The ceremony marked the beginning of the historic Golden Jubilee Celebration of His Majesty Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Mu’izzaddin Waddaulah ibni Al-Marhum Sultan Haji Omar ‘Ali Saifuddien Sa’adul Khairi Waddien, Sultan and Yang Di-Pertuan of Brunei Darussalam’s Accession to the Throne.

The Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga ceremony showcased the Sultanate’s rich centuries-old royal traditions and customs, denoting the beginning of a period of royal ceremonies (also known as the Musim Istiadat Diraja) which ends when the Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga is ‘closed’. The tradition of Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga is the playing of traditional musical instruments by royal court musicians for the purpose of keeping vigil.

Attending the ceremony was His Royal Highness Prince Haji Al-Muhtadee Billah ibni His Majesty Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Mu’izzaddin Waddaulah, the Crown Prince and Senior Minister at the Prime Minister’s Office. Upon arrival, His Royal Highness was greeted at the Lapau by the Chief of Adat Istiadat Negara, Yang Amat Mulia Pengiran Lela Cheteria Sahibun Najabah Pengiran Anak Haji Abdul Aziz bin Pengiran Jaya Negara Pengiran Haji Abu Bakar.

Also in attendance at the ceremony were His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Malik and His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Mateen.

His Royal Highness Prince Haji Al-Muhtadee Billah ibni His Majesty Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Mu’izzaddin Waddaulah, the Crown Prince and Senior Minister at the Prime Minister’s Office; His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Malik; and His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Mateen during the opening of the Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga ceremony at Lapau yesterday

His Royal Highness Prince Haji Al-Muhtadee Billah ibni His Majesty Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Mu’izzaddin Waddaulah, the Crown Prince and Senior Minister at the Prime Minister’s Office; His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Malik; and His Royal Highness Prince ‘Abdul Mateen arriving at the Lapau for the opening of the Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga ceremony

Chief of Adat Istiadat Negara, Yang Amat Mulia Pengiran Lela Cheteria Sahibun Najabah Pengiran Anak Haji Abdul Aziz bin Pengiran Jaya Negara Pengiran Haji Abu Bakar

Ketua Juru Laki Haji Johan Areffen carrying the Nakara (drum) as part of the royal orchestra performance Nobat Diraja

The ceremony, upon being given approval to begin by His Royal Highness Prince Haji Al-Muhtadee Billah in his sabda, proceeded with the Gendang Jaga-Jaga, which saw a high-ranking male court official (Ketua Juru Laki), Haji Johan Areffen, entering the ceremonial hall and heading towards the Patarana to beat the Nakara (drum) – one of the traditional instruments played by the royal court musicians during the occasion.

The Nobat Diraja performing with the Ketua Juru Laki

Distinguished guests at the ceremony

Members of the Diplomatic Corps at the ceremony. – PHOTOS: AZROL AZMI

This was followed by the royal orchestra performance – or Nobat Diraja – by the royal court musicians. The performance involved the beating of the Nakara, complimented with melodies created from the Serunai – a type of wind instrument – and the beating of the Labik – a cylindrical drum – as well as the gongs and Chanang.

The royal orchestra performance was accompanied by a 21-gun cannon blast salute that echoed through the Lapau building, performed by the Royal Brunei Armed Forces (RBAF) led by Commanding Officer of the Military Police of RBAF, 553 Left Colonel Mardini bin Abdul Rahman.

To bless the ceremony, a Doa Selamat was recited by State Mufti Pehin Datu Seri Maharaja Dato Paduka Seri Setia (Dr) Ustaz Haji Awang Abdul Aziz bin Juned.

Chief of Adat Istiadat Negara, Yang Amat Mulia Pengiran Lela Cheteria Sahibun Najabah Pengiran Anak Haji Abdul Aziz bin Pengiran Jaya Negara Pengiran Haji Abu Bakar at the nightly vigil at the Istana Nurul Iman. – SYAHMI HASSAN

The end of the Istiadat Gendang Jaga-Jaga opening ceremony marks the beginning of nightly vigils which began last night until October 7, at the Istana Nurul Iman.

The Golden Jubilee Celebration was then given blessings with various religious ceremonies including Doa Kesyukuran, mass Maghrib and Isyak prayers, and the recitation of Surah Al-Waqi’ah, Surah Al-Mulk, and Tahlil.

In her first public comments over the shooting at a country music concert that left 58 dead and more than 500 injured, Marilou Danley said she had hoped for a quiet future with Stephen Paddock.

In Las Vegas, Trump visited with survivors and first responders, eulogizing parents and spouses who “used their own bodies to protect their loved ones” from the onslaught that eliminated any future for many.

He toured the Las Vegas Police Department Command Center and the city’s University Medical Center, where he met, among others, officer Tyler Peterson who was injured while responding to the shooting.

“In the months ahead, we will all have to wrestle with the horror that unfolded this week, but we will struggle through it together,” the president said.

Air Force One touched down at McCarran International Airport as the FBI was questioning Danley for clues to what drove Paddock to mass murder.

The 62-year-old returned to the United States from her native Philippines late Tuesday and was met by FBI agents.

‘I loved him’

In a statement read by her attorney Matthew Lombard, she said she had no hint of what was to come: “I knew Stephen Paddock as a kind, caring, quiet man.”

“I loved him and hoped for a quiet future together with him,” she said.

“He never said anything to me or took any action that I was aware of that I understood in any way to be a warning that something horrible like this was going to happen.”

Danley added that two weeks ago, Paddock had told her he found a cheap plane ticket for her to visit family in the Philippines and had wired her money to purchase a house while she was there.

She said she became concerned at that point, thinking he wanted to break up with her.

“It never occurred to me in any way whatsoever that he was planning violence against anyone,” said Danley, an Australian citizen who moved to the United States 20 years ago to work on the casino strip.

US authorities have been at a loss as to how a 64-year-old gambler and retired accountant hauled a vast arsenal of weapons to his hotel room and launched his assault.

Investigators say the shooting appeared to be extensively planned: Paddock set up one camera in the peephole of his hotel room door and two in the hallway.

Calls for gun control

Meanwhile, as the victims’ harrowing stories emerged in the media, America once again grappled with calls for reforms to its permissive firearm control laws.

Trump largely stuck to a talking point repeated by dozens upon dozens of Republican officials: “Well, we’re not going to talk about that today. We won’t talk about that.”

US officials have reacted cautiously to a claim by the Islamic State jihadist group that the shooter had carried out Sunday night’s massacre on its behalf.

Authorities said Paddock, who had no criminal record, smashed windows in his hotel room shortly after 10 pm on Sunday and rained fire on a crowd of some 22,000 attending the country music concert below.

When a SWAT team stormed the room where Paddock had been staying since September 28, they found he had killed himself.

Authorities have seized 47 firearms from three locations.

So far, investigators have found nothing to explain Paddock’s actions, but were continuing to hunt and trace every possible clue about a gunman they described as a “psychopath.”

Trump confirmed that no motive had yet been found. “I can tell you, it’s a very sick man. He was a very demented person,” he said.

Ordinary heroes

Details have gradually emerged about some of the victims — a kindergarten teacher from California who had married her childhood sweetheart, a Tennessee nurse, a high-school secretary from New Mexico.

Stories of heroism also surfaced. Bruce Ure, deputy police chief of the small Texas city of Seguin, was in the concert’s VIP section when the gunfire broke out.

He sheltered from the bullets between two buses, then tended to three strangers who had been shot, loading them into a passing car and riding with them to hospital.

“They were all crying, and I was too,” he told AFP. “They were saying that ‘We’re going to die, we’re going to die,’ and I still remember telling them: ‘Not tonight, not tonight. Tonight’s not your night. You’re going to be ok.’ Because I truly believed it.”

While the White House has rebuffed calls to reopen the fraught US debate on gun control, Congress did shelve a controversial plan to make it easier to purchase gun silencers and make it more difficult to classify certain ammunition as “armor piercing.”

According to his brother, Paddock was a high-stakes gambler and their bank-robber father was once on the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted list.

But Eric Paddock said his brother had led an otherwise normal life.

The Las Vegas attack is the deadliest shooting in recent US history, surpassing the toll of 49 dead in an attack on a Florida nightclub in June 2016.

    Although the FBI wants to talk to her, Marilou Danley, 62, is not in custody — she is classified as a “person of interest” to investigators — and is free to go wherever she wants, US media reported.

She was in the Philippines when Paddock opened fire with high-power rifles from a 32nd floor hotel room Sunday night at a sea of concertgoers below on the Las Vegas strip.

Authorities are investigating reports that while she was in the Philippines, Paddock wired her $100,000.

Danley is an Australian citizen who moved to the United States 20 years ago to work on the casino strip, the Australian government confirmed Tuesday.

As America mourned, President Donald Trump prepared to visit the desert city Wednesday. He has branded Paddock a “demented man.”

Beyond Trump’s assessment, authorities were at a loss as to how a 64-year-old gambler and retired accountant had hauled a vast arsenal of weapons to the hotel and launched his assault.

Meanwhile, victims began to be identified in the media, each new story stirring emotions as America once again grappled with calls for reforms to its permissive firearm control laws.

Trump was not ready to suggest answers.

“What happened in Las Vegas is in many ways a miracle,” he said. “The police department has done such an incredible job, and we’ll be talking about gun laws as time goes by.”

US officials have reacted cautiously to a claim by the Islamic State jihadist group that the shooter had carried out Sunday night’s massacre on its behalf.

Experts cautioned that the group — under pressure in its Syrian and Iraqi heartlands — may be trying to rally its supporters with a false claim.

IS claimed Paddock was one of its “soldiers” but the FBI said it had found no such connection so far.

Authorities said Paddock, who had no criminal record, smashed windows in his hotel room shortly after 10pm on Sunday and rained fire on a crowd of 22,000 attending a country music concert below.

In footage of the massacre, the sustained rattle of gunfire is heard as people scream and bolt for cover with little idea of where the shots were coming from.

Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said Paddock fired through the door of his hotel room and hit a security guard in the leg.

But when a SWAT team stormed the room where Paddock had been staying since September 28, they found he had killed himself.

Authorities have seized 47 firearms from three locations, they said late Tuesday.

– ‘Mind of a psychopath’ –

==========================

So far, investigators have found nothing to explain the actions of the gunman, but were continuing to hunt and trace every possible clue about a gunman they described as a “psychopath.”

“For this individual to take it upon himself to create this chaos and harm is unspeakable,” Lombardo told journalists Tuesday, saying the shooter’s degree of preparation made it clear the attack was extensively premeditated.

Details started to emerge Tuesday about some of the victims — a kindergarten teacher from California who had married her childhood sweetheart, a Tennessee nurse, a high-school secretary from New Mexico.

Stories of heroism also surfaced. Bruce Ure, deputy police chief of the small Texas city of Seguin, was in the concert’s VIP section when the gunfire broke out.

He sheltered from the bullets between two buses, then tended to three people who had been shot. Ure loaded the bleeding strangers into a passing car and rode with them to a hospital.

“They were all crying, and I was too,” he told AFP. “They were saying that ‘We’re going to die, we’re going to die,’ and I still remember telling them: ‘Not tonight, not tonight. Tonight’s not your night. You’re going to be ok.’ Because I truly believed it.”

While the White House has rebuffed calls to reopen the fraught US debate on gun control, Congress did shelve a controversial plan to make it easier to purchase gun silencers and make it more difficult to classify certain ammunition as “armor piercing.”

– ‘Two doors from a lunatic’ –

==============================

According to his brother, Paddock was a high-stakes gambler and their bank-robber father was once on the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted list.

But Eric Paddock said his brother had led an otherwise normal life.

“He liked to play video poker. He went on cruises. He sent his mother cookies,” he said.

“We’re lost,” his brother said.

Paddock’s neighbors in Mesquite were similarly dumbfounded to discover the killer lived in their midst.

“This is just a quiet, sleepy little community. It just blew me away,” said Rod Sweningson.

“We’ve never even thought about locking our doors. We didn’t know we lived two doors down from a lunatic.”

The Las Vegas attack is the deadliest shooting in recent US history, surpassing the toll of 49 dead in an attack on a Florida nightclub in June 2016.//AFP

More than 500,000 Muslim Rohingya have fled ethnic bloodshed in Myanmar in the past month and numbers are again swelling, with Bangladesh reporting 4-5,000 civilians now crossing the border each day after a brief lull in arrivals.

An estimated 10,000 more have reportedly massed in Myanmar near a crossing point into Bangladesh, and are poised to join the hundreds of thousands of mainly Rohingya refugees eking out survival in wretched camps over the border.

The spike in new arrivals — prompted by what Rohingya say is a fresh drive to purge Muslims still in westernmost Rakhine state — casts doubt on a Myanmar proposal aired this week to start repatriating the persecuted minority.

Rakhine has been emptied of half of its Rohingya population in weeks, and more are on the move as insecurity presses them to leave villages which have so far been spared the worst of the communal violence ripping through the state.

Rashida Begum, who arrived in Bangladesh late Monday, said local officials assured the Rohingya community for weeks they would be safe if they remained in their village.

“(But then) the army came and went door to door, ordering us to leave,” she told AFP of the military sweep in Maungdaw on Friday.

“They said they wouldn’t harm us, but eventually they drove us out and burned our houses.”

Myanmar state media said the fleeing Rohingya had left “of their own accord” despite assurances they would be safe.

“I wanted to stay in my village,” Hasina Khatum, 25, told AFP in the coastal border town of Shah Porir Dwip.

“They (local officials) said ‘don’t go to Bangladesh. Everything will be fine’. We believed them, but nothing improved. Eventually we had to leave.”

Sumaya Bibi, a softly-spoken Rohingya teenager, described more than a thousand civilians hiding along the riverbank late Monday.

Fazlul Haq, a local councillor in the area, said the flow of boats had almost stopped by late September but has resumed in recent days, bringing scores of Rohingya families reporting threats and intimidation by the army.

The UN said Tuesday that 509,000 refugees had crossed into Bangladesh as of September 30.

The influx began after August 25, when attacks by Rohingya militants spurred a ferocious Myanmar army crackdown that the UN says amounted to “ethnic cleansing”.

Myanmar’s government refuses to recognise the Rohingya as a distinct ethnic group and considers them illegal migrants from Bangladesh.

Myanmar’s army is accused of waging an ethnic cleansing campaign against the Rohingya in the far west, where more than half a million of the Muslim minority have fled across the border to Bangladesh since August 25.

In the face of intense global condemnation, Myanmar authorities have staunchly defended the security operation as a legitimate crackdown on Rohingya militants who attacked police posts last month.

The conflict has curdled religious tensions inside Myanmar, fanning Buddhist nationalism and a hatred against the Rohingya that has been steeping for years.

In a video posted on her Facebook last week, Miss Grand Myanmar Shwe Eain Si accused the Rohingya militants of leading a “media campaign” to trick the world into thinking “they are the oppressed”.

Shots of Shwe Eain Si speaking to the camera were interspersed with graphic images of people with bloody gashes across their faces, nude babies and screenshots from videos posted by the militant group, known as ARSA (Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army).

On Sunday the firm behind the beauty pageant announced Shwe Eain Si had been stripped of her title for breaching contract rules, in a statement that did not mention the video on Rakhine.

But in a reply posted on Facebook Tuesday Shwe Eain Si said these accusations were “groundless” and linked the move to her comments on the Rohingya.

One of the company’s complaints, the beauty queen wrote, was that she “failed to project a decent image of a pageant contestant”.

“Yes, Shwe Eain Si made a video about the reign of terror brought about by the ARSA militants in Rakhine State, but that was hardly qualified as a failure to project a decent image of a pageant contestant,” her post said.

Miss Universe Myanmar was not immediately available for comment.

It is not the first time Myanmar’s nascent beauty queen scene has been rocked by drama.

Earlier this year a prominent transgender pageant winner was detained after a famous actress sued her for defamation over insults posted on a popular celebrity gossip page.

And in 2014 a Myanmar beauty queen was dethroned for alleged dishonesty and bad behaviour, after which she ran off with her crown to South Korea.//AFP

Patches of the Singapore River turned a startling shade of green Monday morning because of an algal overgrowth.

People working in the area said they noticed a greenish tint on the water’s surface two days earlier. Some detected a pungent smell too.

“I was quite shocked. I was wondering if it was because the water was polluted,” said Tina Teng, 29, a service staff member at a seafood restaurant along Boat Quay.

Others were less alarmed as they had seen it happen before.

Asha Azizan, 45, a ticket sales agent said “I usually notice it after heavy rain. I don’t think much of it because I figured it is probably a natural thing.”

National water agency PUB confirmed that the greener-than-usual waters were caused by algae – microscopic organisms naturally present in reservoirs and waterways. It added that algae in waters here are removed effectively during the water treatment process for drinking water.

By 3pm Monday, the river looked normal after routine clean-up operations by the PUB.

Environmental experts said recent weather – rain followed by strong sun, typical just after monsoon season – creates a conducive environment for algal blooms.

“Rain will wash off nutrients from land into the water bodies, and the sun allows photosynthesis, which helps green algae multiply faster,” said Chan Wei Loong, programme chair of the diploma in marine science and aquaculture at Republic Polytechnic.

An algal bloom usually lasts up to a week and disappears after that because the nutrients within the water body would have been used up.

Associate Professor Federico Lauro of the Asian School of the Environment at Nanyang Technological University said “I don’t think people should be alarmed unnecessarily.

“We should however put things in place to prevent their recurrence because they can be harmful to aquaculture.”

Most algae are not toxic, but an algal bloom can kill fishes by starving them of oxygen and clogging up their gills. In 2015, fish farmers were hit by a bloom that wiped out more than 500 tonnes of fish stocks, causing them to lose millions of dollars.

Algal blooms have also turned other water bodies here green, including the waters of Marina Bay outside the Fullerton Bay Hotel in 2015 and Kranji Reservoir last year.

Lauro said “It will happen and will keep on happening until we correct the underlying causes behind the introduction of nutrients into the water.”

Data of a flight simulator session recovered from Capt Zaharie Ahmad Shah home was considered during the search for MH370, disclosed the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) in its 440-page final report.

ATSB said six weeks before the incident, Capt Zaharie used his simulator to fly a route, initially similar to part of the route flown by MH370 up the Strait of Malacca, with a left-hand turn and track into the southern Indian Ocean.

“There were enough similarities to the flight path of MH370 for the ATSB to carefully consider the possible implications for the underwater search area.”

However the simulated flight had flown approximately 4,200 nautical miles.

The ATSB added the reasons for the loss of MH370 cannot be established with certainty until the aircraft is found.

“It is almost inconceivable and certainly societally unacceptable in the modern aviation era with 10 million passengers boarding commercial aircraft every day, for a large commercial aircraft to be missing and for the world not to know with certainty what became of the aircraft and those on board,” the report said.

But the report added their understanding of where MH370 might be located was better now than it had ever been.

“The underwater search has eliminated most of the high-probability areas yielded by reconstructing the aircraft’s flight path and the debris drift studies conducted in the past 12 months have identified the most likely area with increasing precision,” the report said.

ATSB said debris from MH370 found on the shores of Indian Ocean islands and the east African coastline in 2015 and 2016 yielded significant new insights into how and where the aircraft ended its flight.

“It was established from the debris that the aircraft was not configured for a ditching at the end-of-flight,” the report said.

ATSB said the initial surface search and the subsequent underwater search had been the largest in aviation history.

ATSB also expressed their sympathies to the families of the passengers and crew on board MH370.

“We share your profound and prolonged grief, and deeply regret that we have not been able to locate the aircraft, nor those 239 souls on board that remain missing.”

MH370 disappeared on March 8, 2014 during a scheduled flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing.

In August, Transport Minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai said any decision to resume the search, based on any new data, had to be jointly made by Malaysia, Australia and China

The Philippines’ National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) said the FBI, its US counterpart, had sought help in finding Marilou Danley.

“Danley arrived in the Philippines last month, and then there was a wire transfer to her account for $100,000 from Stephen,” NBI spokesman Nick Suarez told AFP.

“The FBI has coordinated with the Philippine office of the Interpol to look for her.”

Suarez said the FBI considered Danley a “person of interest”, but not necessarily a suspect.

Paddock, a 64-year-old gambler and retired accountant, killed 58 people and injured at least 527 others when he used a vast arsenal of weapons to shoot at a Las Vegas concert from a hotel room on Sunday.

Suarez and other Filipino authorities would not say if Danley, 62, was still in the Philippines.

The US embassy referred questions on her whereabouts to the Philippine government.

“From the US side, we are not able to comment on ongoing investigations, and I would not want to get ahead of the authorities leading the investigation,” US embassy spokeswoman Molly Koscina told AFP by email.

Danley is an Australian citizen who moved to the United States 20 years ago to work on the casino strip, the Australian government confirmed Tuesday.

“There are reports her ID was used for booking the hotel or some such detail,” Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said.

“Australia will support the US authorities in their investigation in whatever way we can, but we have not had contact with Marilou Danley directly.”

Media reports said Danley was born in the Philippines, although the Philippine foreign department and Suarez said they could not confirm that.

Paddock killed himself after mowing down the concert-goers.

President Donald Trump branded the attacker — who raked a crowd with gunfire from a 32nd floor hotel room, leaving 59 dead and at least 527 injured — a “demented man.”

But beyond that diagnosis, authorities were at a loss as to why a 64-year-old gambler and retired accountant had hauled a vast arsenal of weapons to the hotel and launched his assault.

Meanwhile, the attack’s victims began to be identified in the media, each new story stirring emotions as America once again grappled with calls for reforms to its permissive firearm control laws.

Trump was not ready to suggest answers.

“What happened in Las Vegas is in many ways a miracle,” he said. “The police department has done such an incredible job, and we’ll be talking about gun laws as time goes by.”

US officials have reacted cautiously to a claim by the Islamic State jihadist group that the shooter, Stephen Craig Paddock, had carried out Sunday night’s massacre on its behalf.

Experts cautioned that the group — under pressure in its Syrian and Iraqi heartlands — may be trying to rally its supporters with a false claim.

IS claimed Paddock was one of its “soldiers” but the FBI said it had found no such connection so far.

Authorities said Paddock, who had no criminal record, smashed windows in his hotel room shortly after 10:00 pm on Sunday and rained fire on a crowd of 22,000 attending a country music concert below.

In footage of the massacre, the sustained rattle of gunfire is heard as people scream and bolt for cover with little idea of where the shots were coming from.

Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said Paddock blasted through the door of his hotel room and hit a security guard in the leg.

But when a SWAT team stormed the room where Paddock had been staying since September 28, they found he had killed himself.

Inside were 23 firearms including automatic weapons.

Lombardo also said Paddock had cameras in his room — including one apparently monitoring the corridor approach.

Leaked photographs, which Lombardo’s department is investigating, showed scope-mounted assault rifles and a floor covered with expended shells.

Other pictures show a neatly stacked pile of ammunition clips, and other rifles piled up on lounge chairs.

Investigators additionally found another 19 firearms along with explosives and several thousand rounds of ammo at Paddock’s house in Mesquite, Nevada, 80 miles (130 kilometers) away.

‘Mind of a psychopath’

So far, investigators have found nothing to explain the actions of a gunman, but were continuing to hunt and trace every possible clue about a gunman they described as a “psychopath.”

“For this individual to take it upon himself to create this chaos and harm is unspeakable,” Sheriff Lombardo told journalists Tuesday, saying the shooter’s degree of preparation made it clear the attack was extensively premeditated.

Details started to emerge Tuesday about some of the victims — a kindergarten teacher from California who had married her childhood sweetheart, a Tennessee nurse, a high school secretary from New Mexico.

Stories of heroism also surfaced. Bruce Ure, deputy police chief of the small Texas city of Seguin, was in the concert’s VIP section when the gunfire broke out.

He sheltered from the bullets between two buses, then tended to three people who had been shot. Ure loaded the bleeding strangers into a passing car and rode with them to a hospital.

“They were all crying, and I was too,” he told AFP. “They were saying that ‘We’re going to die, we’re going to die,’ and I still remember telling them: ‘Not tonight, not tonight. Tonight’s not your night. You’re going to be ok.’ Because I truly believed it.”

Trump will visit Las Vegas Wednesday, but the White House has rebuffed calls to reopen the fraught US debate on gun control in the latest atrocity’s wake.

Congress did however shelve a controversial plan to make it easier to purchase gun silencers and make it more difficult to classify certain ammunition as “armor piercing.”

‘Two doors from a lunatic’

According to his brother, Paddock was a high-stakes gambler and their bank-robber father was once on the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted list.

But Eric Paddock said his brother had led an otherwise normal life.

“He liked to play video poker. He went on cruises. He sent his mother cookies,” he said.

“We’re lost,” his brother said.

Paddock’s neighbors in Mesquite were similarly dumbfounded to discover the killer lived in their midst.

“This is just a quiet, sleepy little community. It just blew me away,” said Rod Sweningson.

“We’ve never even thought about locking our doors. We didn’t know we lived two doors down from a lunatic.”

Paddock had wired $100,000 to an account in his girlfriend’s native country of the Philippines in the week before the shooting, NBC reported Tuesday, citing multiple senior law enforcement officials.

But it was not known who was the intended recipient. Marilou Danley, 62, who is Australian by nationality, was overseas at the time of the shooting and investigators said she was not believed to have been involved.

The Las Vegas attack is the deadliest shooting in recent US history, exceeding the toll of 49 dead in an attack on a Florida nightclub in June 2016.

The mass shooting, which left at least 58 people dead and more than 500 injured on 01 October, is the largest in modern US history.

The gunman, identified by the police as Stephen Paddock, 64, fired from an upper floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel before reportedly killing himself as police made their way into his hotel room.

// EPA-EFE PHOTO

Mourners attend a candlelight vigil at the corner of Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard for the victims of Sunday night’s mass shooting, October 2, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. // AFP PHOTO

// EPA-EFE PHOTO

Mourners attend a candlelight vigil at the corner of Sahara Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard for the victims of Sunday night’s mass shooting, October 2, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. // AFP PHOTO