22/12/2025

MONDAY | DEC 22, 2025

/thesuntelegram FOLLOW / Malaysian Paper

ON TELEGRAM m RAM

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Australia falls silent, lights candles for shooting victims o Prime minister announces gun buyback scheme

Gunmen kill nine, wound 10 in bar BEKKERSDAL: Nine people were killed when gunmen opened fire at a bar outside Johannesburg early yesterday, police said, in the second such shooting in South Africa this month. Ten more were wounded in the early morning attack at the tavern in the impoverished Bekkersdal township in a gold mining area around 40km southwest of the city. It follows a shooting at a tavern near Pretoria on Dec 6 when gunmen killed a dozen people, including a three-year-old child. Police initially said 10 people were killed when the Bekkersdal bar was attacked just before 1am (7am in Malaysia), but later revised the toll downwards. Most of the attackers were armed with pistols and one had an AK-47 rifle, deputy provincial police commissioner Major General Fred Kekana told SABC television. “They entered the tavern and randomly shot at the patrons, unprovoked,” he said. Three people were killed in the bar and others as they fled the scene, with the attackers continuing to shoot as they left, he said. “It’s also reported that after they shot the people, they searched them. They took their valuables, including cell phones,” Kekana said. The dead included a driver from an online car-hailing service who was driving past. Police launched a manhunt for the attackers and appealed for public assistance. South Africa, the continent’s most industrialised nation, is grappling with a high crime rate, much of it driven by organised networks and gangs. The country is awash with legal and illegal firearms and shootings are common. – AFP Bathing made easy for elderly OSAKA: A “human washing machine” that cleans and dries the body and drew large crowds when showcased at the World Exposition in Osaka this year will be sold to consumers next year, Kyodo News Agency reported. Shipments to caregiving facilities for the elderly will begin next March, with general sales of the machine developed by bath and shower equipment manufacturer Science Co to start by the end of the year. The machine “will reduce the burden (of bathing) on both users and caregivers”, said Yasuaki Aoyama, chairman of the firm based in Osaka. The device resembles a raised rectangular bathtub. Users enter through a side door and sit down to soak in the water. Using “fine-bubble” technology to make tiny bubbles that can slip into small crevices, the machine will enable full-body cleansing without the need for shampoo or scrubbing, with one bathing session taking around 10 minutes. The machine will be sold for ¥1.45 million (RM3,751). “We have created a real-world version of the human washing machine that cleans you from head to toe,” Aoyama said. The idea of the human washing machine first appeared at the 1970 Osaka expo. About 1,300 visitors to this year’s expo tried the device, according to the company. The company said it received requests at home and from abroad for the technology to be commercialised. – Bernama

Already, it threatens to fray the bonds of social cohesion in a multicultural nation. Right-wing groups have organised a fresh wave of anti-immigration rallies. Grieving families are demanding to know how the gunmen slipped through the cracks. Naveed was flagged by Australia’s intelligence agency in 2019. But he fell off the radar as authorities deemed he posed no imminent threat. The government has announced a suite of measures on gun ownership and hate speech, promising stricter laws and harsher penalties. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced a sweeping buyback scheme to “get guns off our streets”. It is the largest gun buyback since 1996, when Australia cracked down on firearms in the wake of a mass shooting that killed 35 people at Port Arthur. A counter-terrorism task force is investigating why the duo travelled to the southern Philippines weeks before the attack. Albanese has ordered a review of police and intelligence services. – AFP

Summer winds buffeted flags dipped to half-mast across the country, including over the famed Sydney Harbour Bridge. A seaplane buzzed above Bondi Beach trailing a message of love. “It’s still really difficult to understand what’s been happening,” said Leona Pemberton at the Bondi memorial. “I guess the tears, they have to flow at some point.” A generation of Australians has grown up with the reassuring notion that mass shootings simply do not happen in the country. That illusion was shattered when alleged gunmen Sajid Akram, 50, and his 24-year-old son Naveed trained their long-barrelled weapons on the beach. A deep sense of sorrow has settled over Australia in the past seven days. Loved ones collapsed in grief as they travelled from one funeral to the next. “The loss is unspeakable,” said rabbi Levi Wolff. Authorities have branded the shooting an act of terrorism.

SYDNEY: Australians fell silent in flickering candlelight yesterday to honour the Bondi Beach shooting victims, marking one week since gunmen fired into crowds at a festival. A father and son are accused of targeting the beachside celebration, killing 15 people including children. From raucous city pubs to sleepy country towns, Australia observed a minute’s silence at 6.47pm (3.47pm in Malaysia) exactly a week since the first reports of gunfire. In a nationwide gesture of “light over darkness”, countless homes lined their windowsills with candles. “We’re here together,” said Roslyn Fishall, a member of Sydney’s Jewish community. “Turn to strangers and hug them. Let’s make peace together,” she said from a makeshift memorial at Bondi Beach.

Benthaus is carried to a wheelchair from the capsule door after landing in Van Horn, Texas on Saturday. – BLUE ORIGIN HANDOUT/ REUTERSPIC

Wheelchair user flies into space HOUSTON: A German woman engineer on Saturday became the first wheelchair user to blast into space, taking a brief ride on a Blue Origin flight. with disabilities, she said in a video released by the company. “If we want to be an inclusive society, we should be inclusive in every part, and not only in the parts we like to be,” Benthaus said.

with Blue Origin, including the pop singer Katy Perry and William Shatner, who played the legendary Captain Kirk on Star Trek . These high-profile guests are aimed at maintaining public interest in the flights at a time when private space companies are vying for pre-eminence. Virgin Galactic offers a similar suborbital flight experience. But Blue Origin also has ambitions to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX in the orbital flight market. This year, the Bezos company successfully carried out two uncrewed orbital flights using its massive New Glenn rocket, which is significantly more powerful than New Shepard. – AFP

The space company owned by Jeff Bezos launched its New Shepard suborbital mission from its site in Texas. Michaela Benthaus, an aerospace and mechatronics engineer at the European Space Agency, was among the passengers to cross the Karman line, the internationally recognised boundary of space, during the 10-minute flight. Benthaus suffered a spinal cord injury after a mountain biking accident and now uses a wheelchair. “After my accident, I really, really figured out how inaccessible our world still is” for people

The small, fully automated rocket took off and the capsule carrying the tourists then detached in flight before gently descending back to the Texas desert, slowed by parachutes. It was the 16th crewed flight for Blue Origin, which has for years offered space tourism flights – the price isn’t public – using its New Shepard rocket. “Congratulations, Michi! You just inspired millions to look up and imagine what is possible,” Nasa chief Jared Isaacman said on X. Dozens of people have travelled to space