American Bill Richardson, quitting the board chaired by Thai former foreign minister Surakiart Sathirathai, said he was particularly incensed over the suppression of press freedom in Myanmar.

“I was extremely upset at State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s reaction to my request that she address the situation of the two Reuters journalists both swiftly and fairly,” Richardson said in his statement, which was later posted on the Twitter feed of Dutch diplomat Laetitia van den Assum.

“Freedom of the press to report the facts is a fundamental bedrock of democracy.”

Richardson, a former governor of the US state of New Mexico, was a member of the five-member Advisory Board on the Implementation of Recommendations on Rakhine State.

He’d been in Nay Pyi Taw for the board’s inaugural meeting, chaired by Surakiart and with Suu Kyi in attendance.

“It has become clear that I cannot in good conscience serve in this role,” Richardson said. “In the Advisory Board’s initial meeting with Daw Suu, I was taken aback by the vigour with which the media, the United Nations, human rights group, and in general the international community were disparaged.

“I was also alarmed by the lack of sincerity with which the critical issue of citizenship was discussed [and] moreover [by] Daw Suu’s furious response at my suggestion that the case against the two arrested Reuters journalists be addressed swiftly, as a way to protect freedom of the press in an increasingly constraint environment.”

Richardson said his scheduled meeting with Myanmar’s minister of home affairs was abruptly cancelled.

He acknowledged it was important to recognise that the military still wields significant power and that the military blamed Rohingya militants for the exodus of more than half a million Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh, but insisted that the absence of Suu Kyi’s “moral leadership” on the issue was of great concern.

Richardson said he was also concerned that Surakiart was not “genuinely committed” to implementing the recommendations made last August, just as the current crisis erupted, by the Rakhine Advisory Commission led by former United Nations chief Kofi Annan.

Nor did Richardson feel Surakiart was committed to addressing the root causes of the conflict in Rakhine.

“He [Surakiart] parroted the dangerous and untrue notion that international NGOs employ radicals and that the humanitarian agencies are providing material support to ARSA,” Richardson wrote, referring to the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, a militant group that launched attacks on Myanmar security outposts last summer.

The attacks triggered a brutal response from the military – a “clearance operation” in which hundreds of Rohingya were killed and an estimated 655,000 displaced from their homes.

Contacted by The Nation, Surakiart’s team declined to comment, saying the Myanmar government would respond to Richardson’s resignation soon.

In his annual World Communication Day message held on the feast day of Francis de Sales, the patron saint of journalists, the Pope referred to Eve being fooled by the snake as “the first fake news”.

“We need to unmask what could be called the ‘snake-tactics’ used by those who disguise themselves in order to strike,” he said.

“Fake news” was popularised as a phrase by Donald Trump during his victorious 2016 US presidential election campaign and first year in the White House.

Trump uses it as a barb towards what he believes is a mainstream media biased against him, but it has come to be used as a way of describing the proliferation of outlets and websites publishing invented news stories as a tool of political propaganda.

Pope Francis used the story of Adam and Eve, from the Old Testament’s Book of Genesis, to highlight that “there is no such thing as harmless disinformation; on the contrary, trusting in falsehood can have dire consequences. Even a seemingly slight distortion of the truth can have dangerous effects”.

In the story, the snake convinces Eve and then Adam into eating the forbidden fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, an act which leads to God expelling them from the Garden of Eden.

“Spreading fake news can serve to advance specific goals, influence political decisions, and serve economic interests. The effectiveness of fake news is primarily due to its ability to mimic real news, to seem plausible,” added Francis.

“The most radical antidote to the virus of falsehood is purification by the truth.”

In order to discern the truth from the lie, the Pope suggests that people look at the results and see “whether they provoke quarrels, foment division, encourage resignation; or, on the other hand, they promote informed and mature reflection leading to constructive dialogue and fruitful results”.

He also looked towards journalism as “not just a job” but “a mission”, and journalists as “protectors of news” who should promote a “journalism of peace”.

“I mean a journalism that is truthful and opposed to falsehoods, rhetorical slogans, and sensational headlines,” he said.

Changi Airport, which handled a record number of passengers, flights and cargo last year , will continue to leverage technology to handle even more traffic, while waiting for expansion projects such as the construction of Terminal 5 (T5) to be completed.

Between January 2017 and last month, total passenger traffic grew by 6 per cent year on year to 62.2 million, Changi Airport Group (CAG) said yesterday (Jan 23).

Aircraft movements during the period rose by 3.5 per cent to 373,200 landings and take-offs, while air cargo volumes grew by almost 8 per cent to 2.13 million tonnes.

South-east Asia and North-east Asia accounted for about seven in 10 passengers Changi Airport handled during the year.

Among the airport’s top 10 country markets, India and China led the pack with double-digit growth of 16 per cent and 12 per cent respectively, while Kuala Lumpur replaced Jakarta as Changi’s top city link.

With a growing number of passengers travelling on multiple transport modes on their journeys, Changi is also taking steps to cater to this segment.

Last year, a new shuttle service was launched to facilitate transfers between Changi Airport and Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal. This has seen a ridership of close to 10,000 passengers in its seven months of operation.

To grow the fly-cruise market, CAG has also signed on to various collaborations with cruise companies – which are expected to bring in more than 600,000 visitors over a four-year period.

Transfer and transit passengers continue to be an important segment for Changi Airport.

Under the ongoing Changi Transit Programme, about 700,000 passengers claimed transit rewards while shopping in Changi last year.

Changi’s numbers last year are in line with global trends, based on preliminary data released by trade body Airports Council International (ACI) recently.

Based on the January to October trend, ACI expects total global passenger traffic to increase by 6.5 per cent year on year.

Speaking at a media briefing yesterday, CAG’s managing director for air hub development Lim Ching Kiat said that 2017 was a significant year for Changi, with strong growth in both passenger and cargo traffic.

“Looking ahead in 2018, we expect to see more developments in the long-haul segments to Europe,” he said.

This includes the launch of Scoot’s non-stop service to Berlin, LOT Polish Airlines’ new service connecting Singapore and Warsaw, and the return of Qantas’ Singapore-London route.

Centre for Aviation’s Mr Brendan Sobie noted in a recent report that Changi was the busiest airport in South-east Asia last year, crossing the 60 million passenger mark on Dec 18.

“The T5 project may seem very ambitious, but is realistic, in the context that Changi traffic will likely double again over the next 15 to 20 years,” he said.

With the demand for air travel in Asia-Pacific expected to triple in the next two decades, Changi is growing capacity to cater to the growth.

Terminal 1 is being upgraded alongside the development of Jewel Changi Airport – a mainly retail hub which will open in early 2019.

This will increase Changi Airport’s handling capacity to 85 million passengers a year.

In the longer term, T5 – which will eventually be able to handle up to 70 million passengers annually – is slated for completion around 2030.

China has made significant strides in port transportation by using self-driving trucks to transport containers at Zhuhai Port in Guangdong province from Tuesday as part of its efforts to realize an unmanned smart port system in the future.

The domestically-made truck looks like a normal one but does not need any drivers. It is used to move containers between the stocking area and the container gantry crane at a standard speed of about 30 kilometres per hour.

Based on artificial intelligence technology developed by Shanghai-based startup Westwell Lab, the 18-metre-long vehicle can automatically navigate, calculate the best route, avoid barriers and deal with an emergency by slowing down, braking or taking a detour.

Tan Limin, CEO of Westwell, said the self-driving truck is “nearly 100 per cent safe”. Guided by the Beidou Navigation Satellite System, sensors and radars, it can reach an accuracy level of within two centimetres.

He said the self-driving technology for port transportation is more difficult than that for passenger vehicles as some roads in the container stocking area are almost the same width as that of a truck. This makes navigation difficult, even for experienced drivers.

Transport advances are necessary at ports as container throughput at China’s ports has risen in recent years, putting immense strain on existing transport resources and drivers, he said.

A medium-sized port with a throughput capacity of 2 million 20 foot equivalent units needs about 200 container trucks and four drivers for each truck. The annual pay for each driver is about 60,000 yuan ($9,372) to 120,000 yuan.

Many cities in China, such as Qingdao in Shandong province and Tianjin, are competing to build smart ports. Traditional automatic ports need to modify many facilities, such as road resurfacing and inserting transponder for vehicle navigation, but Tan believes their smart port solutions are much easier and cheaper to apply.

In addition, he added, driverless trucks are four to five times cheaper than automatic guided vehicles.

Ou Huisheng, chairman of Zhuhai Port Group, estimated that by using dozens of self-driving trucks, it would be able to save labor costs equivalent to hundreds of employees.

He said Zhuhai Port will expand its cooperation with Westwell to build a completely intelligent port in the future.

Despite the launch of the self-driving trucks, a “safety supervisor” is still needed when the vehicle is in operation.

According to the UNAIDS report 2017, an estimated 5.1 million in the Asia Pacific region are living with HIV while  only 2.4 million have access to treatment. Since data on China is not available, India has the highest number of deaths in Asia as per the report. Although the number of deaths due to AIDS has declined significantly, the disease claimed 62,000 people in 2016. India remains the country with the third largest population of people with HIV after South Africa and Nigeria.

In China, the number of people affected by HIV has been estimated at between 430,000 and 1.5 million. However there is no data available in the report about people who died of AIDS-related illnesses.

Indonesia lost 38,000 in 2016 to due to the disease. While the new HIV infections saw a decrease, the country has seen an increase in the number of AIDS related deaths.

Thailand has the third highest AIDS related death rate in Asia. With 16,000 people dying due to the disease in 2016, the country launched a new national strategy in 2017 to end the AIDS epidemic as a public health threat by 2023.

With fourth highest death rate in Asia, 8,000 people died in Vietnam in 2016 due to the disease. The country has seen a steady decline in the number of new infections as well as deaths. Myanmar and Malaysia lost 7,800 and 7,000 people respectively due to the disease in 2016.

Pakistan saw 5,500 people lose their lives due to AIDS in 2016. The number of deaths has been rising steadily along with the number of new infection cases in the country.

In Cambodia and Nepal, the disease took lives of 1800 and 1700 people respectively. Bangladesh lost an estimated 1,000 people in 2016 due to AIDS. There has been a slight increase in the number of new infections as well as number of deaths due to the disease. However, overall Bangladesh remains low HIV-prevalence country.

Philippines and Laos have less than a thousand and five hundred people dying of the disease respectively. Philippines has seen a significant rise in the number of new infections while as the statistics for Laos have not changed much from a last couple of years.

With much lower number of new infections and deaths compared to its South Asian neigbours Sri Lanka has seen less than 200 deaths due to the disease in 2016.

Mongolia has the least number of deaths due to the disease with less than 100 people. The country hasn’t seen a significant change in AIDS related cases since past one decade.

According to the report overall there has been a 39 per cent reduction in AIDS related deaths in the Asia Pacific region.

The Philippine Airlines (PAL) stopped its flights to and from Legazpi City from Wednesday, January 24, until Thursday, January 25.

Based on PAL’s advisory the following flights for Wednesday and Thursday have now been cancelled:

PR 2921 Manila – Legazpi

PR 2922 Legazpi – Manila

PR 2927 Cebu – Legazpi

PR 2928 Legazpi – Cebu

PAL, however, said that the following flights would only be cancelled for Wednesday:

PR 2935 Clark – Virac

PR 2936 Virac – Clark

PR 2621 Clark – Masbate

PR 2622 Masbate – Clark

PR 2965 Clark – Naga

PR 2966 Naga – Clark

“We shall issue regular updates to update the flying public on the situation in Legazpi, Albay,” PAL said in its advisory.

“PAL assures its passengers that it is in close coordination with the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines and the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology in securing information on the seismic activity and its effects on flight path,” it added.

Meanwhile, Cebu Pacific also announced re-timing and cancellation of its flights going to Palawan and Mindoro as a preventive effort “to ensure the safety of our flights and our passengers.” The carrier said volcanic ashes from Albay were being anticipated to move towards Palawan and Mindoro.

Cebu Pacific said the schedules of the following flights were re-timed:

DG 6041 Manila-Busuanga

DG 6055 Manila-Busuanga

DG 6043 Manila-Busuanga

DG 6042 Busuanga-Manila

DG 6056 Busuanga-Manila

DG 6044 Busuanga-Manila

“Passengers with flights to and from Busuanga (Coron), Palawan over the next few days are advised to monitor their flight status before heading to the airport. We will provide updates as soon as possible,” Cebu Pacific said.

On the other hand, Cebu Pacific cancelled flights for the following routes:

DG 6111 Manila-Naga

DG 6113 Manila-Naga

DG 6117 Manila-Naga

DG 6112 Naga-Manila

DG 6114 Naga-Manila

DG 6118 Naga-Manila

DG 6031 Manila-San Jose

DG 6032 San Jose-Manila

“Kim Jong-Un will not rest with a single successful test,” Pompeo said in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute.

“The logical next step would be to develop an arsenal of weapons that is not one, not a showpiece, not something to drive on a parade route,” he said.

Kim seeks “the capacity to deliver from multiple firings of these missiles simultaneously,” said Pompeo.

Moreover, he said, the Central Intelligence Agency believes North Korea wants to go beyond just being a theoretical threat — where it is now — to one with certainty.

“He is trying to put in our mind the reality that he can deliver that pain to the USA. And our mission is to make the day that he can do that as far off as possible.”

The goal for Kim is not simply to protect his autocratic regime, Pompeo noted.

“We do believe that Kim Jong-Un, given these tool sets, would use them for things besides simply regime protection,” he said, pointing to Kim’s ultimate goal as “reunification on the peninsula under his authority.”

US policy towards the North has included tougher sanctions and stepped-up efforts to halt the country’s sea-borne trade with ship interdictions.

“We are taking the real-world actions that we think will make unmistakable to Kim Jong-Un that we are intent on denuclearization. We are counting on the fact that he’ll see it. We are confident he will.”

That said, Pompeo cast doubt on whether Kim is well-briefed on the situation.

“We are concerned that he may not be getting really good, accurate information. It is not a healthy thing to be a senior leader and bring bad news to King Jong-Un,” Pompeo said, joking that such a person should buy life insurance first.

The new centrist government is preparing to soften legislation, making users caught with cannabis liable for an instant fine of 150-200 euros ($180-250) instead of prosecution and the threat of a one-year jail term.

The change was an election campaign pledge from Macron last year, justified on the grounds that it would reduce the time spent by the police and judiciary on criminal cases involving recreational smokers.

The plan has been backed by a cross-party report for parliament, set to be unveiled on Wednesday, which rejects the idea of legalising the drug despite gains worldwide for a radical change in policy.

“At the moment we have procedures that complicate the lives of our police and court officials for not much in terms of results,” Christophe Castaner, the head of Macron’s Republic On The Move (LREM), said Monday.

He said there were 1.2 million regular users in France — higher than other estimates of around 700,000 which makes France one of the biggest consumers of the drug on the continent.

The smell of the pungent herb wafts through streets around the country, while Macron found himself in a cloud of ganja in the overseas French territory of Cayenne in October.

Posing for selfies with young people on a Friday night, the 40-year-old joked that “I’ve still got a nose for it… that will not help with your school work.”

Clarity and deterrence

A 2014 study by the French Observatory for Drug Use and Addiction (OFDT) found that 48 percent of 17-year-olds had tried the drug and nine percent were regular users.

Given its widespread consumption, French police have long given up bothering to arrest most people caught in possession of small quantities of the drug despite the mental health risks associated with heavy use, particularly in young people.

“A young person who gets caught smoking a joint knows that he or she risks nothing,” Castaner added in his interview on Monday with France Bleu radio.

Even when criminal procedures are launched — there are around 140,000 annually for drug possession — only 1,283 of them led to prison time for culprits in 2015, according to figures contained in the parliamentary report.

And the law is applied inconsistently, with prosecutors in northeastern Lille pressing charges against anyone caught in possession of more than 20 grams of cannabis, while the threshold is generally 50 grams in Paris, the report adds.

The on-the-spot fine scheme is intended to bring clarity and serve as a deterrent, with ministers and Macron all against following the worldwide trend towards decriminalising cannabis out of fear of normalising drug use.

“I’ll give you my personal conviction: we shouldn’t decriminalise cannabis, but on the other hand we need to face up to our failure,” Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire said at the weekend.

‘Not normalising cannabis’

In the United States, six states have begun producing and selling pot for recreational use, including California, while Canada is set to legalise hash in July this year.

In 2013, Uruguay became the first country in the world to completely legalise the production and sale of the drug, while in Europe, the Netherlands, Spain and the Czech Republic have laws tolerating personal use by adults.

One of the lawmakers who prepared the French parliamentary report, Eric Poulliat from Macron’s LREM, stressed to AFP that the fine “is not normalising cannabis or a step towards decriminalisation.”

Pro-legalisation lobby group Echo believes the French leader, elected last May, is missing an opportunity for more radical reform that would hurt dealers where it hurts — in their pockets.

“The regular cashflow for a dealer who sells several products comes from cannabis,” Benjamin Jeanroy from Echo told AFP. “If you take that away from them, then you’re hitting them financially.”

In a December 2014 study, the left-leaning think-tank Terra Nova calculated the possible tax gains from legalising and regulating cannabis at 2.0 billion euros a year for the state.

Footage broadcast on Japanese television showed thick black smoke interspersed with falling rocks sliding down the snow-covered side of the volcano towards a ski slope.

“One of the six members of the Self Defence Forces (injured in the incident) has died after being caught up in an avalanche,” a defence ministry spokesman told AFP.

The ministry had earlier said that six infantry personnel who had been on a training mission on the mountain were hit by the avalanche but had been rescued.

The falling rocks kicked clouds of snow into the air as they made impact.

“Black smoke rose from the top of the mountain and we were told to evacuate inside 30 minutes later,” a man who was at the ski resort told public broadcaster NHK.

“About 100 people have evacuated,” he said.

Japan’s Meteorological Agency urged nearby residents to stay away from Mt. Kusatsu Shirane, northwest of Tokyo, after it detected what it said was “slight volcanic activity.”

“Today an eruption occurred” at the mountain, agency official Makoto Saito told reporters.

He warned that the volcano could still spew more rocks and ash, and that there was a risk of further avalanches.

A local fire department official told AFP that 10 people had been injured in the incident.

“Five of them were seriously injured. We began sending the injured to a hospital,” he said.

    – Stranded in gondola –

Among the injured were four people hurt by shattered glass while on a ropeway gondola at the ski resort in Gunma.

The official said an earlier report that one person was missing in the avalanche was not accurate.

A local town official said that a total of 78 people, some of them suffering injuries, were stranded at a gondola station at the top of the mountain.

The gondola has been stopped because of a power outage.

“We’re now discussing how we can evacuate them,” the official said.

NHK said that eight of those stranded had already been rescued.

Japan, with scores of active volcanoes, sits on the so-called Pacific “Ring of Fire” where a large proportion of the world’s quakes and volcanic eruptions are recorded.

On September 27, 2014, Japan suffered its deadliest eruption in almost 90 years when Mount Ontake, in central Nagano prefecture, burst unexpectedly to life.

An estimated 63 people were killed in the shock eruption which occurred as the peak was packed with hikers out to see the region’s spectacular autumn colours.//AFP

 “Based on available data, there is no tsunami threat to the State and island of Hawaii,” a 1:15 a.m. civil defense message stated. “I say again, based on available data, there is no tsunami threat to the State and Island of Hawaii.”

Earlier reports said a Tsunami Watch is in effect for the State of Hawaii following the Magnitude 8.2 earthquake off the Gulf of Alaska that occurred at 11:32 pm.

“Based on all available data a tsunami may have been generated by this earthquake that could be destructive on coastal areas even far from the epicenter,” the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center wrote. “An investigation is underway to determine if there is a tsunami threat to Hawaii.”

If tsunami waves impact Hawaii, the PTWC estimated the earliest arrival of the first tsunami wave is 4:23 a.m. HST on Tuesday (Jan. 23)