09/12/2025

TUESDAY | DEC 9, 2025

7 Thailand launches airstrikes

Jakarta frees Dutch inmate

Japan pulls out of power project HANOI: Japan has dropped out of plans to build a major nuclear power plant in Vietnam because the time frame is too tight, said ambassador Naoki Ito. Vietnam has faced major power blackouts as demand from its huge industrial sector and expanding middle class often outpaces supply, strained by increasingly frequent extreme weather, such as droughts and typhoons. “The Japanese side is not in a position to implement the Ninh Thuan 2 project,” the ambassador to Vietnam said, referring to a plant with a planned capacity of 2 to 3.2 gigawatts. The project is part of Vietnam’s strategy to boost power generation. Ninh Thuan 2 is scheduled to come online by 2035 alongside Ninh Thuan 1, a plant with the same capacity, according to the government’s roadmap. The announcement comes amid strains in ties between Hanoi and Tokyo, including from a planned ban on petrol motorcycles in central Hanoi that has angered Honda. – Reuters Dutch deputy ambassador Adriaan Palm said authorities in The Hague would deliberate on whether the men’s sentences will be continued in the Netherlands. – AFP JAKARTA: A 74-year-old Dutchman sentenced to death in Indonesia 17 years ago for drug trafficking was released from a prison here yesterday for repatriation to the Netherlands on humanitarian grounds. Siegfried Mets walked out of Cipinang prison and headed to Soekarno-Hatta International Airport. Mets was due to fly home later, accompanied by fellow Dutch inmate Ali Tokman, 65, who was serving a life sentence for a similar offence and also was granted a reprieve. The convicted drug smugglers will return home on humanitarian grounds after a deal struck this week between Indonesia and the Dutch government. “Their detention will be transferred to the Netherlands,” said Indonesian official I Nyoman Gede Surya Mataram. Mets was sentenced to death in 2008 for smuggling 600,000 ecstasy pills into Indonesia, but his execution had not been carried out. Tokman was handed a death sentence in 2015 for smuggling more than 6kg of the stimulant MDMA. The sentence was later commuted to life.

o Ex-Cambodian head urges restraint

both countries accused the other of breaching a ceasefire. At least one Thai soldier had been killed and eight were wounded in the fresh clashes that intensified around 5am (6am in Malaysia), a Thai army spokesperson said, adding that air support was called in to hit Cambodian military targets.

Thailand’s Air Force said that Cambodia mobilised heavy weaponry, repositioned combat units and prepared support elements that could escalate military operations. “These developments prompted the use of air power to deter and reduce Cambodia’s military capabilities,” it said in a statement.

Cambodia’s Defence Ministry said in a statement that the Thai military had launched dawn attacks on its forces at two locations, following days of provocative actions, and added that Cambodian troops had not responded. Cambodia’s influential former longtime leader Hun Sen, father of Prime Minister Hun Manet, said Thailand’s military was seeking to provoke a retaliatory response and urged Cambodian forces to exercise restraint. “The red line for responding has already been set,” Hun Sen said on Facebook, without elaborating. “I urge commanders at all levels to educate all officers and soldiers accordingly.” Three Cambodian civilians have been seriously injured in the fighting, according to a senior provincial official. Cambodia’s Defence Ministry said its forces had not retaliated. A simmering border dispute between the countries erupted into a five-day conflict in July, before a ceasefire deal brokered by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and US President Donald Trump, who also witnessed the signing of an expanded peace agreement between the two countries in Kuala Lumpur in October. Phichet Pholkoet, a resident of Thailand’s Ban Kruat district which adjoins Cambodia, said he heard gunfire since early yesterday. “It startled me. The explosions were very clear. Boom boom!” he said via telephone. “Some are heavy artillery, some are small arms.” In Thailand, more than 385,000 civilians across four border districts were being evacuated, with more than 35,000 already housed in temporary shelters, the Thai military said. Across the border in Cambodia, opposition politician Meach Sovannara said civilians were also moving away from the fighting along the frontier. “I heard the artillery shelling,” he told Reuters in an audio message from Samroang town, the capital of Oddar Meanchey Province, which abuts Thailand. More than 1,100 families in Oddar Meanchey had been evacuated, authorities there said. – Reuters

BANGKOK: Thailand said it launched airstrikes into Cambodia yesterday as fighting broke out along their disputed border, after

A Thai woman carries a dog and a mat as she evacuates to a shelter in Buriram province. – REUTERSPIC

Sumatra needs US$3b in recovery funds JAKARTA: Sumatra will require 51.82 trillion rupiah (US$3.11 billion or RM12.78 billion) in reconstruction and recovery funds following deadly floods, senior government officials said. rupiah, Suharyanto said at a Cabinet meeting chaired by President Prabowo Subianto in Aceh late on Sunday. North Sumatra and West Sumatra will require 12.88 trillion and 13.52 trillion rupiah respectively. “In the next phase, they will be relocated into permanent houses, built by the Housing Ministry,” he said. Responding to the initial estimated recovery cost, Prabowo said his calculations were “similar”, without elaborating whether he will approve the spending or not.

The death toll from the floods and landslides reached 950 yesterday, with 274 people still missing, according to official data. Suharyanto, head of Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency, said that the recovery funds needed across Aceh, North Sumatra and West Sumatra may still increase as the agency continues to calculate how much damage has been done. Among the three provinces affected, Aceh needs the most funds, amounting to a total of 25.41 trillion

The reconstruction process will soon begin in some areas in North Sumatra and West Sumatra, which have recovered relatively well, he said. “So, areas that are already in better condition can start reconstruction. We will relocate people living in evacuation centres to temporary houses,” Suharyanto said. The temporary houses are 40 sq m plywood structures built by the government for people affected by natural disasters.

“The point is we have the capacity and we will do it meticulously and do our best to manage it,” Prabowo said. Prabowo also said that conditions in some areas remained serious, with rice fields, dams and a large number of houses affected. “In some places, there are still challenges,” he said, adding that the distribution of medication and clothes to the residents must also become a priority. – Reuters

Aid is airdropped over isolated Gayo Lues in Aceh on Sunday. – AFPPIC