leonid Moiseyev told
TASS on Wednesday.
“The outgoing year
was successful for bilateral ties, with trade growth
being the most impressive
result. We expect to reach
an absolute record,” the
diplomat said, adding that
a positive tendency had
continued for the past few
years.
“Given the global
economic situation which
has seen a certain slowdown of Chinese economic
growth, as well as against
the background of obvious
difficulties facing some
other countries of the Asia
Pacific region, the Russian
market, ties with Russia are
Singapore
becoming increasingly attractive for Singapore,” the
diplomat said.—Itar-Tass
8
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
opinion
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
Birth and death should
be for the world
M
By Aung Khin
an is born into the world. Ever since
we were in the womb of our mother,
we have depended on the support of
the world for our survival. That means we cannot keep ourselves alive without protecting our
environment. As soon as we started off as a fetus, nutrition and air became essential for our
survival, and they still are.
If we had not been safe in the womb of our
mother, we would never have appeared as a
creature of this world. Safe environment, sufficient nutrition and good nurturing are fundamentals for our lives, and they have been so since
our birth.
Even after we have grown up, our life depends on our surroundings. Many people in the
world are now faced with life-threatening conflicts, terrorism, disasters and diseases. All of
these problems have their root causes. These
should not be regarded as our enemies, but instead as issues to be solved tactically and appropriately. As all people are living on the same planet, we are breathing the same air. The air we
breathe out will be inhaled by another of a certain place or a certain time.
Therefore, our birth is very meaningful to
protect and safeguard the world and its people.
Even when we squash a mosquito, we will suffer a
certain reaction from that. Killing or troubling
others is against humane society.
THREATS TO GLOBAL VILLAGE AND GLOBAL PEACE
By TOMMY PAUK
G
lobal people are hearing miserable, disgusting, abhorrent, shocking and
incredible news every day.
Act of terrorism, extremism,
injustice, racial injustice, inequity, power-politics, warmonger, hegemonies, racial
conflicts, cybercrimes, cyber-attack and exploitations
are the threats to our global
village and global peace.
There are many kinds of
threats such as hacker’s
threat, terrorist’s threat , extremist’s threat, pirate’s
threat,
sex-trafficker’s
threat, human-trafficker’s
threat,
drug-trafficker’s
threat and neo-colonialist’s
threat.
Despite the Information Technology and its tremendous contribution to
mankind, unfortunately, the
destructive elements have
appeared i.e., the cybercrime. The cybercrime is
criminal activity done using
computers and the internet
(or) the illegal activities
which
are
committed
through the use of a computer and the internet.
The following crimes
are considered to be cybercrimes;
Downloading illegal
music files, stealing millions of dollars from online
bank accounts, creating and
distributing viruses on other
computers, posting confidential business information on the internet, identity
theft, credit card account
theft, in which criminals use
the internet to steal personal
information from the users,
phishing, harming, blackmailing.
The hackers are the
ones who can penetrate the
high security levels to get
the information or change
the information. They even
take down the websites
which include important
documents or information.
On the other hand, they try
to steal people’s information through viruses and bogus emails.
A very handful of despotic rulers in the world
commit cyber- attack to the
networks of the countries or
corporate organizations because they do not get on
well with these countries or
corporate
organizations.
Their acts are involved in
the criminal activities on internet, threatening the global
telecommunications
worldwide. Significantly,
the majority of the global
communities do not support
or recognize the notorious
despotic rulers and their isolated policies. Such ridiculous and despotic rulers
threaten with the nuclear
weapons to the countries
which oppose them. This is
an absolutely great threat to
the global peace. However,
the peace-loving peoples
and pacifists strongly denounce and oppose those
foolish rulers .Even their
own citizens do not support
their unscrupulous acts.
Peoples in these countries
are oppressed by ruthless
and despotic rulers. They
aggressively provoke some
countries and neighboring
countries. Therefore, the
global people are deeply
concerned about that region
and its people.
NB. The unstable and unsafe situations in the region
threaten the global peace.
NEC has clarified the
illegal activities of cyber-attacks as follows;
Cyber attacks are socially or politically motivated attacks carried out primarily through the internet.
Attacks target the general
public or national and corporate organizations and are
carried out through the
spread of malicious programs (viruses), unauthorized web access, fake websites, and other means of
stealing personal or institutional information from targets of attacks, causing farreaching damage.
NB. It is also a great threat
to global internet and the users.
These acts or behaviors
are despicable and horrible
for all civilized people on
earth. In this 21th century,
due to advanced technologies, we humans obtain a lot
of achievements in trade,
telecommunications, travelling, education, economies,
computer sciences etc. Consequently, global people are
able to communicate each
other for any aims and objects easily and swiftly. Relations among global communities and societies seem
like a family in which we
can discuss, cooperate, decide any issues closely and
solve the problems together.
This situation is rather encouraging and it is a sign of
prosperity for entire mankind. Nevertheless, there
still prevails havoc and barbaric or atrocious acts in the
world. Some countries are
practicing isolated policies
led by obnoxious, stubborn,
narrow-minded, ridiculous
and aggressive governments and they do not care
the aspiration of their people and wishes even though
the globalization takes place
in the world. As a result, in
such countries, people become weary, unhappy, miserable and blunt .These people are upset and frustrated
with their dull, unwise and
selfish government all the
time.
Seemingly,
people
around the world are happy
and secure to travel or struggle in their daily life. In reality, their inner-feelings are
insecure for their safety and
security because the insidious plague of threats is prevailing around the world.
Travelling by air, or travelling by ship, or travelling by
car, or travelling by train
cannot fully give the travelers guarantee for their security and fate in some regions
in the world. e.g., recently,
the passenger- plane of Malaysian Airline was shot
down by unknown armedgroup while it was on her
normal air-routine, flying
over Ukraine territory. That
area is a conflict zone between Russia and Ukraine.
The hostility between two
countries threat global travelers those who are innocent, but they tragically
faced with fateful incident.
It alarms the global people
to be cautious if they have
to travel in that region and
their safety and security are
not guaranteed.
Nowadays, the sporadic warfare or armed-clashes
occur here and there in
some regions in the world.
Some tourists were murdered in some countries, but
We are extremely grateful to Mother Earth
as she has supported and supplied us with
everything we need. When we reach the end of
our life, the world gives us a place to lie down.
Between birth and death, we have stood on the
earth; we get food and shelter from the world;
we get the sun and the air.
We should be for the world; not the world
be for us. Therefore, we should respond to the
world with great love and sympathy at our best.
Write for us
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the culprits are not caught.
The criminals challenge the
police force and justice.
This is another kind of
threat to people around the
world and peace. It can be
inferred that their minds are
not filled with compassion
and humanity. The hostile
conditions of their environment affect them and they
become savages in the
world. They even targeted
and killed children brutally
.e.g. Recently, the Taliban
gunmen or militants raided
the Army public School in a
town called Peshawar, in
Pakistan
and
killed
132 school children. The
so-called Taliban militants
committed the bloody
massacre on the very
innocent children cruelly
and inhumanely. Imagine
how callous the terrorists
are! Their callous disregard
for human life reveals that
they are totally savages. The
act of terrorism is vividly
seen in some regions irrespective of religious sites,
schools, airports, train-station, crowded markets,
shopping malls, public areas, cinemas etc. Mostly,
they commit homicide, beheading and massacre in
broad daylight.
Among the beheaded
victims are the foreign and
local journalists, who take
risks to get information and
news, wearing without protective equipment or holding no arms for their safety
in the conflict areas or
zones. In fact, the terrorists
create mayhem in the world
to achieve extreme goals.
The terrorists or extremists
use the tactics of violence,
destructions and abduction
in order to establish a socalled certain religious
state. They have madly de-
clared their manifesto for
founding such state. However, the normal believers in
that religion around the
world utterly condemn the
acts of terrorists and their
manifesto. Instead of supporting these extreme
groups or organizations, the
normal believers willingly
and actively co-operate or
support the countries which
eradicate the extremists or
terrorists and save the innocent people around the
world. All the global people are on the alert to wipe
out the terrorist organizations or extremist organizations with the co-operation
of international communities across the world. The
innocent people around the
world are encountering an
alarming situation related to
these threats. The threats
which plagued the global
village and global peace
must be repelled and
crushed by the entire global
people unitedly.
Terrorism and extremism cannot be split apart because the way they act and
kill violently is exactly the
same and they foolishly neglect the laws and humanity. They are stupid enough
to commit kidnapping, intimidation, homicide, genocide and even suicide for the
sake of ridiculous or extreme ideologies that they
are obsessed with. They are
totally blind of conscience
and overwhelmed by inhumane thoughts as well. The
obsession of their ideologies is not recognized by
every civilized people of
respective faiths in the
world. They are cruel, brutal, hostile and inhumane
persons indeed. Each and
every faith prohibits the
(See page 9)
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
9
National
International Fashion
Show honours Myanmar’s
ASEAN chairmanship
Yangon, 24 Dec—In
honour of Myanmar’s successful efforts for its ASEAN chairmanship in 2014,
the Diplomatic Skills Trainees Organization (DSTO)
organized the international
fashion show 2014 at Sedona Hotel, here, on 23 December evening.
Chairman of the organization U Ye Tun explained
the emergence of the organization and purpose of the
show.
Artistes, models and
staff family members presented cultural performances of ASEAN countries by
wearing costumes sent by
42 Myanmar-based embassies. Among the spectators
were Yangon Region Minister for Finance Daw San
San Nwe, Director-General
Daw Maw Maw of Training, Research and Foreign
Languages Department of
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, diplomats and members of the organization.
MNA
Record of Discussion for new Technical Cooperation
Project signed
Nay Pyi Taw, 24
Dec—A signing ceremony
on Record of Discussion for
the new Technical Cooperation Project (TCP) “The
Project for Capacity Development in Basic Water Environmental Management
and EIA System in Myanmar”, to be implemented
by Environmental Conservation Department (ECD),
Yangon City Development
Committee (YCDC) and
Mandalay City Development Committee (MCDC)
in cooperation with Japan
International Cooperation
Artistes participate in fashion show with traditional costume of
ASEAN countries.—mna
THREATS TO GLOBAL VILLAGE AND GLOBAL PEACE...
(from page 8)
cruel-killing, violence, extremism, suicide, homicide,
genocide and any unjust
acts.
NB. Sectarian violence is
threatening to the global village
Every civilized and humane person strongly condemns or denounces the impudent and barbaric acts of
the terrorists and extremists
in the world. Since they do
not hold moderate views
and ideas, they recklessly
commit crimes against humanity which results in a
great harm to the global village. As the gruesome acts
of extremists or terrorists
prevail everywhere in the
world, the global people
cannot enjoy peace of mind
wherever they travel around
the globe. Occasionally, the
abhorrent terrorists target
the international air-route
e.g. hijacking airplanes and
taking air-passengers as
hostages. So the international air-route is not safe and
we cannot prevent the act of
terrorism. In order to protect
the passengers and airplanes
from act of terrorists and
plane-hijacking, the outgoing air-passengers are being
scrutinized and scanned at
every international airport
in the world.
Sea-route is also threatened by so-called armed pirates .e.g. The notorious
Somalian pirates seize the
cargo sea-vessels to kidnap
the seafarers and demand a
huge amount of ransom.
This situation is an act of violence indeed. To prevent
this act, the naval forces
from France, China and Japan are combating the pirates and safeguarding the
cargo ships now.
NB. This threat affects the
ocean liners, world shipping
companies and seafarers
The drug traffickers are
threatening the human society and they even create vicious circle to those who are
drug addicts. Consequently,
the drug addicts become the
victim of drugs and they
cannot be rehabilitated in
their community. They cannot participate in social-welfare and do anything good
for the sake of their commu-
nity. Eventually, the drug
addicts commit crimes as
they do not have money to
buy drugs. This is a crisis
caused by drug-trafficking.
NB. We should learn lessons from the terrible event
of the China history known
as ’opium war’.
Human-trafficking targets the people (men, women, boys, girls, children,
even infants) from the poor
countries. The traffickers
organize and persuade these
people into believing that
they will get better jobs and
have better life in a particular country. Afterwards, the
gullible people are sold to
work as sex-workers at
brothel houses, as domestic
servants, as poorly-paid
workers at the factory. The
human-traffickers
inhumanely steal the infants
from their parents’ homes
and sell them to the couples
who do not have child.
Thus, they get good money
and benefits for them.
NB. The poor, innocent
and gullible people in the
poor countries encounter
the
human-trafficker’s
threat.
Agency (JICA) was organized at Environmental Conservation Department of
Ministry of Environmental
Conservation and Forestry
in Nay Pyi Taw on 23 December.
It was signed by U
Nay Aye, Director-General of Environmental Conservation Department and
Mr. Masahiko TANAKA,
Chief Representative of
JICA Myanmar Office.
The Project will be
implemented for three
years, starting from early
FY 2015.The purposes of
the Project are to obtain
enough capacity for devel-
oping basic water pollution
control measures based on
the acquired and analyzed
information, and to establish institutional framework of the EIA review.
Five Japanese experts will
be dispatched to ECD to
work in close cooperation
with its staff both in office
and on site. The team of experts will also work closely
with the officials of Pollution Control and Cleansing
Department and Water and
Sanitation Department of
YCDC and Water Supply
and Sanitation Department
of MCDC.
With rapid increase
of domestic and foreign
investments and infrastructure development, especially in urban areas, there is no
doubt that comprehensive
and strong environmental
conservation and pollution
prevention policy, laws
and regulations including
Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) system are
needed for sustainable development of Myanmar.
ECD, by the strong
leadership of Union Minister U Win Tun has been
showing keen interest and
willingness for capacity development and institutional
management, especially in
the field of water pollution
control and EIA review. At
the urban level, YCDC and
MCDC are placing priory
on how to prevent and mitigate industrial pollution
such as effluent from various factories, and to keep
river water quality which is
also precious resources for
the residents of the cities.
The Project is targeting to support those efforts
by the Government of Myanmar and City Development Committees through
intensive technical assistance and close cooperation
between Japan and Myanmar.—JICA/GNLM
The sex-traffickers normally target the young
women and young girls in
the poor countries. The victims are persuaded to believe that they might get
better jobs and future prospect. Since the victims are
poor and gullible, they fall
into trap of the traffickers.
The victims followed the
traffickers somewhere in
their country or in a certain
foreign country or in a
neighboring country or in
border towns of their country. Afterwards, the victims
are coerced to work as
sex-workers or to get married to a man in a foreign
country. When they realize
that they have been exploited or sold to harlotry or
brothel house, they cannot
escape from these places
hopelessly. Thus, many innocent women and girls
from the poor countries are
being victimized by the
sex-traffickers around the
world.
NB. In some cases, the targeted victims can be children of both boys and girls
from poor countries. Young
boys and young girls are
sold to the persons who are
paedophiles or paederast.
The neo-colonialists
are from the powerful countries, who directly or indirectly influence the poor
countries or weak military-forces and then they
meddle with the internal affairs or political affairs of
the poor countries. They
control the governments
and instruct them to obey
their policies and principles.
Unless the government
complies these policies and
principles, the government
will be removed or the leader will be toppled. Sometimes, the neo-colonialists
even occupy the territory of
the poor country or militarily-weak country for gaining
some kind of benefit from
there. Thus, neo-colonialism is enlivened in the
world. Few countries are
still depending on rich or
powerful countries to sur-
vive for their existence.
NB. In this situation, the
peoples of small or poor
countries are scared of the
threat made by neo-colonialists. This act is also known
as’ Hegemony’.
Obviously,
these
threats make vulnerable situations in every community
in the world.
The main conclusion is
that we must unitedly protect our communities and
eliminate any forms of the
horrendous threats on earth.
It is a serious global concern. Since we live in global
village, we can work closely
for good things and do for
welfare of all mankind. We
are responsible for safeguarding human society and
restoring peace, stability
and harmony in the world.
Beware of threats which
prevail everywhere in the
world!!!
*****
Director General U Nay Aye and Mr. MasahikoTANAKA, Chief Representative of JICA Myanmar Office(Right), and Deputy Minister Dr. Daw
Thet Thet Zin of Ministry of Environmental Conservation and Forestry attend signing ceremony.
Tommy Pauk is the pseudonym of U Thein Swe, who
is a B.A (English) and (Registered Law) R.L I.
degrees holder. He has English Teaching experience
at Yangon University English Department and
Workers’ college in Yangon, and now is working as
freelance writer and English Teacher cum Translator/
Interpreter for foreign firms.
10
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
world
France steps up patrols after spate of lone-wolf attacks
Paris, 24
Dec —
French security forces
stepped up security in public places for the Christmas
season on Tuesday after
three acts of violence in
three days left one dead
and 30 wounded, reigniting
fears of attacks by Islamist
radicals.
Late on Monday, a
man rammed a van into a
crowded Christmas market in the western city of
Nantes, wounding 10 shoppers. One of the victims, a
25-year-old man, later died
of his wounds. The assailant survived and is being
questioned by police.
That came a day after a
man shouting “Allahu Akbar” (“God is greatest”) injured 13 in a similar attack
in the eastern city of Dijon.
On Saturday, an attacker,
also yelling “Allahu Akbar”, was shot after stab-
French soldiers patrol near the Eiffel Tower in Paris as part of the “Vigipirate”
security plan on 23 Dec, 2014. — Reuters
bing three police officers in
central France.
“What we are seeing
with events in Dijon and
Nantes is that they are cre-
ating copy-cat reactions,”
Prime Minister Manuel
Valls said after ordering
the deployment of 200
to 300 extra soldiers for
patrols in zones such as
Paris’s
Champs-Elysees
avenue and main shopping
districts. Some 780 soldiers
have already been deployed
to security patrols.
France is already on
high alert after calls earlier
this year from militants to
attack its citizens and interests in reprisal for French
military strikes on Islamist
strongholds in the Middle
East and Africa. Prosecutors have opened a terrorist
investigation for the first
attack, after searches unearthed what they called
a written “religious testament” in which the suspect
invoked the Arabic word
for God, “Allah”, to give
him strength.
Authorities are not
treating the other two other incidents as terrorism
and have said those attackers both had mental health
problems.
Valls nonetheless said
on Monday France had
“never before faced such
a high threat linked to ter-
rorism”. Interior Minister
Bernard Cazeneuve said
this week France had made
118 arrests in its efforts to
crack down on French nationals who leave to fight
alongside jihadists in Iraq
and Syria and return home
as potential threats to security. The far-right National
Front has accused the Socialist government of trying to play down the Islamist threat and has stepped
up its own calls for deportations of radical preachers
and a tightening of border
controls.
Separately, police in
the Riviera city of Cannes
said a man armed with two
pump-action shotguns and
a knife had been arrested at
dawn near a local market.
They said his motivations
remained unclear pending
further interrogation.
Reuters
Colombia army launches search
for soldier kidnapped by rebels
Bogota, 24
Dec
— Colombia’s army has
launched a search operation for a soldier kidnapped
during an ambush by leftist
FARC rebels last week in
which five of his colleagues
were killed, a spokesperson
said on Tuesday.
The FARC, or Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia, killed five soldiers in the southwestern
province of Cauca as they
patrolled a road the rebels
had damaged with a bomb
shortly before.
The attack came just
hours before the group began an unlimited ceasefire
at midnight on Friday.
“In accordance with
the directives of the National Army Command,
all actions necessary to
locate the soldier have
been deployed and will
continue until his freedom
is reached,” an army statement said, naming the soldier as Carlos Becerra Ojeda. The FARC’s ceasefire
comes as the group advances in peace negotiations
launched by President Juan
Manuel Santos in late 2012
and some analysts see it as
a sign of progress toward
the signing of a definitive
peace deal.
The sides have reached
a partial agreement on land
reform, the FARC’s future
participation in politics and
how to end the drugs trade.
The tricky points of victim
compensation and how to
bring the armed conflict
to an end, have yet to be
agreed on.
The FARC was formed
in 1964, mushrooming out
of a peasant movement
demanding land reform
and has fought successive
governments in a mainly
rural conflict that has killed
more than 220,000 and uprooted millions from their
homes.— Reuters
Former US President Bush, 90,
hospitalised for shortness of breath
Austin, (Texas) 24 Dec — Former
US President George HW Bush, 90, was
hospitalized in Houston, Texas, late on
Tuesday after experiencing shortness of
breath, a spokesman for the 41st commander-in-chief said in a statement.
Bush’s latest health scare came two
years after he was struck by illness during the 2012 holiday season and ended up
spending seven weeks in a Houston hospital for bronchitis and related ailments, before his discharge in mid-January of 2013.
On Tuesday evening, the former
president “was taken by ambulance to
the Houston Methodist Hospital as a precaution after experiencing a shortness of
breath,” according to his spokesman, Jim
McGrath.
Bush “will be held for observation,
again as a precaution,” McGrath said in a
statement.
The former president grew so ill
Former President George H W Bush
during his previous hospitalization that
he was believed at one point to be near
death, and members of his family gathered
around him. But he recovered and went
on to mark his 90th birthday this year by
taking a parachute jump in Kennebunkport, Maine. His eldest son, former President George W. Bush, just published a
best-selling book about his dad, titled “41
— A Portrait of My Father.”—Reuters
Image provided by Venezuela’s Presidency shows Venezuelan President Nicolas
Maduro (C) talking with architect Frank Gehry (L) and musician Gustavo
Dudamel (R) during their meeting in the Miraflores Palace in Caracas,
Venezuela, on 23 Dec, 2014. — Xinhua
Global arms trade pact to take
force; US Senate has not ratified
United Nations, 24
Dec — A global arms trade
treaty that aims to regulate
the $85 billion industry and
keep weapons out of the
hands of human rights abusers and criminals will enter
into force on Wednesday,
though the US Senate has
not yet ratified it.
Supporters of the treaty
welcomed the development,
saying it was long overdue.
They say the treaty, which
the United States signed in
2013, would require arms
exporters around the world
to meet tough export criteria
comparable to those in place
in the United States and
other Western democracies.
“Campaigners have been
pushing for this moment for
a decade,” said Anna Macdonald, director of the lobby
group Control Arms, adding
that it would be the “dawn
of a new era.”
“If robustly implemented, this treaty has the
potential to save many lives
and offer much-needed
protection to vulnerable civilians around the world,”
she said. “It is now, finally,
against international law to
put weapons into the hands
of human rights abusers and
dictators.” Of the 130 signatories of the treaty, 60 have
ratified it. A total of 50 ratifications were necessary for
the pact’s entry into force.
The United States, the
world’s top arms exporter, signed the Arms Trade
Treaty in September 2013
but the Senate has not ratified it.
The National Rifle Association, a powerful US
gun lobby, opposes ratification, even though the
treaty covers only weapons
exports, not domestic gun
sales. Major weapons producers like Russia, China,
India and Pakistan have not
signed the treaty.
Top arms exporters that
have signed and ratified it
include Britain, France and
Germany.—Reuters
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
11
world
As US troops return to Iraq, more private contractors follow
A Shi’ite fighter walks during an intensive security
deployment against Islamic State militants in Balad,
north of Baghdad on 15 Dec, 2014.—Reuters
Washington, 24 Dec
— The US government is
preparing to boost the number of private contractors
in Iraq as part of President
Barack Obama’s growing
effort to beat back Islamic
State militants threatening
the Baghdad government, a
senior US official said.
How many contractors will deploy to Iraq—
beyond the roughly 1,800
now working there for the
US State Department—will
depend in part, the official
said, on how widely dispersed US troops advising
Iraqi security forces are,
and how far they are from
US diplomatic facilities.
Still, the preparations
to increase the number of
contractors—who can be
responsible for everything
from security to vehicle
repair and food service
—underscores
Obama’s
growing commitment in
Iraq. When US troops and
diplomats venture into war
zones, contractors tend to
follow, doing jobs once
handled by the military itself.
“It is certain that there
will have to be some number of contractors brought
in for additional support,”
said the senior US official,
speaking on condition of
anonymity.
After Islamic State
seized large swaths of Iraqi territory and the major city of Mosul in June,
Obama ordered US troops
back to Iraq. Last month,
he authorized roughly doubling the number of troops,
who will be in non-combat
roles, to 3,100, but is keen
not to let the troop commitment grow too much.
There are now about
1,750 US troops in Iraq,
and US Defence Secretary
Chuck Hagel last week ordered deployment of an additional 1,300.
The US military’s reliance on civilians was on
display during Hagel’s trip
to Baghdad this month,
when he and his delegation
were flown over the Iraqi
capital in helicopters operated by State Department
contractors.
The problem, the senior US official said, is that
as US troops continue
flowing into Iraq, the State
Department’s contractor
ranks will no longer be able
to support the needs of both
diplomats and troops.
After declining since
late 2011, State Department contractor numbers in
Iraq have risen slightly, by
less than 5 percent, since
June, a State Department
spokesman said.
For example, in July,
the State Department boosted from 39 to 57 the number of personnel protecting
the US consulate in Erbil
that came under threat from
Islamic State forces during
its June offensive.
That team is provided
by Triple Canopy, part of
the Constellis Group conglomerate, which is the
State Department’s largest
security contractor. Constellis did not respond to
a phone call seeking comment.
The presence of contractors in Iraq, particularly
private security firms, has
been controversial since a
series of violent incidents
during the US occupation,
culminating in the September 2007 killing of 14
unarmed Iraqis by guards
from Blackwater security
firm.
Three former guards
were convicted in October
of voluntary manslaughter charges and a fourth of
murder in the case, which
prompted reforms in US
government oversight of
contractors.
US troops in Iraq are
not using private contractors to provide them additional security, a second
US official said.
Virtually all the US
government
contractors
now in Iraq work for the
State Department. The
withdrawal of US combat
troops from Iraq in 2011
left it little choice but to
hire a small army of contractors to help protect
diplomatic facilities, and
provide other services like
food and logistics.
The number of Pentagon contractors, which
in late 2008 reached over
163,000—rivaling
the
number of US troops on
the ground at the time—has
fallen sharply with reduced
US military presence.
Pentagon spokesman
Mark Wright said there is
only a handful left now and
they report to the State Department. In late 2013, the
Pentagon still had 6,000
contractors in Iraq, mostly supporting US weapon
sales to the Baghdad government, Wright said.
Reuters
China police stop
Ten more strikes hit Islamic State in Syria, Iraq
W
, 24 Dec
‘extremists’ leaving
— The US-led coalition
Islamic State in
country, one shot dead fighting
Syria and Iraq launched
ashington
Beijing, 24 Dec — Police in southwestern China
shot dead one person and
detained 21 others who
were part of a group of “religious extremists” trying
to cross the border into Vietnam, state media said on
Wednesday.
The reports, carried by
state television and the official Xinhua news agency,
did not say where the group
was from, but small numbers of Uighurs from China’s far western region of
Xinjiang have begun trickling out of China to Southeast Asia in recent years.
State television said
that one of the group tried
to stab a policeman but
two other officers shot the
person dead, adding that
the others had all been detained. The incident happened on Sunday night in
Guangxi region, it said.
Xinhua said police had
been tipped off that the
group was trying to cross
the border into Vietnam,
and so assembled a team to
track them down.
Hundreds of people
have been killed in unrest
in Xinjiang in the past two
years, prompting a crackdown by Chinese authorities, who blame the problem on Islamist militants
who want an independent
state called East Turkestan.
Some of the Uighurs
who have ended up in
Southeast Asia are believed
to first go overland into
Laos or Myanmar, and then
onwards to Thailand and
elsewhere.
Chinese officials in
Thailand have identified
numerous Uighurs among
the individuals Thai police
have rescued from a people-smuggling camp, and
those confirmed to be from
China will be sent home, a
state-run Chinese newspaper said last month.
Thai police told Reuters about 200 people rescued in March were believed to be Uighurs, many
of whom chafe at Chinese
government curbs on their
culture and Muslim religion.
China and Thailand
have agreed to step up their
cooperation in the fight
against illegal immigration
and terrorism, the Chinese government said on
Wednesday.
In a joint communique
released by China’s foreign
ministry following a visit
to Beijing by Thai Prime
Minister Prayuth Chanocha, both countries said
they would hold defence
and security dialogue between their defence ministries.
Reuters
10 more strikes against the
militants on Tuesday, destroying various fighting
positions, the US military
said in a statement.
The seven strikes in
Syria and three in Iraq
also struck a unit of Islamic State fighters as well as
some of the militants’ oil
collection equipment, according to the Combined
Joint Task Force for the operation.—Reuters
A general view shows the town of Sinjar as smoke rises from what activists said were
US-led air strikes on 22 Dec, 2014. —Reuters
Suicide
Islamic State captures Jordanian
pilot after warplane downed in Syria bomber kills
Amman / Beirut, 24
Dec — Islamic State fighters took a Jordanian pilot
captive after his warplane
was downed in northeastern
Syria on Wednesday, the
first captive taken from the
US-led coalition battling the
jihadi group.
Jordan’s armed forces
said one of its pilots had been
captured after his plane fell
during an air raid over the
northeastern Syrian province
of Raqqa on Wednesday.
“Jordan holds the group
(IS) and its supporters responsible for the safety of
the pilot and his life,” an
army statement read on state
television said. It did not say
whether the plane was shot
down.
Islamic State social
media accounts published
pictures purportedly of the
warplane’s pilot being held
by the group’s fighters as
well as images of what they
said was his Jordanian military ID card. The images
were verified by two close
relatives contacted by Reuters who said they had been
notified by the head of the
Jordanian air force the pilot
was held captive.
One of the images
showed the pilot in a white
shirt being led out of the water by several armed fighters. Another showed him on
land surrounded by at least
a dozen fighters in military
fatigues and equipped with
assault rifles.
Jordan is one of the
countries participating in
the US-led coalition set up
to battle Islamic State and
which has been bombing Islamic State targets in Syria
since September.
Saudi Arabia, Qatar,
Bahrain and the United Arab
Emirates have also participated in or supported the
strikes against Islamic State
targets in Syria, according to
US Central Command.
Raqqa province, which
borders Turkey, is almost
entirely under the control of
Islamic State fighters.
Boosted by arms seized
in Iraq, the group evicted
most rival rebels from the
province earlier this year and
took control of a string of
government military bases
over the summer, including
an air base. —Reuters
17 people
south of
Baghdad
Baghdad, 24 Dec —
A suicide bomber killed
17 people and wounded 33
others in Madaen, 45 km
(15 miles) south of Baghdad on Wednesday, Iraq
police and medical officials
said.
The dead were 14 Sunni pro-government fighters and three soldiers. The
bomber blew himself up
near a line of pro-government fighters waiting for
their salaries, the official
said, adding they expected
the toll to rise.
Reuters
12
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
world
South Korea seeks China’s
cooperation in probe into
cyberattack on nuclear operator
South Korean President
Park Geun-hye
Seoul, 24 Dec —
South Korea is seeking the
cooperation of Chinese authorities in a probe into a
cyberattack on its nuclear
power plant operator after
tracing multiple Internet addresses involved to a northeastern Chinese city near
North Korea, a prosecution
official said on Wednesday.
The location of the
Internet addresses, which
were used to connect to networks in South Korea for
the attacks, did not prove
the source of the hack was
either China or North Korea, said the official, who
spoke on condition of anonymity.
“When we have the
cooperation of the Chinese,
where of course we don’t
have jurisdiction, we will be
asking for checks or maybe
a search of the location of
the IP addresses,” the official said.
“As we’re doing this,
there is a possibility that the
IP addresses in China are
not the final source but used
in a routing. It’s possible
(the network) in China was
used (remotely) from some
other location.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua
Chunying said: “I regret
that I’m not aware of the
specific situation but I can
tell you, China’s relevant
position has been consistent. We resolutely oppose
hacking activities in any
form.”
Korea Hydro and
Nuclear Power Co Ltd
(KHNP), which runs South
Korea’s 23 nuclear power
reactors, said last week its
computer systems had been
hacked but only non-critical
data had been stolen. Operations were not at risk, it
said.
The official close to the
investigation reiterated his
team had not ruled out the
involvement of North Korea
in the attack but there was
also no indication yet to believe it was involved. North
Korea remains technically
at war with the South.
Connections to South
Korean virtual private networks (VPNs) used in the
cyberattacks were traced
to multiple IP addresses in
China’s Shenyang city, located in a province which
borders North Korea, the
official said. The country’s
nuclear operator, watchdog
and the ministry have set up
emergency teams to remain
on stand-by for two days
starting from Wednesday
as a self-claimed hacker
demanded the shutdown of
three reactors by Thursday
in Twitter messages, threatening to create “destruction”.
President Park Geun-hye has called the leaks
“grave” and cyber security has been boosted at the
country’s nuclear plants.
The incident at the nuclear operator came after
the United States accused
North Korea of a serious
cyberattack on Sony Pictures and vowed to respond
proportionately.—Reuters
Photo taken on 23 Dec, 2014 shows the London Eye in London, Britain.—Xinhua
Modi orders insurance, coal reforms
after stymied by parliament
New Delhi, 24 Dec —
The cabinet approved an
executive order on Wednesday to implement coal and
insurance reforms, a government official said, underlining the administration’s
resolve to push through
economic measures despite
political opposition in parliament.
Under the order, foreign firms can increase
their participation in insurance joint ventures from
26 percent to 49 percent, a
potential lifeline for a sector starved of capital and
Local women carry coal taken from open cast coal field at Dhanbad District
in Jharkhand on 19 Sept, 2012.—Reuters
US to pay $3.2 million to contractor freed from Cuba prison
Alan Gross faces a news conference in Washington
hours after his release from Cuba on 17 Dec, 2014.
Reuters
squeezed by regulations.
The move came after
the government’s plan to introduce a bill to increase the
foreign investment cap was
blocked in the upper house
of parliament by opposition
deputies who demanded
that it rein in Hindu hard-
Miami, 24 Dec — Alan
Gross, the contractor freed
last week after five years in a
Cuban jail will receive $3.2
million (2 million pounds)
from the US government as
part of a settlement with his
employer, the US Agency
for International Development (USAID) announced
on Tuesday.
Gross was employed by
Bethesda, Maryland-based
DAI as part of a USAID-financed project in Cuba.
DAI had sought $7 million
for Gross, said a USAID
spokesman.
“Our
understanding
is that the money will go
to Alan Gross as part of an
agreement between the two
parties,” the USAID spokesman said. The money would
be paid in the next few days,
he added.
DAI spokesman Steven
O’Connor said the company
was “delighted to have Alan
home and pleased to have
this legal matter settled.”
Gross had been jailed
in Cuba since December
2009 until his release last
week as the governments of
the United States and communist-run Cuba restored
diplomatic relations and
swapped prisoners.
His detention was a ma-
jor obstacle to improvement
in US-Cuban relations after
more than 50 years of hostility. The settlement calls
for payment by USAID for
unanticipated claims under
a cost-reimbursement contract, including claims related to Gross, USAID said in
its statement.
Gross and his wife Judy
filed a $60 million lawsuit
in November 2012 for gross
negligence against DAI and
the US government. Gross
settled with DAI for undisclosed terms in May 2013,
and a US district court rejected his claim against the
government, which was upheld last month on appeal.
A lawyer for Gross de-
liners pushing a partisan
agenda.
Modi won a national election this year but he
lacks a majority in the upper
house which is indirectly
elected by state legislators.
Finiancial firms led by
Max India (MAXI.NS) and
Reliance Capital (RLCP.
NS) rallied on news of the
government decree which
has to be approved by lawmakers within six weeks of
the opening of the next session of parliament—scheduled for the start of February.
The cabinet also renewed another order opening up the coal industry to
the private sector after a bill
on the issue similarly failed
to make headway in parliament. “Both insurance and
coal ordnance were cleared
by the cabinet this morning,” a government official
said, speaking on condition
of anonymity. The president
has to sign off the decrees.
Reuters
clined to discuss the settlement but added that it was
planning to seek a review
by the Supreme Court of its
case against the US government.
Gross was serving a
15-year sentence for providing Internet equipment to
Jewish Cubans under a US
programme that Cuba views
as subversive. Information
is tightly controlled on the
Caribbean island, Internet
use is limited, and visitors
are not allowed to carry satellite technology.
The United States says
Gross was merely helping
Cubans get connected as
part of a democracy-building project.—Reuters
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
13
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MV marinos voy No (001)
Consignees of cargo carried on MV marinos
voy No (001) are hereby notified that the vessel
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to the byelaws and conditions of the Port of Yangon.
Damaged cargo will be surveyed daily from 8
am to 11:20 am and 12 noon to 4 pm to Claims Day
now declared as the third day after final discharge of
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No claims against this vessel will be admitted
after the Claims Day.
Shipping Agency Department
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Agent for: M/s china shipping lines
Phone No: 2301185
Claims Day Notice
MV daewai star voy No (001)
Consignees of cargo carried on MV daewai
star voy No (001) are hereby notified that the
vessel will be arriving on 25.12.2014 and cargo will
be discharged into the premises of M.I.P where it will
lie at the consignee’s risk and expenses and subject
to the byelaws and conditions of the Port of Yangon.
Damaged cargo will be surveyed daily from 8
am to 11:20 am and 12 noon to 4 pm to Claims Day
now declared as the third day after final discharge of
cargo from the Vessel.
No claims against this vessel will be admitted
after the Claims Day.
Shipping Agency Department
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Agent for: M/s continetal shipping
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Phone No: 2301185
Australian foreign minister hopeful Egypt
will release Al Jazeera journalist
Sydney, 24 Dec —
Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said on
Wednesday the case of
jailed Australian journalist
Peter Greste is “under consideration” by high levels
of the Egyptian government and she is hopeful of
his release by the end of the
year.
“I urged (the Egyptian
foreign minister) to consider releasing Peter Greste
for Christmas, we wanted
him out and home as soon
as possible,” Bishop told
the Seven Network.
“We’ve got our fingers
Two dead,
three missing
after fishing
ship sinks in
Sea of Japan
Matsue, (Japan), 24
Dec — Two fishermen
died and three others are
crossed, we don’t know
whether we have secured
this yet.”
Egyptian
President
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi sug-
gested in November he
was considering pardoning Greste and two other
journalists of Qatar-based
Al Jazeera television who
have been in jail for a year.
The three journalists
were sentenced in June to
between seven and 10 years
jail on charges including
spreading lies to help a
“terrorist organization”, an
allusion to the banned Muslim Brotherhood.
Greste and possibly
Canadian-Egyptian
Mohamed Fahmy could be
pardoned. However, the
third journalist, Baher
Mohamed, is Egyptian, so
would not be expected to
benefit.
Human rights groups
and Western governments
have condemned the trial
of the journalists and the
United Nations questioned
Egypt’s judicial independence. The affair has
contributed to tensions between Egypt and Qatar.
An appeal for Greste is
due to be heard on 1 January.
“It would be very exciting if there were some
steps taken before then,”
Bishop said.—Reuters
missing after a fishing vessel sank in the Sea of Japan
early on Wednesday, the
Japan Coast Guard said.
The 135-ton No 1
Gempuku Maru with a
crew of 20 men — 17 Japanese nationals and three Indonesians — sank in waters
some 48 kilometers off the
city of Hamada, Shimane
Prefecture, in western Japan at around 4:40 am on
Wednesday, coast guard
officers said.
Crew members from
other boats rescued 17 of
the fishing vessel’s crew,
two of whom later died,
but the three others remain
missing.
The two dead were
identified
as
Shoichi
Yokoyama, 59, and Keiji
Tsukamoto, 56, both residents of the city of Hirado,
Nagasaki Prefecture.
The three missing
are Mitsuyoshi Hamamoto, 52, Yoichi Imanishi,
60, and Akihiro Matsuguchi, 54, the coast guard
said, adding five others
were injured and taken to
a hospital in Hamada.
The Japan Coast
Guard sent patrol boats
to search for the missing
fishermen.—Kyodo News
Australian Foreign
Minister Julie Bishop
Weather
Weather report
report
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China asks Japan to be on peaceful
path after Abe renamed PM
Beijing, 24 Dec — A Chinese government official
on Wednesday renewed a call on Japan to appropriately
face wartime history and pursue a peaceful development
after Shinzo Abe was reelected by parliament as Japanese
prime minister.
“A long-term steady and sound development of Sino-Japanese relations serves the fundamental interest
of the countries,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua
Chunying told a Press briefing. “We hope that Japan will
work toward the same direction with China...will follow
the path of peaceful development.”—Kyodo News
Senior US nuclear official Burns
to head regulatory agency
Washington, 24 Dec — US President Barack Obama
has promoted a senior official of the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission to succeed Allison Macfarlane as chairman,
the commission said on Tuesday.
Stephen Burns, an NRC commissioner who has held
various posts at the organization for more than three decades, will take the top post 1 January, the commission
said. His five-year term will expire in 2019.
The commission is a Maryland-based body independent of the federal government. It helped the Japanese
government and Tokyo Electric Power Co contain the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, set off by an
earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.
Burns was head of legal affairs of the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development before returning to the NRC as commissioner in November.
Macfarlane, who is stepping down, will take a post at
George Washington University, according to the commission. — Kyodo News
Beijing bans private clubs in public parks
Beijing, 24 Dec — Beijing is seeking to ban private
clubs located in city parks
as part of the latest effort to
crack down on hedonism
and extravagance among officials.
Private clubs using public resources such as pavilions, towers and aisles will
be banned across the city’s
300 plus parks, effective on
10 Jan, 2015, according to a
recently published guideline.
Public anger has been
rising against private clubs,
which are often illicitly built
with public resources, sometimes in historical buildings
or parks, and frequently
visited by the powerful and
rich. The guideline defines
private clubs as high-end
restaurants, gyms, beauty parlors, hotels and other
entertainment venues built
on public resources inside
parks.
Renovation or reconstruction of old buildings in
parks cannot be done without government permission,
and new buildings can only
be constructed with official approval. The decree
also bans billboards such as
“tourists not allowed” and
“no entry” in the parks.
The guideline is Beijing’s answer to an October
decree by China’s central
authority that prohibits pri-
vate clubs in historical buildings, parks and other public
facilities.
The CPC has been effectively fighting corruption
since Xi Jinping took the
helm in November 2012,
targeting official decadence
and corruption in its ban
of luxury banquets, flower
arrangements in meeting
rooms, expensive liquor,
delicacies such as shark fin,
and luxurious gifts during
festivals.
Officials are also ordered not to use public money to attend expensive training programs such as EMBA
classes to network with businessmen.—Xinhua
Illegal Indonesian migrant workers returning from Malaysia arrive at Halim
Perdanakusumah military airport base in Jakarta, capital of Indonesia,
on 23 Dec, 2014. —Xinhua
14
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
entertainment
Director
Angelina
Jolie and cast
members Miyavi
(R) and Jack
O’Connell
(L) pose for
the media to
promote her film
“Unbroken’’
in Berlin on 27
Nov, 2014.
Reuters
Angelina Jolie’s ‘Unbroken’
mines human spirit, survival
New York, 24 Dec —
Angelina Jolie never expected to direct a film with
shark attacks, plane crashes
and prisoner-of-war camps,
but she found the story of
a World War Two hero
so compelling she tackled
them in “Unbroken,” a biopic about survival, faith
and forgiveness.
The
Oscar-winning
actress and second-time
director was half-way
through Laura Hillenbrand’s best-selling book
about Olympic runner
and POW survivor Louis
“Louie” Zamperini when
she knew she wanted to
make it into a film.
“I would never have
thought of myself handling
that kind of cinematic film
making,” said Jolie, 39.
“But I cared about the story
so I had to suddenly learn
to do all those things.”
The film opens in US
theatres on Christmas.
Shot in Australia with
a script by Joel and Ethan
Coen, “Unbroken” follows
Zamperini as a bombardier
in an air fight with enemy
planes and through two
harrowing crashes.
After his plane plummets into the Pacific in
1943, he survives 47 days
adrift in a life raft battling
starvation and sharks. He is
fished out of the ocean, imprisoned in Japanese POW
camps and tortured, pushed
to the edge of human endurance.
“It’s a movie for everybody,” said Jolie. “I want
my children to know about
men like Louie, so when
they feel bad about themselves and they think all is
lost, they know they’ve got
something inside them, because that is what this story
speaks to, what is in all of
us.”
English actor Jack
O’Connell, 24, won the
National Board of Review’s 2014 breakthrough
performance award and
plaudits for his portrayal of
Zamperini.
Reuters
Remake of ‘The Gambler’
turns to theme of redemption
(L-R) Cast member
Anthony Kelley,
producer Stephen
Levinson, director
Rupert Wyatt, cast
members John
Goodman and
Mark Wahlberg
and producer Irwin
Winkler pose during
premiere of the film
“The Gambler”
in Los Angeles,
California on 10 Nov,
2014. —Reuters
New York, 24 Dec
— From the opening shot
of the new remake of the
classic 1970s film “The
Gambler,” a different Mark
Wahlberg is on view from
the scrappy, uninhibited
characters he has traditionally played.
As English professor
Jim Bennett, a tear runs
down Wahlberg’s cheek as
he sits at his dying grandfather’s bedside.
“This particular part
was an opportunity for me
to do something different,” the actor told a news
conference. “I am used to
playing the underdog, as
opposed to the guy who has
everything.”
“The Gambler,” which
opens on Christmas day,
chronicles the week-long
downward spiral of disaffected Bennett, who despite all the trappings of
success and privilege is
bent on self-destruction via
high-stakes gambling.
Jessica Lange plays
Bennett’s wealthy, outof-patience mother, Brie
Larson is a star pupil with
whom he becomes romantically involved, and John
Goodman is a philosophical loan shark.
Intent on defying expectations, the filmmakers
said they aimed to take a
different approach to the
story of the gambler, a
role memorably played by
James Caan 40 years ago.
“The 1974 film was
about gambling addiction,
and I happen to come from
a mindset where I think
everything is voluntary,”
said writer William Monahan, describing his take on
the story.
“I don’t believe in
addiction,” said the Oscar-winning writer of “The
Departed,” a film that
scored Wahlberg a best
supporting actor nomination and also won best picture.
Reuters
Actresses need to act
their age: Russell Crowe
London, 24 Dec — Russell Crowe
feels older stars should not expect to be
cast as young characters. Crowe, 50, said
there are roles out there but the older actresses still expect to be cast as young
characters, reported Contactmusic.
“I think you’ll find that the woman who
is saying that (the roles have dried up) is the
woman who at 40, 45, 48, still wants to play
the ingenue, and can’t understand why she’s
not being cast as the 21 year old,” he said.
Crowe added that film stars need to
ensure they are comfortable with who they
are in order to succeed in the industry.
“If you are willing to live in your own
skin, you can work as an actor. If you are
trying to pretend that you’re still the young
buck when you’re my age, it just doesn’t
work,” he said.—PTI
‘Star Trek 3’ film to open
in US theatres in July 2016
New York, 24 Dec — “Star Trek 3,”
the latest film in the intergalactic franchise
featuring Captain Kirk and the crew of the
USS Enterprise, will open in US theatres
on 8 July, 2016, Paramount Pictures said
on Tuesday.
The release will coincide with the 50th
anniversary of the original “Star Trek” series starring William Shatner as Kirk and
Leonard Nimoy as the pointy-eared First
Officer Spock.
“Fast and Furious” director Justin
Lin is set to direct the latest film in the
Star Trek franchise. The first two movies
were helmed by “Lost” TV show creator
JJ Abrams, who rebooted the franchise,
based on the popular TV show and earlier
film adaptations.
Abrams is directing “Star Wars: The
Force Awakens” but will be a producer on
the film.
Director of the movie JJ Abrams poses at
the party for the release of the Blu-Ray
DVD of “Star Trek Into Darkness’’ at
the California Science Centre in Los
Angeles, California on 10 Sept, 2013.
Reuters
The “Star Trek’ films have earned
more than $1.2 billion at the US box office
since 1979, according to boxofficemojo.
com.—Reuters
One Direction sing Christmas song
Los Angeles, 24 Dec — British
boyband One Direction sang ‘Santa
Claus Is Coming to Town’ while playing
instruments like drum, triangle and banana-shaped maraca on a TV chat show.
One Direction made an appearance on
‘The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon’ and joined the show’s host for a song,
reported Ace Showbiz.
Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik,
Louis Tomlinson and Liam Payne all looked
cute in bright-coloured Christmas-y jumpers
as they showcased their sweet vocals while
playing instruments like snare drum, triangle
and banana-shaped maraca alongside Fallon
and the members of The Roots.—PTI
One Direction sang ‘Santa Claus Is Coming to Town’ while playing instruments like
drum, triangle and banana-shaped maraca on a TV chat show.—PTI
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
15
general
Southampton sign Dutch winger Elia
on loan from Bremen
L ondon , 24 Dec —
Southampton have agreed
to sign Werder Bremen’s
Netherlands winger Eljero Elia on loan until the
end of the season, the Premier League club said on
Tuesday. “The winger will
officially join Saints on
Saturday 3rd January, initially on loan until the end
of the season with a view to
a permanent transfer next
summer,” the club said on
their website.
The 27-year-old Elia
will provide cover for Eng-
Emir Spahic challenges Eljero Elia (L) during a
Bundesliga soccer match in Leverkusen
on 12 Sept, 2014. — Reuters
land forward Jay Rodriguez,
who has been sidelined by
cruciate knee ligament surgery, and Senegal winger
Sadio Mane who is heading
to the Africa Cup of Nations
in January.
Elia, who was a member of the Netherlands
World Cup squad in Brazil
this year, began his career
with ADO Den Haag before moving to FC Twente.
He then joined Hamburg
SV and had a brief spell at
Juventus before signing for
Bremen in 2012.—Reuters
Navas, Wambach win CONCACAF
Players of Year awards
Real Madrid’s goalkeeper
Keylor Navas gestures
during a news conference
on the eve of their
Champions League soccer
match against Ludogorets
at the Valdebebas training
grounds, outside Madrid
on 8 Dec, 2014.—Reuters
M i a m i , 24 Dec —
Costa Rica’s World Cup
goalkeeper Keylor Navas
and United States women’s
team striker Abby Wambach were named CONCACAF’s Players of the Year
for 2014 on Tuesday.
The governing body
for the sport in North and
Central America and the
Caribbean also named
Jorge Luis Pinto Coach
of the Year after he led
Costa Rica to the last eight
at the World Cup for the
first time.
Navas, 28, produced
Sony considering sale of
unit that owns Beatles
songs — WSJ
New York, 24 Dec —
Sony Corp is considering a
sale of its Sony/ATV Music
Publishing unit, which owns
the rights to most of the Beatles’ songs, the Wall Street
Journal reported, citing the
company’s leaked internal
emails.
The unit, which Sony
owns jointly with deceased
pop star Michael Jackson’s
estate, is estimated to be
worth $1.5 billion-$2 billion
(0.96-1.28 billion pounds),
the Journal said.
Sony/ATV Music declined to comment on the
report.
It is currently not clear
if Sony will sell its stake
in the unit or the entire
business will be put on the
block, the Journal said.
The leaked documents
do not indicate an expected
price and the timing of a
potential sale, the newspaper said.
Sony is still reeling
from the disclosures in documents released by computer hackers, which have exposed internal discussions
key to the company’s future
to public scrutiny.—Reuters
some outstanding displays
for Costa Rica in the World
Cup with three clean sheets
from five matches and
winning three Man of the
Match Awards.
Following the World
Cup, Navas completed a
move to Spanish giants
Real Madrid.
Wambach, the 34-yearold striker, who has scored
more goals in international
football than any male or
female with 177 in 228
games, had another fine
season including scoring
four goals in the final of
the CONCACAF Women’s
Championship in 2014 in
which the United States
beat Costa Rica 6-0.
Pinto was rewarded
for Costa Rica’s memorable World Cup campaign
where they finished top of
their group ahead of Uruguay, Italy and England and
then beat Greece on penalties before losing to the
Netherlands in a shootout
after a goalless draw.
Pinto became head
coach of the Honduran
national team earlier this
month.
United States and
Everton keeper Tim Howard won CONCACAF
Goalkeeper of the year for
the second year while Costa
Rica’s Bryan Ruiz’s strike
against Italy in the World
Cup was voted Goal of the
Year.
American Mark Geiger
was voted Referee of the
Year. The awards are voted
on by three constituencies
— national team coaches
and captains, media and
fans.—Reuters
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China Cup Chinese speech contest held in western Japan
Osaka, 24 Dec— The eighth annual China Cup Chinese speech contest for overseas Chinese children and youngsters
in Japan was held in Kobe, western Japan on Tuesday, with 44 Japanese Chinese students taking part.
The contestants gave speeches in Mandarin on bridge, a theme set beforehand. Most of them were born and grew up
in Japan and some of them started to learn Chinese only a couple of years ago. Yet they speak Chinese fluently and told
the audience about their understandings of bridge.
“Bridge signifies communication between people. I hope I can build a bridge of friendship between the Japanese and
Chinese people in the future, and promote relationship between the two countries.” said Li, a contestant aged ten from
Kobe. “Language is a bridge. My mother came from China and I was born in Japan. I can speak both Chinese and Japanese, and I would like to tell my Japanese friends about Chinese culture and Chinese friends about Japan, and help them
to know each other better,” said another contestant Hirano. “The contest aims to provide a platform for young Chinese in
Japan to exhibit their Chinese-speaking skills and encourage them to learn the Chinese language better, in the hope that
they could become envoys of friendship between the two countries in the future.” said Hu Shiyun, one of the organizers of
the contest and head of Overseas Chinese Association in Western Japan. China Cup Chinese speech contest for overseas
Chinese children and youngsters in Japan has been held annually since 2007, and are cosponsored by Chinese Educators’
Association in Western Japan and Kansai Chinese Teachers’ Association. —Xinhua
Buenos Aires Tecnopolis to host 2015 Argentina-Brazil match
Buenos Aires, 24 Dec
— Argentina’s Tecnopolis
theme park, located in the
Greater Buenos Aires area,
will host the first-round Argentina vs Brazil match of
the 2015 Davis Cup World
Group.
The March 6 to 8 series
will take place at the out-
door clay court of the venue,
in the city’s northern Villa
Martelli district, Argentina’s Tennis Association
(AAT) said on Tuesday.
“An all-South American clash sees neighbours
and long-term rivals Argentina and Brazil battle it
out for the first time in the
World Group,” is how Davis
Cup organizers described
the upcoming match on its
website.
Argentina’s new captain, Daniel Orsanic, has
brought Juan Martin del Potro, the country’s best tennis
player, back to the team
after a more than two-year
absence sparked by differences with squad managers.
Del Potro, champion of
the 2009 US Open, will join
a team that also comprises
Carlos Berlocq, Leonardo
Mayer and Federico Delbonis.
“The entire team has to
be as competitive as possible
to achieve the best outcome.
But today I think more
about transmitting values
like responsibility, effort,
discipline — the character
building that comes from
tennis. If I can transmit
these values to the youngest,
my dream will have come
true,” said Orsanic.
Brazil’s strongest players, meanwhile, are Thomaz
Bellucci, and the doubles
players Bruno Soares and
Marcelo Melo.
Argentina has never
won a Davis Cup, but was
runner up on four occasions,
in 1981, 2006, 2008 and
2011. —Xinhua
Thursday, 25 December, 2014
5th Waxing Day of Pyatho 1376 ME
Madrid, 24 Dec — Atletico Madrid president
Enrique Cerezo has hinted at a possible deal to bring
struggling Spain forward Fernando Torres back to his
boyhood club.
Cerezo said the Spanish champions’ coach Diego
Simeone had the squad he needs to compete in La
Liga, the Champions League and the King’s Cup but
did not rule out Torres returning to the club he left in
2007 to join Liverpool.
Torres moved from Chelsea to AC Milan on a
two-year loan deal in August but the switch has yet
to help the 30-year-old rediscover anything like the
form that lit up the English Premier League during his
first few seasons.
“He (Torres) is not here but that does not mean
that he won’t be,” Cerezo was quoted as saying in
local media on Tuesday.
“Right now we have a great team and we believe
that all the positions are well covered but that does
not mean that up until the last hour of 31 January, we
won’t bring someone in,” he added. “We have a fantastic team that will fight for all three titles.”
A World Cup and two-time European Championship winner with Spain, Torres had a mostly forgettable time at Chelsea since joining from Liverpool for
50 million pounds in 2011 but did help the Londoners
win the Champions League the following year.
At Milan, he has made 10 appearances in Serie A
but only managed one goal and has been thoroughly outshone by France forward Jeremy Menez.—Reuters
Ibra unhappy at coming second
on list of Swedish greats
Stockholm, 24 Dec —
Striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic
has dismissed his second-place finish on a list of
Sweden’s all-time sporting
greats behind tennis master
Bjorn Borg.
“Thank you but to finish second is like finishing
last,” he informed the Dagens Nyheter newspaper
through his brand manager
Mika Lepisto.
The 33-year-old Paris St Germain striker was
second in the list of 150
Swedish sportspeople, created by the newspaper as
part of their 150th-anniversary celebrations.
Asked
where
he
would have put himself
in the rankings, Ibra said:
“On that list I would have
been number one, two,
three, four and five, with
due respect to the others.”
Instead, the newspa-
Zlatan Ibrahimovic
per jury selected tennis
great Borg, who won 11
grand slam tournaments in
a stellar career that Ibrahimovic acknowledged.
“Bjorn Borg is a cool
person and a living legend,” said Ibra, who has
scored 51 goals in 101
games for Sweden and
has won titles at many of
Europe’s leading clubs including Ajax Amsterdam,
Juventus, Inter Milan.
Barcelona, AC MIlan and
PSG.—Reuters
London, 24 Dec — None of Manchester United’s
injured players are likely to be fit for the next Premier
League match against Newcastle United, manager Louis
van Gaal said on Tuesday.
Daley Blind, Marcos Rojo, Luke Shaw,
Marouane Fellaini, Ander Herrera and
Chris Smalling missed the 1-1 draw at
Aston Villa and only Smalling has an
outside chance of returning against
Newcastle at Old Trafford on Friday.
“For a few players it is fine
because they are recovering quickly,” Van Gaal told reporters.
“You also have players who
are not recovering so quickly, so I
have to rotate. I have a lot of injured
players, that is the problem with these
matches.”
United’s 1-1 draw at Villa ended a run of
six successive wins which has lifted Van Gaal’s side to
third.
“We want to build a fortress at Old Trafford and we
have made it that already because we have won a lot, and
with great results,” Van Gaal said.
“We have to continue, but there are no easy games
in the Premier League.” United travel to Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday and Stoke City on Thursday before an FA Cup third-round trip to Yeovil.
“My record in away matches as a
coach is not so bad,” Van Gaal said.
“Away, teams are more open and
want to attack but here they want
to defend. That is why we have to
build up a certain playing style so
we can dominate. I’m saying every
week that we are dominating for
45 or 60 minutes. We have to dominate for 90 minutes.”
Radamel Falcao headed the
equaliser against Villa, only his second goal for United, and Van Gaal is
looking for more from the on-loan Colombian striker. “He can be in great form, but the
team has to be in great form. That allows Falcao to show
his qualities,” the Dutchman said. “When the cross is not
coming from Ashley Young, then he cannot show what
he has done in the last match.”—Reuters
Chelsea aim to deny rivals City any festive cheer
London, 24 Dec — The omens are good for a
Chelsea side heading into Christmas top of the Premier
League tree but manager Jose Mourinho does not want
to give title rivals Manchester City any reason to cheer
over the festive season.
Having beaten Stoke City 2-0 at the Britannia Stadium on Monday, the London club ensured they went
into a busy fixture schedule leading the table with 42
points from 17 matches.
The last three times Chelsea have been top on
Christmas Day they have gone on to win the title, but
with in-form City hot on their heels three points behind,
Mourinho is taking nothing for granted with testing
matches to come.
Sam Allardyce’s fourth-placed West Ham United
travel to Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge ground on Friday
before Mourinho’s men head to Southampton on Sunday and then make the short trip across London to face
Tottenham Hotspur on New Year’s Day.
“Now we have to focus on the three matches we
still have until the end of this period,” Mourinho told
reporters after the victory at Stoke.
“Playing against Big Sam is a hard job for us, we
have to cope with it. The three-point lead we have is a
little advantage, it is a little pillow we have to protect
us. “We have been top of the league since day one and
we are there because we are playing really well. Our
Christmas fixtures are more difficult than any other one
(club).”
Second-placed City travel to West Bromwich Albion in search of a seventh straight league win but they
are still without injured strikers Stevan Jovetic, Edin
Neymar:
I have
learned
from World
Cup pain
Praia Grande, 24 Dec
— Neymar says he has
learned important lessons
from his 2014 World Cup
heartbreak as he looks to
2015 for redemption.
The Brazil captain on
Tuesday reiterated that a
back injury suffered during
his team’s 2-1 World Cup
quarterfinal victory over
Colombia in July was one
of the “worst moments” of
his life. Neymar was ruled
out of the tournament with
a fractured vertebra after
clashing with Colombia’s
Camilo Zuniga late in the
match in Fortaleza.
The hosts were eliminated from the World
Cup four days later when
Dzeko and Sergio Aguero.
Captain Vincent Kompany is
also missing for Manuel
Pellegrini’s side but
midfielder David
Silva, having
scored twice
in City’s 3-0
home win over
Crystal Palace
last weekend, is
ready to strike
against struggling West
Brom.
“I like
to play in the
middle,
even
though I can play
on both wings,”
Silva said. “When
I play in the middle I
get chances to score. That is
why I scored the two goals.
But I will be happy to
help the team when the
strikers are back.”
Elsewhere on Friday, third-placed Manchester
United, whose progress up the league was slowed with
a 1-1 draw at Aston Villa last weekend, host Newcastle
United while Arsenal welcome London rivals Queens
Park Rangers to the Emirates.—Reuters
they lost 7-1 to eventual
winners Germany in Belo
Horizonte. “It was a year
of lessons, happiness and
sadness,” the Barcelona
forward said during the
opening of his Neymar Jr
Institute for underprivileged children.
“It was an excellent
World Cup from a certain
point of view. But then I
got injured and that was
one of the worst moments
of my life.”
Neymar has already
scored 16 goals from 19
matches in all competitions
for Barcelona this season.
He has also shone
for Brazil since replacing
Thiago Silva as captain in
September.
He scored all four
goals in the 4-0 victory
over Japan in October and
added a brace in a 4-0 rout
of Turkey in November.
The Selecao No 10
looks set to again be his
team’s central figure at
the Copa America in Chile
next June and July.
Xinhua
[email protected]
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Spain’s
Fernando
Torres
celebrates
after scoring
a goal during
the 2014
World Cup
Group B
soccer match
between
Australia and
Spain at the
Baixada arena
in Curitiba on
23 June, 2014.
Reuters
No injury returns for
Man United, says Van Gaal
“R/489 Printed and published at the Global New Light of Myanmar Printing Factory at No. 150,
Nga Htat Kyee Pagoda Road, Bahan Township, Yangon, by the Global New Light of Myanmar Daily.”
Atletico president hints
at possible Torres return