Malaysia, S'pore talk again on 'crooked' bridge<\/p>\n
Clarence Fernandez, Reuters\/Kuala Lumpur<\/p>\n
Singapore and Malaysia began talks in the Malaysian capital on
\nTuesday to try and agree on plans for a bridge to replace a
\ncauseway between the neighbors, a project that occasionally
\ninflames tempers on both sides.<\/p>\n
Malaysia-Singapore ties have warmed since Malaysia's outspoken
\nformer prime minister Mahathir Mohamad handed power to Abdullah
\nAhmad Badawi late in 2003.<\/p>\n
The new cordiality has inspired efforts to settle several
\noutstanding issues, the bridge among them.<\/p>\n
Officials of the two countries would begin talks on Tuesday,
\nsaid Singapore Minister for Foreign Affairs George Yeo, who is on
\na two-day visit to Malaysia.<\/p>\n
\"This evening a team from Singapore is coming to talk to their
\nMalaysian counterparts about that very subject,\" Yeo told
\nbusinessmen who asked when the bridge project would be completed.<\/p>\n
\"But of course in any such discussion, it's got to be mutually
\nbeneficial,\" he said. \"It should take into account the needs and
\nconstraints on both sides. It should not be a bridge to nowhere.\"<\/p>\n
He declined to give additional details.<\/p>\n
Singapore lies at the southern tip of the Malay peninsula. The
\ntwo nations separated in 1965 after a brief union in the years
\nfollowing independence from Britain and have deep economic ties,
\nalthough relations have sometimes been prickly.<\/p>\n
Former premier Mahathir unveiled the plan for a bridge to
\nreplace half the 500-meters causeway between the neighbors in
\n2003, after Singapore rejected a plan to jointly build a bridge
\nto replace the entire causeway.<\/p>\n
Malaysia says its bridge, called the \"crooked\" bridge because
\nof its convoluted design, would boost traffic flow and ease jams
\non its side of the 81-year-old causeway, allow ships to pass
\nbeneath and improve water quality by unblocking the strait.<\/p>\n
Singapore opposes the original plan on cost grounds and has
\nraised its own environmental concerns over the crooked bridge,
\nwhich would merge with Singapore's half of the causeway.<\/p>\n
In Singapore, analysts said the bridge could threaten the
\nisland's economy.<\/p>\n
\"As it is, the Singapore port is already facing stiff
\ncompetition from the port in Tanjung Pelepas,\" Ho Khai Leong, a
\nresearch fellow at the city-state's Institute of Southeast Asian
\nStudies, told Reuters, referring to a Malaysian port.<\/p>\n
\"If Malaysia gets its way with building the bridge, then
\nSingapore's port will lose more business,\" Ho added.<\/p>\n
In 2002, the Port Authority of Singapore lost two key clients
\n-- Taiwan's Evergreen Marine and Maersk Sealand, the world's
\nlargest container shipping firm -- to the Port of Tanjung Pelepas
\n(PTP), prompting PSA to shelve listing plans.<\/p>\n
Although PTP handled just four million 20-foot equivalent
\nunits (TEUs) last year, against PSA's 33.1 million, its volume
\ngrowth since its birth in 1999 has made Singapore increasingly
\nwary.<\/p>\n
As talks on the bridge have dragged on, Malaysia has gone
\nahead with a key part of its 1.1 billion ringgit (US$292 million)
\nproject, building a customs, immigration and quarantine center at
\nJohor Baru, the main gateway to Malaysia from Singapore.<\/p>\n
Malaysia says it hopes to work with Singapore on the plan for
\nthe bridge as one of a series of issues it wants to settle.<\/p>",
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