World Cup hosts to help ASEAN

World Cup hosts to help ASEAN

MALAYSIA: Japan and South Korea will use lessons learned from
hosting the soccer World Cup to teach Southeast Asian countries
about security for big events, an official said on Sunday.

Singapore will host a conference in August or September of the
10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
at which Japan and South Korea will discuss security problems
they encountered at the May 31-June 30 World Cup finals and how
they were overcome, said Tan Boon Huat, deputy secretary-general
of Singapore's Home Affairs Ministry.

"The focus will be on security preparations against
terrorism," Tan said on the sidelines of a meeting in Kuala
Lumpur of ASEAN home ministers.

The conference was agreed upon during a meeting of the ASEAN
Regional Forum officials in Brunei last week, Tan said. The forum
is a security group which joins ASEAN with other Asian countries,
the United States, Europe and other nations.

Tan said the Southeast Asian Games, the regional version of
the Olympics, was one event which could be a potential target for
terrorist attacks. The last games took place in Kuala Lumpur on
Sept. 11 last year, when terrorists flew jet liners into
buildings in the United States, killing thousands. -- AP

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Australia-ETimor-visits
Australian FM heads to ETimor, Thailand and Indonesia
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Downer to attend Australia-RI dialog

AUSTRALIA: Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer began a
six-day trip to Southeast Asia by joining thousands of guests at
Timor Lorosae's (East Timor's) independence celebrations on
Sunday, before traveling to Thailand and Indonesia.

After the celebrations in Dili, which he was attending with
Prime Minister John Howard, Downer will co-host the Coolum Forum
with Thai Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathirathai, in Phuket.

He will also hold bilateral talks with a number of other Thai
ministers on May 22 before meeting his Indonesian counterpart
Hassan Wirayuda in Bogor, near Jakarta, for the inaugural
Australia-Indonesia Dialogue on May 23 and 24.

"The dialogue will bring together a new generation of leaders
from Australia and Indonesia, including representatives from
politics, business, academia and the media," he said.

"Its aim is to build enduring relationships and to provide
ideas on how to strengthen bilateral relations."

He will also meet other Indonesian ministers. -- AFP

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CAMBODIA-ROUGE (PICTURE)
Cambodia mourns Khmer Rouge victims on "Day of Hate"
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Cambodians mourn Khmer Rouge victims

CAMBODIA: More than 1,000 Cambodians gathered at a former Khmer
Rouge execution ground on Sunday to mourn victims of the "killing
fields" regime as dark clouds hang over the future of a Cambodian
genocide trial.

Dozens of Buddhist monks chanted prayers as mourners old and
young gathered at the site, located 17 kilometers from Phnom
Penh, where the Khmer Rouge bludgeoned and shot to death some
17,000 people in the 1970s.

The mourners came to lay offerings of incense sticks and
flowers at a memorial glass pagoda containing the skulls of 8,000
Khmer Rouge victims exhumed from mass graves in the area.

The ceremony marks what Cambodians call the "Day of Hate",
against the 1975-1979 regime of Democratic Kampuchea, popularly
known as the Khmer Rouge, during which thousands, perhaps
millions, of people are estimated to have died from sporadic
bloody skirmishes with the Vietnamese military, disease,
starvation, forced labor and execution. -- Reuters

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PHILIPPINES-HOSTAGE
Philippine troops clash with gang holding Korean
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Troops kill suspected kidnappers

PHILIPPINES: Philippine troops killed five suspected kidnappers
in a gunbattle on Sunday with Moro gunmen believed to be holding
a South Korean hostage for more than three months, the military
said.

Other members of the kidnap gang escaped, taking Korean
businessman Jae Kwon-yoon with them during the hour-long clash in
the mountains of Maitum, 80 km (50 miles) west of General Santos
city, army area commander Colonel Alexander Yano said.

There were no reports of government casualties.

"We received reports from villagers that the Korean hostage
was with the group in Maitum," Yano said by telephone.

"Our forces did not see the Korean and we suspect that he was
taken by the others, who escaped during the fighting."

Yano said the group that clashed with his troops numbered
about 35 gunmen. -- Reuters