Indonesia and Google have agreed to implement the Trusted Flagger program, which reviews flagged content and removes content deemed inappropriate for the internet on websites such as YouTube.

Trusted Flagger is a program in which volunteers, who have been accepted through an application process, are given the authority to flag content that violates the terms of service or community guidelines of Google’s websites. Google then reviews the flagged content and determines whether to remove it.

Communications and Information Minister Rudiantara said that, currently, the program was being tested and that he expected it to be launched within the next two to three months.

He said the government would involve several non-governmental organizations such as Wahid Institute, ICT Watch and Anti-Defamation Society of Indonesia (Mafindo) as content moderators.

“With such a transparent panel system that involves the public, there is no room for someone to abuse their authority,” Rudiantara said during a press conference in Jakarta on Friday, adding that the program would increase the response time of removal requests.

“Based on our experience, only 50 percent of the take down requests were responded to quickly. We do not want the rest of the 50 percent to snowball.”

Google policy and government affairs director for Greater China and Southeast Asia Ann Lavin said the Trusted Flagger program was implemented in June in the US and some European countries.

“We have seen this program in the US and a number of European countries but this might be the first time [it is implemented] in Southeast Asia,” Lavin said.

The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) announced that Huang Jing and his wife Shirley Yang Xiuping, who are United States citizens, will be permanently banned from Singapore, in what is the first publicly known case of its kind in nearly two decades.

The ministry said in a statement that Dr Huang has been identified as “an agent of influence of a foreign country” who worked with intelligence organisations and agents from that country. It did not name the country.

Dr Huang was Director of the Centre on Asia and Globalisation and Lee Foundation Professor on US-China relations at the LKY School, which is part of the National University of Singapore (NUS), and his views on China and foreign policy issues were regularly sought by organisations and the media.

“Huang used his senior position in the LKYSPP to deliberately and covertly advance the agenda of a foreign country at Singapore’s expense. He did this in collaboration with foreign intelligence agents,” said the ministry.

“This amounts to subversion and foreign interference in Singapore’s domestic politics. Huang’s continued presence in Singapore, and that of his wife, are therefore undesirable.”

The Controller of Immigration has cancelled the couple’s entry and re-entry permits, the ministry said.

It noted that Ms Yang was aware of her husband using his position to advance a foreign country’s agenda.

Dr Huang had engaged prominent and influential Singaporeans, providing them with what he claimed was “privileged information” about the foreign country to influence their opinions in favour of that country, the ministry said.

It added that he also recruited others to aid his operations.

The ministry cited how Dr Huang gave supposedly “privileged information” to a senior member of the LKY School, so it could be passed on to the Singapore Government.

“The information was duly conveyed by that senior member of the LKYSPP to very senior public officials who were in a position to direct Singapore’s foreign policy,” it said.

“The clear intention was to use the information to cause the Singapore Government to change its foreign policy.”

However, the Government declined to act on the information.

The Government has in the past taken action against individuals who had carried out subversive activities for foreign countries.

In 1998, the Internal Security Department arrested four Singapore citizens. Three of them were agents for a foreign intelligence service, and one of them recruited the fourth person to collect intelligence on and to subvert a local community organisation.

Before he joined the LKY School, Dr Huang taught at several universities in the United States, most recently as a lecturer at Harvard University from 2013 to 2014.

He has published numerous articles, book chapters and columns and opinion pieces – including in The Straits Times and Chinese daily Lianhe Zaobao – on Chinese elite politics, China’s development strategy, its military and foreign policy, and US-China relations, among other topics.

He was director of the Asia Studies Program and associate professor of political science at Utah State University from 1994 to 2004, and was granted tenure in 1998.

He was a Shorenstein Fellow at Stanford University from 2002 to 2003, and became Senior Fellow at the John Thornton China Center at the Brookings Institution from 2004 to 2008. Various foundations have also awarded him grants and fellowships.

Currently, he serves as a senior overseas economic analyst for Xinhua News Agency, and is an overseas advisor to the China Foundation for International and Strategic Studies.

He also sits on various boards, including Keppel Land, the Steering Committee of the NUS Research Institute in Suzhou, the Fujitsu-JAIMs Foundation Japan, and Chinese energy firm Wasion Group.

He received his Bachelor of Arts in English from Sichuan University, his Masters degree in history from Fudan University, and his doctorate from Harvard University.

A NUS spokesman said it had been informed of the ministry’s findings that Dr Huang used his senior position to advance the agenda of a foreign country at Singapore’s expense.

“This is a matter of serious concern, and LKYSPP is cooperating fully with MHA,” she said.

“NUS does not tolerate such acts of foreign interference, even as we continue to value and uphold the diverse and international character of our University. As this matter relates to national security, the University is unable to comment on the details of the case,” she added.

The spokesman added that in light of the ministry’s findings and actions, Dr Huang has been suspended without pay with immediate effect.

“Prof Huang’s employment at NUS is conditional on the necessary permits for working in Singapore. As these permits have been cancelled, we would not be able to continue with his employment,” she said.

He came up with the call while visiting two Rohingya refugee camps in Ukhiya upazila in Cox’s Bazar, reports our local staff correspondent.

The OIC chief also urged the global community to stand by the most persecuted minority people in the world.

He also appreciated Bangladesh’s roles for providing shelter, food and security to the refugees over the last 25 years.

Read More: Keep helping Dhaka over Rohingya crisis

“Bangladesh selflessly stood by the Rohingya refugees over two decades and she deserves cordial thanks,” he told reporters.

He added, “The OIC is cordially working to bring a permanent solution to resolve the crisis and vows to continue its campaign until a resolution to this end is found.” Yousef reached Cox’s Bazar around noon as part of his four-day official tour to Bangladesh.

Read Also: Rohingya Crisis: Int’l initiative needs to be strengthened

During the nearly one and a half hour-long visit, he talked to the refugees and listened to their needs and complaints with sympathy.

Officials of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Rohingya Refugee Repatriation Action Committee district administration and Rohingya refugee camp management were also present during the visit.

The court in the city of Dessau found that the 21-year-old defendants, named only as Sebastian F. and Xenia I., lured the 25-year-old architecture student to an empty apartment in May last year, DPA news agency reported. They submitted their victim to a horrific ordeal that led to her death.

Presiding judge Uda Schmidt called the case an “incomprehensible crime”, handing down a 15-year sentence to Sebastian F. and a juvenile sentence of five years and six months to his partner at the time, who is the mother of three children.

The two defendants, who sat impassively as the verdict was read out, were also ordered to pay a total of 60,000 euros ($71,300) for the pain and suffering of the victim’s parents, who were co-plaintiffs in the case.

Schmidt said the pair’s sole motive had been to fulfil a sadistic sexual fantasy.

After trapping her in the flat, the pair repeatedly sexually assaulted the woman, leaving her with such severe injuries that they assumed she would die, the court found.

When the couple returned hours later and found the victim, identified in media reports as Li Yangjie, still alive, they carried the severely injured woman away and abandoned her in underbrush.

After friends in Germany and China alerted the authorities that she was missing, police organised a search for the woman, who was from the eastern province of Henan. Her corpse was found two days later.

An autopsy found she had suffered blows to the head, torso and extremities.

After news of the murder spread, hundreds of Chinese students and local residents held a rally in Li’s memory to demand justice.

The couple was arrested two weeks after the crime and went on trial last November.

Xenia I. had admitted in testimony that she had lured the young woman, who was jogging in town, to the empty flat under false pretences and was present while Sebastian F. raped her.

But she denied taking part in the abuse that led to the student’s death.

Beyond the shock at the brutality of the crime, the case also caused controversy in Germany and China because the mother and stepfather of Sebastian F. are both police officers.

Sebastian F. is also accused of at least one further rape committed in the summer of 2013 in Dessau which only came to light in the course of the investigation.

Dessau, 130 kilometres (80 miles) southwest of Berlin, is closely associated with the Bauhaus movement and draws architecture and design students from around the world.

 Nearly 700 employees at the Jakarta International Container Terminal (JICT), the bulk of the workforce, stopped work Thursday for a strike intended to last a week, the company’s labour union said.

“The strike has paralysed the loading and unloading process as well as the terminal’s activity,” Mokhammad Firmansyah, the union’s secretary general, told AFP.

Workers are demanding to be paid last year’s production bonus in full, after it was cut by more than 40 per cent, Firmansyah said.

The Indonesian Logistics Association said the strike would damage the country’s reputation as an export and import hub.

“This uncertainty will hurt Indonesia’s exports as foreign buyers could turn to other countries,” the association’s chairman, Zaldy Masita, told AFP.

Indonesia’s government denied the strike had disrupted the flow of containers and vessels to Tanjung Priok port, which accounts for 70 per cent of the country’s container capacity.

However, incoming vessels have been diverted to four other terminals at the port, said Bay Hasani, a sea traffic and transport official at the transport ministry.

JICT, whose controlling shareholder is Hong Kong’s Hutchison Ports, handles about 40 per cent of the containers at the Jakarta port.

The creation process, however, is decidedly modern.

In northwest Shaanxi province’s capital of Xian, home to such historic sites as the clay Terracotta Army and the 1,000-year-old Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, a small studio and factory uses 3D printing technology to replicate ancient art.

“All the intricate details of the original design are preserved in a 3D mould,” Xi Xin, the president of the Xian Chizi Digital Technology company, told AFP.

“Human workers may not be able to produce everything we want in the design, but the printer can do it all.”

The firm, whose products are sold at museum shops and to personal collectors, is among the businesses taking advantage of China’s foray into 3D printing — a rapidly-growing industry that has been incorporated into the country’s national manufacturing strategy.

“In the last five years, 3D printing in China has grown from a one billion yuan ($149 million) industry to a more than 100 billion yuan ($14.9 billion) industry,” Luo Jun, the head of the China 3D Printing Technology Industry Alliance, told AFP.

– Technological breakthrough –

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

3D printing came to China in the 90s, Luo said, after Tsinghua University and Huazhong University of Science and Technology professors brought the technology back from the United States.

Domestic development of the methods were slow at first, but the industry has gained momentum with government support.

The Chinese State Council’s “Made in China 2025” industrial development plan lists the promotion of “new breakthroughs in 3D printing” as a priority for growth into the next decade, while the Ministry of Science and Technology counts 3D printing among its thirteen priority projects for technological innovation.

“Now the scale of China’s 3D printing industry has surpassed those of Europe and the US,” Luo said.

The Xian Chizi Digital Technology company has developed its 3D design technology over the last ten years, using a stereolithography machine to print carefully constructed digital replicas of historic artifacts.

The design process can take between one to three months, while printing requires up to several weeks of time for the more elaborate pieces.

Once the prototype is complete, it will be mass-produced in a factory using the sane material — usually wood or copper — as the relic it was modelled on.

“Our clients don’t buy our products because of the 3D printing aspect, but it does make things easier,” Xi said.

For instance, if a customer decides that she wants an 80-centimetre elephant instead of a 50-centimetre one, it’s a simple matter of programming the 3D printer accordingly.

Xi’s company also makes 3D printed moulds for sculptors who use them as models for their own handcrafted artworks.

The final products — painted miniatures sold for between 20 yuan ($3) and 500 yuan ($74) — are popular among the tourists who flock to Xian, known as the oldest of China’s four great imperial capitals.

The figurines are now being sold at the mausoleum for Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor, and his Terracotta Warriors.

There, at the burial place dating back to 200 B.C., visitors can hold the 3D “artifacts” of China’s future in the palm of their hands.

Authorities said no casualties were reported from the blaze which erupted in the middle to upper floors of The Torch, once the tallest residential development in the world.

The 337-metre (1,105-foot) tower was the scene of a 2015 inferno that caused extensive damage to its luxury flats and triggered an evacuation of nearby blocks in the seafront Marina neighbourhood.

Dubai authorities said firefighters arrived at the scene within four minutes of the blaze erupting at 12:45 am (2045 GMT Thursday).

They said residents were immediately evacuated and the fire put out by 2:58 am without any casualties.

Dubai’s civil defence authority said it started on the 65th floor of the luxury tower block.

In the morning, an AFP correspondent saw torched vehicles in the block’s car park and extensive fire damage to the middle and upper storeys of the left side of the building.

“We thank God that there were no casualties, that because of the efforts of all teams on the ground… the residents were evacuated from this building to another one and there were no injuries,” Dubai police commander Major General Abdullah Khalifa al-Marri said.

In January, Dubai announced tougher rules to minimise fire risks after a series of tower blazes in the emirate mostly due to flammable material used in cladding, a covering or coating used on the side of the buildings.

In November 2015, fire engulfed three residential blocks in central Dubai and led to services on a metro line being suspended, although no one was hurt.

On New Year’s Eve that year, 16 people were injured when a fire broke out in a luxury hotel, hours before a massive fireworks display nearby.

Dubai has established a reputation for building dozens of futuristic skyscrapers, which have transformed its skyline.

The city state boasts the world’s tallest building, Burj al-Khalifa, which stands 828 metres (2,700 feet) tall, as well as iconic palm tree-shaped, man-made luxury residential islands.

Saudi Arabia’s Kingdom Holding is building a tower in Jeddah that is planned to surpass the Burj Khalifa, rising more than a kilometre.

Dubai first became a magnet for property investments when it opened the sector to foreigners in 2002, standing out in a region that largely confines freehold ownership to citizens.

The value of property surged at breakneck speed until the global financial crisis hit the debt-laden emirate in 2009, sending prices into free-fall.

A recovery led by tourism, trade and transportation pushed prices up again between 2012 and 2014.

But Dubai’s real estate sector again slowed down, with residential prices dropping around 12 per cent in 2015 before slowly starting to climb in 2016.

Trusted Flagger is a program in which volunteers, who have been accepted through an application process, are given the authority to flag content that violates the terms of service or community guidelines of Google’s websites. Google then reviews the flagged content and determines whether to remove it.

Communications and Information Minister Rudiantara said that, currently, the program was being tested and that he expected it to be launched within the next two to three months.

He said the government would involve several nongovernmental organizations such as Wahid Institute, ICT Watch and AntiDefamation Society of Indonesia (Mafindo) as content moderators.

“With such a transparent panel system that involves the public, there is no room for someone to abuse their authority,” Rudiantara said during a press conference in Jakarta on Friday, adding that the program would increase the response time of removal requests.

“Based on our experience, only 50 percent of the take down requests were responded to quickly. We do not want the rest of the 50 percent to snowball.”

Google policy and government affairs director for Greater China and Southeast Asia Ann Lavin said the Trusted Flagger program was implemented in June in the US and some European countries.

“We have seen this program in the US and a number of European countries but this might be the first time [it is implemented] in Southeast Asia,” Lavin said.

Bun Chhay was arrested yesterday at noon at his home in Chroy Changvar district and was taken to the municipal police headquarters, with a Phnom Penh Municipal Court arrest warrant accusing him of conspiracy to produce drugs and of importing drug components in relation to a major drug bust in April 2007.

National Police Deputy Chief Mok Chito and Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak both confirmed the arrest, saying it was linked to a drug-related case, but declined to offer details.

“The warrant was issued by the Phnom Penh court and the case is now with the Phnom Penh Municipal Police,” Chito said yesterday, declining to comment further.

However, a senior police official, who requested anonymity, said the arrest was over a 2007 drug case, and said that it was linked to another 2012 bust of a drug production racket as well.

Following the arrest yesterday, Sopheak said Bun Chhay was taken into custody for a 2012 drug case, but could not be reached later in the day for clarification.

The senior official added that 17 other people were involved in the case and their fortunes rested on Bun Chhay’s questioning.

“Wait to see how Grandfather Chhay answers. This story is very big,” he said.

Bun Chhay was at the receiving end of the government’s displeasure after the leak of an alleged phone call to CNRP Deputy President Eng Chhay Eang in which he appeared to offer votes to the CNRP in communes that the KNUP was not contesting.

Despite denying he had intended to speak to Chhay Eang or colluded to offer votes, the ex-royalist was abruptly stripped of his title as adviser to the government in June, with more than a dozen other party members meeting the same fate in the following weeks. The sacking came on the same day as what appeared to be a surrender of firearms from Bun Chhay to the Ministry of Defence.

The 2007 incident referred to by the police officers took place in Kampong Speu’s Phnom Sruoch district, where two tonnes of “precursor” chemicals, including a reported 400 to 500 kilograms of chloroephedrine, were seized at a clandestine operation posing as a cow farm. In all, 14 were arrested. At the same time, police stormed a house in Phnom Penh’s Tuol Kork district where they found another tonne of precursors and arrested a 28yearold Chinese woman.

Chea Chung – an adviser to Bun Chhay when the latter was co defence minister in the FuncinpecCPP coalition government – was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in the high-profile case, with others implicated as well.

Bun Chhay was linked to the case for allegedly owning the land where the drug racket was based in Kampong Speu, but in an interview with The Post in 2007, he distanced himself from Chung and denied owning the land.

The 2012 case, meanwhile, was an apparent reference to a raid in the same district in Kampong Speu in which around 1,000 litres of precursor chemicals stored in 82 tanks used for methamphetamine production were seized from a warehouse While KNUP spokesman Run Meatra could not be reached for comment yesterday, Chong Chuoy, a party councillor from Thma Puok commune in Banteay Meanchey, refused to believe the accusations and said the arrest must have been linked to the CNRP call.

“This is intimidation for the party,” he said. “This took place only after his conversation with the opposition.”

Political analyst Cham Bunteth said the circumstances leading up to the arrest of Bun Chhay were baffling, and while the alleged phone call to the CNRP could be one of the reasons, he speculated there had to be more happening behind the scenes.

“I don’t know why they are targeting people that they have worked with so nicely for all this time,” he said. “To bring a case against a [former] deputy prime minister who you have been working with – I am speechless.”

He said the modus operandi of resurrecting an old case was not surprising, as it had been done with others who had rubbed the government the wrong way – perhaps most visibly in the case of the legal troubles faced by self-exiled former opposition president Sam Rainsy.

He said if the move was to send a message to Hun Sen’s allies to remain loyal ahead of the next elections, it could have the opposite effect.

“They may bow their head before you, but they will be doing something behind your back,” he said. “I don’t think Prime Minister Hun Sen will do this to get loyalty. You don’t get loyalty from fear and hate.”

VISITING AUSTRALIAN Foreign Minister Julie Bishop yesterday called on Asean to tackle rising tensions on the Korean peninsula ahead of tomorrow’s Asean ministerial meetings in Manila.

“We recognise challenges must be embraced by like-minded countries,” Bishop said. “North Korea presents threats in this region and beyond. It will take a number of countries to work on [it].”

Bishop spoke before Asean ministerial meetings in Manila, which will be attended by ministers from 10 Asean states and several Asean partners, including Australia, the United States and China. US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is expected to seek greater cooperation to sanction North Korea, which last Friday launched an intercontinental ballistic missile, putting Asia-Pacific countries on the alert.

Tillerson will raise issues relating to the nuclear programme on the peninsula, South China Sea conflicts and terrorism during meetings in Manila, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur next week.

Bishop will also underline the same issues during the Philippine meetings, including the Asean-Australia Ministerial Meeting. “The region faces challenges and a shift of power. There is also rising tension in the South China Sea,” she said. “It tests norms and rules about security and prosperity. The rule-based order in the region is essential to maintain these norms.”

Under close observation by the US, the Declaration of Conduct in the contested sea was declared in 2002 between China and Asean, but its non-binding nature has been enough to tone down tensions between claimants.

In Manila, a draft of framework of the long-sought Code of Conduct (CoC) will be considered by Asean and Chinese ministers, paving the way for actual negotiations on the CoC.

Prior to the Asean meetings, Bishop arrived in Thailand on Wednesday to strengthen Thailand-Australia diplomatic ties, which will realise their 65th anniversary this year.

She also paid respects to the late King Bhumibol Adulyadej, opened the new Australian Embassy in Bangkok and consulate in Phuket, and planned discussions with Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-o-cha and top Thai officials.

At the Foreign Ministry in Bangkok yesterday, she signed a bilateral agreement on air traffic services with Thai Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai and provided a special lecture on Asean’s 50th anniversary to be celebrated on Tuesday.

She identified multilateral successes such as the Asean-Australia-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement (FTA), the Asean-Australia Development Cooperation Program and the Australia-Asia Program to Combat Trafficking in Persons.

The 2010 FTA was Australia’s first, involving multiple countries. In 2015, the overall GDP of the 12 countries involved hit US$3.9 trillion (Bt130 trillion), contributing $120 billion to Australia.

Thailand also has had a bilateral FTA with Australia since 2005 and has more than doubled trade between the two countries since its implementation. Thailand’s trade volume with Australia of 20.8 billion Australian dollars (Bt584.4 billion) in 2015 resulted from the elimination of almost all Thai tariffs on imports from Australia.

Bishop also emphasised the |New Colombo Plan, which enables Australian undergraduates to |study and take internships in |the Indo-Pacific region. Over the first four years, it supported about 17,500 students to complete overseas studies.