Taiwan arrests
Taiwan arrests RI sailors
TAIPEI (Reuter): Taiwan authorities have arrested nine Indonesian sailors for alleged gun-running to Taiwan's underworld, the coastguard said yesterday.
The nine are alleged to have tried to smuggle 16 handguns and 776 bullets on a cargo ship that docked at the southern port of Kaohsiung after sailing from Bangkok, a coastguard statement said.
"All nine are still being detained," a coastguard spokesman said." We are still looking for another man, whom the sailors call Tony. He was supposed to take delivery of the guns in Kaohsiung."
The sailors had been promised US$200 for delivering each of the guns, he said. "Tony" -- also an Indonesian -- was to sell them to the local underworld for US$500 each.
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S'pore ship barred from leaving Manila
MANILA (Reuter): Owners of a Philippine ferry involved in a collision in which more than 140 people died won a temporary court order yesterday preventing the other vessel, a Singapore- registered ship, from leaving Manila.
The Manila Regional Trial Court issued the order requiring the Customs, Coast Guard and ports authority to prevent the 12,549- ton container ship Kota Suria from departing.
William Lines, the owners of the Cebu City ferry which sank a week ago after colliding with the Kota Suria at the mouth of Manila Bay, said they would be seeking unspecified damages from the cargo ship's owners.
Altogether 47 bodies have been recovered since the accident, but divers were continuing to search the wreck of the Cebu City for around 100 people still missing. More than 450 people were rescued.
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Smuggle attempt foiled
BANGKOK (Reuter): Thai customs officials seized from a drifting fishing trawler south of Bangkok about 100 young kangaroos and various kinds of birds believed to have come from Australia.
The officials, acting on a tip, searched the trawler about 100 kilometers south of Bangkok late on Thursday, they told reporters yesterday.
No person was on board but the officials found cages containing about 100 baby kangaroos and various kinds of birds, including 82 baby cockatoos, two birds of paradise and two emus, all very young and looking weak and exhausted.
Four kangaroos had already died from exhaustion, a veterinarian said.
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China's delegates to welcome Pope
MANILA (AFP): China is to send 100 delegates to the World Youth Day celebrations in the Philippines next month, where 300,000 young people from around the world will be addressed by Pope John Paul II, organizers said yesterday.
The Vatican has no formal ties with the state-sponsored "open" Roman Catholic church in Beijing, but the Rev. Socrates Villegas said the Chinese agreed to take part in the biennial event for the first time following "government to government" talks with the hosts.
"Surprisingly, the Chinese government made it easy for us to get the delegates to come" to the Jan. 12-14 meeting in Manila, Villegas told a news conference.
He said the delegates were all members of China's "open" Catholic church. There would be no representatives of the "underground" Chinese Catholics who are loyal to the pope, he added.
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Three hanged for trafficking
SINGAPORE (Reuter): Two Malaysians convicted of trafficking in heroin were hanged yesterday along with their Singaporean accomplice, the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) said.
The three men were arrested in July 1989 after CNB officers recovered 39 packets of heroin weighing 8.25 kilograms from a secret compartment in the fuel tank of a vehicle in which the two Malaysian technicians were travelling.
CNB officers had earlier followed the Malaysian-registered vehicle of Tan Seang Hock, 40, and Yeap Kai Pang, 38. Singaporean barber Kong Weng Chong, 56, was travelling separately in a taxi, CNB said.
In November 1992, the Singapore high court sentenced the three men to death. A year later, the Court of Criminal Appeal rejected their appeals.
The death sentence is mandatory for anyone found guilty of trafficking in more than 15 grams of heroin, 30 grams of morphine or 500 grams of cannabis.
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Filipino workers not target of crackdown
MANILA (Reuter): Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said yesterday Filipinos were not being singled out in his government's crackdown on illegal workers.
"The issue of illegal workers is real. It is not just confined to Filipinos," he told a press forum on a visit to Manila.
Anwar said the problem also involves people from other countries, such as Indonesia and Myanmar.
Filipino workers in Malaysia have complained about what they perceive as heavy-handed treatment by authorities in Kuala Lumpur.
Malaysia welcomes foreign workers, Anwar said, since it is short of both skilled and unskilled workers, but will continue to monitor illegal immigration.
"How do you expect a government just to allow the free flow of illegal workers without any form of enforcement?" he said.