Bank robbed in world's tallest buildings
Bank robbed in world's tallest buildings
MALAYSIA: Robbers seized 2.5 million ringgit (US$658,000) on Tuesday from a bank in the world's tallest buildings -- Malaysia's Petronas Twin Towers -- while scores of tourists and office workers watched helplessly, police said.
Six men, armed with a single revolver among them, snatched the cash from two security guards outside a branch office of Maybank, Malaysia's biggest banking group, in a shopping mall at the foot of the twin towers, said district police chief Hadi Ho Abdullah.
The guards were taking bags of money to a van headed for the bank's nearby headquarters when the robbers ambushed them, Hadi was quoted as saying by the national news agency, Bernama.
The heist occurred at lunchtime, while the area was crowded with shoppers, office employees and tourists.
The robbers fled on motorcycles parked outside the 88-story, 452-meter buildings, which were the backdrop for a robbery in the 1999 Hollywood crime adventure movie Entrapment, starring Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta-Jones. --AP
;AFP;KOD; ANPAu..r.. Aglance-Cambodia-King King Sihanouk marks his 80th birthday amid a cloudy future JP/12/ASEAN
King Sihanouk to mark 80th birthday
CAMBODIA: A healthy King Norodom Sihanouk is to celebrate his 80th birthday on Thursday amid speculation and potential storm clouds over the future of Cambodia's revered monarchy.
Such talk was once considered taboo but palace leaks have combined with comments from both the queen and the monarch's official biographer, Julio Jeldres, to relieve the local press of that constraint.
At stake is the future of the monarchy and a king who fears his cherished heritage and lines of succession could be abolished in favor of a republic after his death.
In what was interpreted as a bid to force the issue with the Cambodian government, Jeldres made it known -- while Sihanouk was in China for medical checks -- that the king could abdicate shortly after his birthday. --AFP
;AFP;KOD; ANPAu..r.. Aglance-Philippines-mayor Town mayor shot dead at wedding in Philippines JP/12/ASEAN
Town mayor shot dead at wedding
PHILIPPINES: A town mayor was assassinated on Tuesday as he attended a church wedding south of the Philippine capital, hospital officials said.
Clarence Benwaren, 37, mayor of Tineg town in the northern Philippines, was shot in the neck as he stepped out of the church in Calauan town.
Security forces killed the gunman and captured one of his accomplices, but five others escaped in a van, police officials said. Police did not immediately say who they suspected of the crime.
Communist New People's Army guerrillas had previously threatened the mayor, circulating written statements about their plan to "punish the Benwaren warlord family." --AFP