- B E R I TA _ H A R I _ I N I ( 2 0 0 4 )

SweetCandy

Austrian President dies

VIENNA (Austria) - President Thomas Klestil died on Tuesday night of multiple organ failure, a spokesman for Vienna's General Hospital said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He had been airlifted to the hospital on Monday after suffering heart failure.

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Mr Klestil, who brought calm to an office frayed by controversy surrounding his predecessor's past in the Nazi army, was 71 years old. His second six-year term in office was to end on Thursday. Hospital director Reinhard Krepler told the Austria Press Agency that the President was surrounded by his family when he died.

Earlier on Tuesday, medical officials said he was in very critical condition.

His heart stopped beating on Monday as he was being flown by helicopter to Vienna's General Hospital after being found unconscious. He was admitted in critical condition, and doctors said they could not rule out brain damage as a possible result of lack of oxygen before hospital staff got his heart functioning again.

In 1996, he suffered from a severe case of pneumonia, and his lung problems had turned serious again in recent days.

Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel assumed the presidential duties when Mr Klestil fell ill. The presidency will be transferred to Mr Heinz Fischer, who won elections earlier this year. Mr Klestil was barred by the Constitution from running for a third term.

While the post is mostly ceremonial, Austria's President is commander-in-chief of the country's military, and the Constitution gives the head of state the power to reject nominations for Cabinet ministers or even to remove them from office - something that has rarely been done.

Mr Klestil, a career diplomat who earlier served as Austria's ambassador to the United States and to the United Nations, was widely credited with helping restore Austria's credibility following a controversy over the Nazi German wartime service of his predecessor, Kurt Waldheim. Mr Waldheim had concealed his service in an SS unit, and it did not come out until after he had retired as UN secretary-general. -- AP

SweetCandy

S'pore man fights with 2 parang attackers in JB
They were after his Lexus, he says. Wife slashed on face

TWO men armed with parangs were after his Singapore-registered Lexus.

But Mr Mohammad Rafi, a 40-year-old Singaporean living in Johor Baru, wasn't giving up without a fight.

He struggled with the two men, even as his wife stood screaming nearby and his Lexus rolled into a drain.

The men eventually ran off leaving Mr Mohammad Rafi with cuts and grazes, which he showed to The New Paper.

'Luckily I'm fit, or else I think I'd be lying in hospital now. What I learnt during national service came to good use this time,' said Mr Mohammad Rafi, who said he served in the Army.

S'PORE CABBY

He now lives in Johor Baru with his Malaysian wife of more than 10 years.

He is a CitiCab MaxiCab driver here and helps run a food business with his wife's family in Malaysia.

At 6am on Sunday, he drove his Lexus S200 out of the garage of his two-storey terrace house. His wife, Madam Khadijah, was closing the gate.

From the corner of his eye, Mr Mohammad Rafi said he saw a small white Perodua Kancil, a car he'd seen near his house a few times before, but had thought nothing of.

Then a man approached, with something long slung over his shoulder.


'I thought it was a badminton racquet or something, but I was already suspicious and alert. The moment he walked towards my wife, I jumped out of the car,' Mr Rafi told The New Paper yesterday.

The car was left in drive mode, and it began to roll down the gentle slope. But Mr Rafi's thoughts were only for his wife 10m away, who stood frozen in terror at the sight of a parang-wielding robber.

'The man raised his parang, but before he could bring it down on her I jumped on him. I don't think he expected that, because he fell to the ground and looked like he was stunned,' said Mr Rafi.

By then a second man, also armed with a parang, was trying to get into the moving car. Mr Rafi said he knocked the man over, pinned him down and started punching his face.

'The first man then came over, and when he swung the parang at me, I siamed (Hokkien for dodged) and the parang went into the upper arm of his accomplice. The accomplice screamed in pain, but was still very aggressive.'

Mr Rafi then spotted a third man, unarmed, who was running after the car.

'The car was a gift to me from my wife's family. There was no way I was going to let them get away with it.

'I threw my whole weight onto him, and he fell face-first onto the road. His face was badly injured and he just lay there. I thought he was unconscious,' he said.

All this time, Madam Khadijah was facing the nightmare of her life. A timid woman by nature, according to her husband, the 40-year-old could not do much else but cry and scream as the second robber took aim at her face.

She managed to duck but the blade left a deep cut near her right eye that needed eight stitches.

Maybe it was the blood that gushed down Madam Khadijah's face, but at this point two of the robbers had had enough, according to Mr Rafi. They ran back to their car.

'The other guy, the one who tried to attack my wife when I was in the car, was stumbling around and swinging his parang wildly. He kept saying to me 'You don't come near me, I will cut you' in Malay,' Mr Rafi said.

Mr Rafi told us the man even made a last ditch effort to take the year-old Lexus, which by then had rolled about 30m into a drain. It was lodged fast, and the man gave up.

As the three sped away, Mr Rafi noted the licence plate number.

WITNESSES

He added that the residents of Jalan Padi Ria 2 in Bandar Baru Uda Tampoi, near Angsana Shopping Centre, were shocked by the vicious attack.

'A few neighbours said they saw what happened but didn't dare to come out to help, and another one said he saw a fourth man running away from the scene. I didn't see him, though,' Mr Rafi said.


Fortunately, the couple's three young children were staying with their maternal grandmother over the weekend and were spared the trauma.

But Mr Rafi is sorry that his wife had to experience it.

He could not explain why the men went after his wife in the first place.

'I didn't want to let the robbers near my wife. She's fragile. She told me not to go back to our house for a few days and even asked me to sell it.'

S'pore police confirmed that Mr Rafi has made a police report.

He also reported the matter to JB police.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'll never return to the house, wife says


WHEN The New Paper spoke to Madam Khadijah on the phone last night, she was recuperating at her mother's place.

We asked her how she was feeling.

'It's quite bad. The cut is very near to my eye, but thank god nothing happened to my eye.

'I'm very upset because I don't feel safe and I'm worried all the time,' she told us.

'When the incident happened, I just froze. Rafi told me to run, but how could I leave my husband? At least if we were both killed we'd be close together,' she added in an emotional voice.


'But he gave them nicely, didn't he?' she said after a while.

'They were so blur they didn't even take my handbag, and left their slippers behind.'

Did she think she'd ever go back to the house to live?

'No way, I'll never go back. I have to think of my children's safety too,' she said.

'I told Rafi to just sell it and be done with.'

At the moment though, Mr Rafi has no intentions of doing so.

'You've just got to be alert to these things,' he said.

chicsee

My opinion is, he shouldn't have taken the risk by fighting back. Kereta boleh beli tapi nyawa....

just give him the money...duit boleh cari...kang the robbers hurt your wife or grandchildren...is it worth it ??? if they are hurt badly...nak menyesal pun tak guna.

kereta baru kilat2 lagi....kalau  yang suv or mpv or station wagon...orang mesti pandang kita banyak duit.to me family safety comes first.
kalau ada don't flaunt...just look average...

dilah21

kat forum st niari~ kesian the girl~

Kicked in leg till she bled but passengers kept mum
==================================
MY DAUGHTER, returning home from school, boarded Tibs' Service 67 outside The Sterling condominium about 4.30 pm on Friday. As all the seats were taken, she stood at the designated standing area facing the first exit of the Bendy bus.

Nearing the next stop, an angry-looking man dressed like a construction worker walked towards the exit. However, before alighting, he kicked her leg twice, even though she was not in his way.

Several passengers saw what the man did. The driver was probably aware too. However, no one did anything and the man was allowed to alight.

My daughter was too stunned to react. She was also afraid that the man would harm her further. It was only when she got home that she realised that her leg was bleeding from the wounds caused by the man's kicks.

What I would like to know is this: Have bus drivers been briefed on what action to take when they notice a bully harassing a passenger?

And what about the other passengers? Did no one think about going to the aid of a young girl? Were they afraid that they, too, would become a punching bag for a violent person in a foul mood? What has happened to our society?



CHONG AI LENG (MDM)

dilah21

hmm dulu i pena kena i was sitting down.. dis man was standing up beside me and the bus was veryy very packed.. he was practically rubbing his ...... against my shoulder..its like veryy nampak sah its intentional .. i mean normally we will know either its sengaja or tak sengaja kan.. the bus memang packed gila..tapi i noe very well dat he purposely buat tu!!  i felt really uncomfortable and felt like crying .. tapi if i were to shout or wat rite.. i tsayat mesti dia akan cakap or give reasons like the bus crowded or wat and im juz cooking up false accusations.. dat guy time tu hari2 i pegi sekolah dia take same bus as me and turun same bus stop.. den i told my fren la abt it.. she cakap one of her frens also pena kena in the bus..any of u here ever encountered this kind of situation?? wat wud u have done??

Originally posted by dilah21 at 7-7-2004 01:49 PM:
hmm dulu i pena kena i was sitting down.. dis man was standing up beside me and the bus was veryy very packed.. he was practically rubbing his ...... against my shoulder..its like veryy nampak sah  ...

i tak bedek.all post are certified true stories.....i pernah naik bas,bas was packed.i was sitting and i tersadar someone was geseling on my shoulder.i thot it was a girl,coz this person was wearing baju shining and was not tucked in.in my heart no sweat lah..pasal bas was very packed,i macam tidor ayam and i feel the the contact was quite obvious...sekali i bukak mata

...........IT WAS A GUY WHO WAS DOING THAT....wa lau eh.....

    kena molest ngan jantan pulak.

chicsee

Originally posted by dilah21 at 7-7-2004 01:49 PM:
hmm dulu i pena kena i was sitting down.. dis man was standing up beside me and the bus was veryy very packed.. he was practically rubbing his ...... against my shoulder..its like veryy nampak sah  ...

Chic pernah encounter something similar masa sekolah dulu. But my experience, the guy just blatantly put his hand on my thigh and raba2. I was in school uniform and sitting at the last few rows in an almost empty bus. Tapi time tu, too afraid to do anything, still young and green. All I did was got up and alighted at the next bus stop. Kalau sekarang, dah berani, mesti kena maki berbsayal punya........(macam real aje ek ;))

Originally posted by SweetCandy at 7-7-2004 02:40 PM:

lol :setuju:

the guy macam lembut2 sikit...small built ...i thot it was a girl....sebab mana ada guy pakai baju tuck out,and shining too....

SweetCandy

Originally posted by chicsee at 7-7-2004 03:17 PM:


:hmm:

no idea....

u all semua nak tau wat's dat?? can let me tell u all.
i got to noe this word while i went to tanah merah prison for one of my project which i m doing rite now.
Catamite is actually bapok, this bapok they have their own cell tak bleh campur dgn lelaki biasa, they got this name for the offence suka spikie @ other pple's drinks wen they go pubbing. tulah crita nya, so lain klai kalo ade lelaki2 yg nak raba sama lelaki tu, kol them'catamites' dah mcm 'termites'lol:lol

[ Last edited by SweetCandy on 7-7-2004 at 03:24 PM ]

Originally posted by SweetCandy at 7-7-2004 03:23 PM:

u all semua nak tau wat's dat?? can let me tell u all.
i got to noe this word while i went to tanah merah prison for one of my project which i m doing rite now.
Catamite is actually bapok, thi ...

one of my girlfriend masok prison,dia kata dalam cell kadang ada lesbian.
orang baru masok kadang2 kena layan nafsu yang lesbian ni.dia kata  couple akan buat kerja covered by blanket...and the act bawah selimut is called ....

      ..................   BLUE LAGOON  .................

alahai...macam mana pulak fire station boleh kena jilap api.....tadi tengok cna at 10 pm punya news...building tu antique...pakai batu bate merah macam
kat national library

chicsee

Originally posted by matz_rockz at 10-7-2004 10:27 PM:
alahai...macam mana pulak fire station boleh kena jilap api.....tadi tengok cna at 10 pm punya news...building tu antique...pakai batu bate merah macam
kat national library

  
JULY 11, 2004
Fire at firemen's workshop
By Crystal Chan

FIREFIGHTERS had no problem locating this blaze. It was their own workshop that went up in flames yesterday.

The fire started at about 5pm in the Central Maintenance Base in Serangoon Road, where the Singapore Civil Defence Force repairs and maintains fire engines, said SCDF's spokesman, Lieutenant-Colonel N. Subhas.

No fire engines were parked in the maintenance base at the time of the fire. A quarter of the building's zinc roof was damaged and the plumes of smoke soared to more than 60m.

Channel NewsAsia's bulletin showed a beam collapsing, very nearly on the firefighters.

The base is next to the Serangoon Fire Station, which has not been used for two years. Twenty firefighters, three fire engines and one red rhino were deployed to put out the blaze, the first for an SCDF building.

It had closed for the day at 1pm, and no one was hurt.

When firefighters arrived, a crowd of more than 100 people had formed. Many said they had seen the smoke from several hundred metres away.

Mr Neo Swee Geok, 52, a dispatch driver, saw the smoke while walking along Whampoa North.

'At first, I thought a TV serial was being filmed. But when I saw the police and firefighters, I realised that it was a real fire.'

The police briefly closed parts of Serangoon and Bendemeer roads leading to the burning building to all traffic but public busesto facilitate the firefighters' work. By 5.40pm, the fire was under control. By 6pm, it was out, but smoke continued to billow from it for another half hour.

The premises smelt of burnt rubber and soot was all over the place.

Said Lt-Col Subhas: 'The fire was small and the affected area - the tyre store and an office - is half the size of a basketball court.'

More than 100 tyres were stored there and about 20 were burnt, which explains why the smoke was thick, he said.

A short circuit is the likely cause although the actual cause cannot be confirmed until investigations are completed.

As a safety precaution, the SCDF had four firefighters stand by overnight to ensure that the fire did not rekindle.

kat straits times....banyak taxi driver yang give up driving...kat road sekarang banyak taxi company yang baru...ada yang color silver,light green and i saw one yang ada tong gas,color merah i think.stiff competition....apatak...too many on the road.i have friends yang drive taxi,dulu dia cakap good money...sekarang quite bad.

SweetCandy

Originally posted by matz_rockz at 12-7-2004 09:14 AM:
kat straits times....banyak taxi driver yang give up driving...kat road sekarang banyak taxi company yang baru...ada yang color silver,light green and i saw one yang ada tong gas,color merah i thin ...

:setuju::setuju:
ckp pasal ni, my dad juga ade kata skrg punya time susah nak jadi taxi-driver, tak mcm dulu bleh dapat bnyk $$. lagipun, dah ade bnyk mode of transport, jadi taxi-drivers face alot of competitions.

kat new paper...kesian ye.tak tau siapa punya kerja...dia slashed rhis boy punya  wheelchair and poured oil at the back pocket of the seat.kesian si auntie tu angkat anak dia.

LoLiPoP

Ni untuk justice ke atau pasal duit?

3 families got $75m. Now 29 others are going to court
LA court judge will decide how much maker of plane component that malfunctioned owes in damages

By Tracy Quek

FIRST came the $75-million ruling that a Los Angeles Superior Court handed down last week.


AMERICAN lawyer Walter Lack was part of the team that took on California's Pacific Gas and Electric in the famous case that was made into the movie Erin Brockovich.

His firm, Engstrom, Lipscomb & Lack, based in Los Angeles, was called in to help Ms Brockovich's lawyers, Masry & Vititoe, deal with the utilities giant in a case that resulted in a US$330 million (S$565 million) settlement for residents of Hinkley, California.

The firm represented, as co-lead counsel, 650 plaintiffs in a personal injury case against Pacific Gas and Electric for toxic pollution from a cancer-causing agent that had contaminated the groundwater of the small town in the Mojave Desert.

That high-profile case and several others catapulted Mr Lack and his firm into the top echelons of the field.

Mr Lack, 56, is frequently listed among the top 25 litigators/lawyers in Los Angeles.

According to his firm's website, he specialises in complex business litigation, insurance bad faith, mass toxic tort and environmental litigation, professional liability, aviation crash litigation and class action suits. -- Tracy Quek





Now, lawyers acting for families of 29 other SilkAir crash victims will be back in court tomorrow, when a judge will determine how their cases should be tried.

The judge will also determine how much Parker Hannifin Corp, the world's largest maker of hydraulic equipment, owes them in damages. It was ordered to pay $75 million to the families of three victims, after the court found it responsible for the December 1997 crash in Indonesia.

The company had made a component of the rudder-control system that malfunctioned, sending the plane into a nose dive. Called a servo valve, it is attached to the plane's power-control unit, which controls the rudder's movement.

The court would not apportion blame to SilkAir or Boeing, maker of the 10-month-old 737.

Lawyer Walter Lack of the LA firm Engstrom, Lipscomb & Lack, who acts for the families, told The Sunday Times by e-mail that he expects the cases to be tried in batches of three or five.

The damages will depend on the age, occupation, earnings history and potential work-life expectancy of each victim.

Earlier, the bereaved families had accepted compensation from SilkAir. This bars them from further legal action against the airline. Boeing is also believed to be reaching out-of-court settlements with the families.

Last December, Boeing dropped its lawsuit against the airline and the estate of pilot Tsu Way Ming, in the wake of new evidence that rudder malfunction caused the crash.

The LA court's ruling contradicts the US National Transportation Safety Board's belief that Mr Tsu purposely crashed the plane.

Parker Hannifin has said it will appeal the decision.

Another 40 cases are pending in the federal court in Seattle. It may accept the ruling of the LA court and then decide how much damages to award. Whatever the ultimate ruling, Mr Lack said, 'that judge will rely heavily upon the result in our case'.

The primary points argued during the trial involved the condition of the servo valve taken from the power-control unit. Found inside it were pieces of sheared metal that could only have resulted from the manufacturing process, said the lawyer.

The specifications for this valve require all edges of its internal structure to be sharp and its metal surfaces to be free of steel burrs.

The metals expert he engaged found 'chip-outs' in the valve and numerous burrs 'that could easily have interfered with the smooth operation of the valve'.

That is why the firm engaged aeronautical engineering expert Frederic Wilken to track it down because 'no one would tell us where the critical servo valve for the power-control unit went after it was inspected in May 1998'.

Mr Wilken found it 'by accident' locked in a safe in Jakarta. A law firm there was engaged to petition Indonesia's Supreme Court to remove the valve. It was taken to a lab in Pensacola, Florida, for tests. All this cost US$150,000 (S$255,000).

The jury rejected Parker Hannifin and Boeing's seven-year bid to blame the pilot. It also rejected Parker Hannifin's claims that Boeing's rudder design or the carelessness of the flight crew contributed to the crash, Mr Lack said.

He said: 'We believe that justice has been well served and that a message has been sent to Parker Hannifin concerning the defective nature of their manufacturing processes.'

SweetCandy

Economy powers ahead in 2nd quarter

Growth rate of 11.7 per cent the fastest in eight years, beating most predictions; Govt may raise year's forecast a 3rd time



SINGAPORE'S economy grew a blistering 11.7 per cent from April to June, leaving the Government with an enviable problem: whether to raise its growth forecast for the third time this year.

That red-hot growth rate for the second quarter, from the same period a year earlier, was the fastest pace in eight years and beat most forecasts.

The economy shrugged off record oil prices and worries over rising interest rates, as manufacturing and services companies benefited from improved spending at home and abroad, advance estimates released yesterday showed.

Some analysts say this may lead the Government to revise its official full-year growth estimate to as high as 7 per cent to 9 per cent, from the current 5.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent.

Already, United Overseas Bank has raised its full-year growth forecast from 6.8 per cent to 7.8 per cent .


Watch Channel i news clip here

Mr Nizam Idris, an economist at IdeaGlobal, said: 'The economy is in a very strong growth phase. I think the Government will have to revise its growth estimate again in August, this time to between 7 per cent and 9 per cent.' He forecasts full-year growth of 8.5 per cent.

So far this year, the Government has upgraded its official forecast twice.

Its first forecast for the year was 3 per cent to 5 per cent growth, but in February that was raised to between 3.5 per cent and 5.5 per cent.

Then, as the economic wheels turned even faster, the forecast was bumped up to its current 5.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent level in May.

Most analysts were forecasting second quarter growth of between 10 per cent and 11 per cent, as the economy's poor performance during last year's Sars outbreak made a low base, boosting second quarter numbers this year.

On an annualised basis, the economy grew 9.1 per cent in the second quarter from the first quarter.

Mr Joseph Tan, an economist at Standard Chartered, expects the Government to raise its forecast to between 6.5 per cent and 8.5 per cent.

'The Singapore economy is doing well and it is coinciding with a boom in the electronics sector. Global demand for electronics is not slowing down,' he said.

The economy grew 7.4 per cent in the first quarter, and this momentum did not let up. The manufacturing sector surged 18 per cent from April to June, and the services sector by 11 per cent.

The Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) said yesterday that output of semiconductors, infocomms and consumer electronics surged. The biomedical industries also grew strongly, it added.

For the services sector, its second-quarter growth was boosted by comparison with a year ago, when Sars kept tourists away and local consumers at home.

'Resumption of international travel had a particularly strong positive impact on the hotels and restaurants sector, as well as the transport and communications sector,' MTI said.

The fly in the ointment remains the construction industry, which shrank 4.5 per cent in the second quarter. MTI attributed this to slower building activity in both public and private sectors.

Still, analysts say that with the manufacturing and services sectors powering ahead, the economy is likely to grow more than 7 per cent this year.

UOB economist Low Ping Yee said that the Government may choose not to raise the official growth estimate: 'The Government may still prefer to err on the side of caution.'

deaf4ever

korang tahu kan, suratkabar Berita Harian last week, kecoh pasal satu keluarga melayu ni pergi court, berebut harta arwah bapak dorang...

ada a few adik beradik bawak kes pergi court cakap pembahagian harta pusaka tak fair....
siap seret semua Mufti Negara, expert dari Malaysia, semua terbabit...


dalam hati aku cakap, seram ye, korang bayangkan la, kita mati besok, instead of harapkan our love ones doakan kita, sedekahkan amalan kat kita...
ringankan sikit siksa kubur kita....

tapi our love ones tengah gaduh pasal harta kita...


tu la kadang2 duit is nothing but trouble.....

sampai masuk paper, siap nama semua...tak segan ke darah daging fight with each other satu negeri tahu, kalo kita gaduh adik beradik pun, depan mak bapak kita act cool, tak mau dorang sedih.