19/03/2025

WEDNESDAY | MAR 19, 2025

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Indonesia to assess scam centre returnees

Taiwan probes duo over ‘unification’ comments TAIPEI: Two Chinese influencers living in Taiwan are under investigation over their comments “advocating unification” with China, a Taipei immigration official said yesterday, days after the agency ordered a third Chinese influencer to leave the island. The National Immigration Agency (NIA) was investigating two influencers identified as En-qi and Xiao-wei over their “statements advocating unification”, a NIA official said. The two women posted videos on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok. Over the weekend, NIA ordered another influencer identified by her surname Liu to leave Taiwan after she allegedly called for “unification by force” in her videos. “The NIA emphasises that, due to Liu’s advocacy of unification by force, which has caused significant public concern and posed potential threats to national security and social stability, she must comply with the departure order within the given timeframe,” the NIA said in a statement on Sunday. “Failure to do so will result in enforced deportation in accordance with the law.” The NIA official said yesterday that Liu “must leave the country within 10 days, starting the day after the letter (departure order) is received”. “The letter has already been sent. I cannot confirm whether it has been received or not,” the official said. Liu, who claims to be from Hunan, shared a compilation of some of her videos with her more than 485,000 followers on Monday. In one video, she said “Taiwan has always been China’s territory, but now DPP is pushing Taiwan into the danger of war”, referring to the ruling Democratic Progressive Party of President Lai Ching-te. Liu said “according to Article 8 of the Anti Secession Law ... the mainland no longer needs any other reason to use force against Taiwan!” “I love the mainland and Taiwan. I support peaceful reunification because both sides of the Taiwan Strait are Chinese people. Chinese people should not fight Chinese people,” she said. – AFP South Korea tightens security for opposition leader SEOUL: South Korean police stepped up security for the leader of the main opposition Democratic Party, after lawmakers had warned of a potential assassination plot targeting Lee Jae-myung. In January last year, Lee was stabbed in the neck by a man who lunged at him with a knife after asking for his autograph. The man was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Tensions have been running high in South Korea since President Yoon Suk Yeol briefly imposed martial law last December, triggering the country’s worst political crisis in decades. His martial law imposition and its fallout have widened deep social rifts between conservatives and liberals and put pressure on institutions. Yoon faces a criminal trial on charges of insurrection, while the Constitutional Court is also expected to rule in coming days on whether to uphold his impeachment and permanently strip him of his powers. Police have been preparing for the risk of clashes, with both Yoon’s supporters and his opponents due to hold large rallies when the court makes its decision. South Korea’s acting President Choi Sang mok repeated yesterday a call for citizens to accept and respect the court’s ruling. – Reuters

o Suspected perpetrators face legal action

JAKARTA: Indonesia will question hundreds of its citizens arriving in the capital yesterday after they were rescued from online scam compounds in Myanmar, the largest batch of arrivals in the country following a multinational crackdown on the operation. Myanmar’s Myawaddy scam centres are part of a Southeast Asia network involving criminal gangs trafficking hundreds of thousands of people to help generate illicit revenues running into billions of dollars a year, according to the United Nations. About 200 Indonesians arrived at Jakarta’s airport yesterday from Myawaddy via Thailand and another 200 will land later, Security Minister Budi Gunawan told a news conference. “The Indonesian government cooperated with the Thai government and the Chinese government to rescue and repatriate 554 Indonesians,” he said. Around 154 more are expected to arrive today, Budi said. They were among 7,000 people from different nationalities freed from scam centres in Myawaddy following a multinational crackdown to dismantle the illegal compounds. “We will conduct an assessment to find out which ones are victims or perpetrators. “We want the Southeast Asia region free of online scams,” he said. The 554 people, consisting of 105 women and 449 men, will be taken to a dormitory usually reserved for pilgrims returning from Mecca where they will be questioned by police, he said. Those cleared would be allowed to return home but those suspected of being willing participants in financial crimes would face legal action in Indonesia. Footage showed the arriving Indonesians wearing red masks and bandanas and being

A returnee making his way to a dormitory at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport yesterday. – AFPPIC

Tennakoon was appointed police chief in November 2023, but the move was challenged in the Supreme Court, which suspended him last July pending the outcome of a separate court case. The next hearing in that case is due in May. He was given the top job despite the country’s highest court ruling in another case that he had tortured a suspect in custody by rubbing menthol balm on his genitals. The Supreme Court had ordered Tennakoon to pay half a million rupees (RM7,111) to the victim in compensation, but the government at the time ignored judicial orders to take disciplinary action against him. – AFP adding that the bodies were taken to Lampung Police Hospital for post-mortem. Senior officers from Lampung Police arrived at the scene as authorities ramped up efforts to investigate and apprehend those responsible, Yuni said. Indonesia has strict gambling laws, with Article 303 of the Criminal Code imposing severe penalties on those involved in organising or taking part in such activities. – Bernama Aside from Indonesia, China and India have also repatriated their citizens from Myawaddy but thousands still remain in the area including those from African nations. Authorities in Myanmar, under pressure from ally China, have cracked down on the scam compounds. Between 2020 and September last year, Jakarta repatriated more than 4,700 Indonesians entangled in online scam operations from countries including Cambodia, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, according to Foreign Ministry data. The United Nations estimates that as many as 120,000 people may be working in Myanmar scam centres against their will. – Reuters/AFP

Failure to find the police chief has “undermined public confidence in the police force”, spokesman Buddhika Manatunga told reporters. A foreign travel ban has been imposed on Tennakoon in case he tries to flee the island. The state prosecutor told another court hearing last week that evidence had emerged of Tennakoon operating a paramilitary hit squad to carry out illegal activities. A magistrate ordered Tennakoon’s arrest in February following allegations he authorised an illegal raid in the southern coastal resort town of Weligama. Local police, unaware of the undercover operation, confronted the unit, sparking a gun welcomed by authorities, including Foreign Minister Sugiono. Some of them cried and hugged the officials. Budi said some of them were beaten and given electric shocks before being rescued. Others were also threatened that their body parts would be surgically removed if they failed to meet targets set by the cartel, he said. “Be careful when you make friends on social media. I am the victim of social media,” a survivor with the initials DN told reporters. Earlier this month, another group of 84 Indonesians returned home from Myanmar while 70 others remain in the country. Some of them were being detained and a few have refused to go home, Budi said.

Court refuses to stop arrest of fugitive police chief COLOMBO: A Sri Lankan court refused on Monday to quash an arrest warrant for the island nation’s fugitive police chief who is wanted over an officer’s death in a botched raid. only able to trace his wife and son, who claimed they were unaware of his whereabouts. battle in which one officer was killed and another critically wounded. No drugs were found.

Inspector-General Deshabandu Tennakoon has been in hiding since the arrest warrant was issued last month and police have made a public appeal to help find him. He stands accused of authorising an ill-fated drug bust in 2023, allegedly against internal regulations, that sparked a gun battle between competing police units. Despite Tennakoon being in hiding, he still managed to file a writ urging the arrest warrant be cancelled, which the Court of Appeal refused to grant in Monday’s ruling. Police said on Sunday they had deployed six special units to track down Tennakoon but were

Three senior cops shot dead in gambling raid JAKARTA: Three police officers were shot dead during a raid on an illegal gambling site in Way Kanan district, Lampung province, on the southern tip of Sumatra. from the Way Kanan Police Criminal Investigation Unit. Lampung Police spokesperson

Commissioner Yuni Iswandari said a 17-member team from Way Kanan Police, which included officers from Negara Batin Police, had been dispatched following reports of illegal gambling activity. “At the scene, they came under fire. Three officers were killed in the line of duty,” she said,

The officers were shot by a gunman on Monday while they were at the site in Karang Manik village, Negara Batin sub-district. They were identified as Negara Batin Police Chief Inspector Lusiyanto, Chief Brigadier Petrus Apriyanto and Brigadier Two Ghalib Surya Ganta