Pro-democracy activists on Tuesday filed a legal challenge to the court to have the junta’s ban on political activities overturned
BANGKOK — Only newly formed political parties will be able to engage in political activities under a Tuesday order approved by the ruling junta.
The partial exemption would allow newcomer parties – such as one aligned with the military – to register and meet, whereas existing parties could not. A Democrat Party spokesman Wednesday slammed the uneven approach for benefiting new parties, especially any formed to support the current regime.
“The government must be careful not to favor newly established parties,” Ramet Rattanachaweng said in an interview. “A democracy must come with equality … I think this is not equal.”
He also urged the military to come clean whether it is forming proxy parties to run in the next election on its behalf.
“There are rumors that the military is setting up parties. The military should have courage and clarify which parties it is setting up for the election,” Remet said. “They should declare their intention to the public.”
Since seizing power in the 2014 coup, the junta has outlawed all protests and political activity. Due to the ban, political parties cannot hold executive meetings, vote on policies or recruit new members, despite an election slated to take place in less than a year.
Speaking Tuesday, junta chairman Prayuth Chan-ocha said he would use the absolute power granted to him by the new constitution to exempt newly formed parties from the ban he put in place over three years ago. He will use the same provision to amend election law to extend the deadline for political parties to submit their membership lists.
A government spokesman later said the move does not lift the politics ban.
Ramet said Prayuth should have amended the law via parliament instead of circumventing the legislative process with his absolute power.
“The law was already clearly defined and settled. It was approved by the legislative branch,” the Democrat said. “Such laws must be amended in parliament.”
A group of activists on Tuesday filed a legal challenge to the court to have the junta’s ban overturned. The group, led by pro-democracy campaigner Rangsiman Rome, said the ban violates constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties.
King Vajiralongkorn, 65, ruled Thailand for all of 2017. It was the first time in over seven decades that Thais have lived under a monarch other than King Bhumibol, who died in October 2016 at 88.
As the royally designated heir, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn assumed the throne after his father’s death in December following a nearly two month interregnum. He is commonly known as King Rama X, the 10th ruler of the Chakri dynasty.
Although he has not been formally crowned – an elaborate coronation is expected to take place next year – King Vajiralongkorn has already made his presence known and reshaped some of Thailand’s institutions.
Under King Rama X, palace affairs have also been centralized, with the monarch assuming direct control over state agencies related to the palace, including the gigantic Crown Property Bureau, the largest landowner in the country.
Political scientist Pitch Pongsawat said King Rama X’s first year has been notable for his interest in solving the bloody insurgency in the three southern provinces, as seen in the number of development initiatives and projects he’s established.
In fact, just a week after Rama X assumed kingship in December 2016, he made his first trip outside Bangkok as king to the Deep South region.
“I think His Majesty gives more importance to the Deep South than Bangkok society does,” said Pitch, who teaches at Chulalongkorn University.
Veera Somkwamkid, a transparency activist who has campaigned politically on a pro-palace platform, said the most apparent change brought about by the new king is increased discipline in the armed forces.
“Since he ascended the throne, we can see that discipline in the military has become more strict,” Veera said.
And His Majesty appears to be more prone to intervention than his predecessor. In January, the king ordered the government to change portions of the new constitution regarding royal power, even though there were no existing legal mechanisms for doing so.
To solve the dilemma, the interim parliament had to retroactively amend a clause that would allow the king’s wishes to be satisfied.
In a sign that his influence will likely extend to the armed forces as well, the king introduced a new form of salute and stricter haircut to the military and police. A new police uniform color has been implemented per his royal wishes.
With an election looming in 2018, political observers are also anticipating what role, if any, King Vajiralongkorn will play in shaping the civilian government set to replace the junta after more than four years in power.
Pitch, the Chulalongkorn lecturer, said it’s a “challenge” for King Rama X to assume kingship at a time of transition marred by decade-long political conflicts that broke out during his father’s final years.
“We have to overcome it together,” he said. “It’s an important mission for His Majesty that he must be part of an institution to bring the country back to democracy.”
Other figures defined 2017 as well, including a big-hearted rockstar, a community that made life more delicious and an activist who society – and justice – all but forgot.
Toon Bodyslam
Artiwara “Toon” Kongmalai first rose to fame as the frontman of pop rock band Bodyslam just after the turn of the millenium. But he’s even more famous now for his feet.
His name dominated news coverage in the final weeks of the year because he embarked on a 2,191-kilometer charity run from the southernmost tip of Thailand to its northernmost point to raise funds for 11 public hospitals.
He’s become an inspiration for many – even a Messiah-like figure for some – but questions remain as to his motives.
His team denied he received a single baht from his main sponsor, Nike, even though its logo has been plastered all over the campaign. A Nike press officer also blocked reporters from asking Artiwara whether he had any political ambition.
Craft Beer Brewers
If 2016 was the year the craft beer movement made its name as underground guerillas, 2017 was the year they go overground and evolve.
Throughout the year, craft beer bars have been popping up on many streets and sois, like Bad Taste Cafe in Lad Prao area, DogStep on Sukhumvit 50, Yolo on Phra Atit Road and Dok Kaew House Bar on Rama VI Road. Novel drinks like Nonthaburi Mead and “beer cocktails” were also introduced this year.
Even longtime lager brewer like Boonrawd is eyeing the market, with reports that it’s slated to launch its own weizen next year.
Pai Dao Din
Image: New Democracy Movement / Facebook
A day little noted, Dec. 3 marked a full year in prison for activist Jatupat Boonpattaraksa, aka Pai Dao Din. His crime consisted of posting a link to a BBC Thai biography of King Vajiralongkorn to Facebook which the authorities deemed offensive.
He sat in jail for months, denied bail and missing his final university year before being found guilty of royal defamation in August. He was sentenced to two and a half years in jail.
The 26 year old, who eventually completed his law degree behind bars, had first campaigned on land rights and environmental issues before the May 2014 coup prompted him to take up the pro-democracy cause. His supporters and a number of rights agencies such as Amnesty International, spent 2017 campaigning for his release. Jatupat’s name has become synonymous with increasingly severe punishment under the lese majeste law.
Story by Teeranai Charuvastra
Correction: An earlier version of this article stated King Vajiralongkorn’s age as 66. He’s 65. We regret the error.
It’s been an anxious year. Turning on the internet has meant numbing threats of thermonuclear war, heartbreaking mass murders, global political instability and no end to stories of the abuse and injustice experienced by women.
But the internet also delivered moments of delight. From animated politicos working up a sweat to bizarre soi stunts, there were moments of joy that could only have come from Thai netizens. So thank you, Thainet, and please keep it up for 2018.
Have you seen the Attitude Adjusters or Article 44s in action? After Gen. Prayuth dictated mandatory Wednesday workout sessions for government employees, he really got into his role as exerciser-in-chief, with the media providing blow-by-blow coverage of the action.
Facebook user Ui Ratchasit Ketkeaw dives into a flooded Bangkok street Tuesday.
Bangkok got a small taste in May of the flood misery which devastated much of the nation this year. Where most city folk saw inconvenience and hazard, one resident saw an Olympic-sized opportunity.
Abdulhakim Kasing risks rapid floodwaters to deliver his take on the situation on the ground in Narathiwat province. Image: Abdulhakim Kasing / Facebook
Maybe it was the sheer scope of the flooding that made people just lose it a little. Down south in Narathiwat, an intrepid Facebooker found a way to turn the murk into mirth by filming a parody video of a disaster news report that went viral.
This head-bobbing pigeon from Syd Weiler’s Trash Doves Facebook sticker set has gone viral in Thailand since its Feb. 1 release.
Remember the purple bird sticker spamming every comment thread? Still see it, head-banging with abandon?
In February, the Thai net became obsessed with a Facebook sticker drawn by an American artist of a purple pigeon, particularly one in which it thrashes its head. Was the bird in agony or ecstasy?
Under all the tubes and chutes and ladders, the foundations of the internet are built on cat – cute cats, specifically. For World Cat Day on Aug. 8, Thai netizens built upon that foundation with adorable pics of their own fur-friends.
Mid-July in Ratchaburi province, things get hot. Hot enough for it to be a totally normal thing for bald men to powder their egg-tops and wrestle for the glory of being named “Mr. Baldy of Damnoen Saduak.” The annual wrestling match lends a fun splash of provincial color.
Models displays creations by Mexican fashion house Yakampot during a fashion show at the Angel of Independence monument, in November in Mexico City. Mexico City has been designated a World Design Capital for 2018 by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design. Photo: Rebecca Blackwell / Associated Press
NEW YORK — From Malta to Minneapolis, here’s a look at some destinations around the world that will be making news in 2018. They include designated culture capitals, places hosting sporting events and even a couple of cities – San Antonio, Texas, and New Orleans – celebrating their 300th birthdays.
Sport
Minneapolis hosts the Super Bowl on Feb. 4 in Minneapolis. The city is encouraging visitors to embrace winter with 10 days of “Bold North” events and activities leading up to the big game. On the other side of the world, the snowy mountains of Pyeongchang, South Korea, host the Winter Olympic Games, Feb. 9-25.
Eleven cities in Russia – including Moscow and Sochi – host the FIFA World Cup, June 14-July 15. The dates coincide with St. Petersburg’s “white nights,” the summer solstice season when city skies never get completely dark. FIFA reports strong ticket sales from the United States even though the U.S. national team failed to qualify for the games. Host cities include lesser-known gems like Nizhny Novgorod and Kazan, while Yekaterinburg is a good jumping-off point for an adventure in Siberia.
Tricentennials
Two American cities mark tri-centennials in 2018. San Antonio plans a commemoration week in May, a “Summer of Spain” marketplace highlighting Spanish food, art and culture, Day of the Dead events Oct. 29-30 and a Witte Museum exhibition about the city’s frontier history under the flags of many countries. The exhibit will include the keys to the Alamo and Davy Crockett’s fiddle.
In New Orleans, tricentennial events include the Prospect.4 art exhibition, which is already underway; a blow-out Mardi Gras, Feb. 13, with the Krewe of Rex procession themed on New Orleans’ history; various spring festivals; Luna Fete next December; and a New Orleans Museum of Art exhibition showcasing works by Raphael, Titian, Rembrandt and others from the Duke of Orleans’ collection.
Culture and Design Capitals
Despite the recent car bomb murder of an investigative journalist in Malta, the island is on many “where to go” lists for 2018. Its capital, Valletta, is one of Europe’s 2018 capitals of culture and a UNESCO World Heritage Site with 7,000 years of history. Attractions include festivals, nightlife, ancient stone architecture, a rollicking Carnival in February and other festivals, plus World War II history, including scuba diving to wartime wrecks.
The other European capital of culture for 2018 is Leeuwarden in the Netherlands’ province of Friesland. Cultural extravaganzas include an Aug. 31-Sept. 1 event expanding an annual marathon across 23 villages with music, art, theater and unusual pop-up hotels.
Mexico City has been designated the sixth World Design Capital and the first city in the Americas to receive the title. It’s being recognized for sustainable design-led initiatives like bike-sharing, urban gardens, parks and playgrounds. Events will include exhibits, conferences and installations.
From England to Ethiopia
Elsewhere around the world, destinations on the travel industry’s radar for 2018 range from England to Ethiopia.
England is suddenly a pop culture darling. Fans of the Netflix series “The Crown” can visit one of Queen Elizabeth’s favorite places, Sandringham House, April-November, while those intrigued by the May 2018 wedding of American actress Meghan Markle to Prince Harry can tour their wedding site, Windsor Castle. Oscar-watchers interested in “The Darkest Hour,” starring Gary Oldman as Prime Minister Winston Churchill during World War II, should visit the Churchill War Rooms museum in London. Also to keep in mind: The Lake District was just named a UNESCO World Heritage site. Visits by Americans to England were up 31 percent January-June 2017 compared with the same period in 2016, thanks in part to the U.S. dollar’s strength against the British pound.
Concerns about terror attacks and unrest have dampened travel to Egypt, Turkey and other destinations in North Africa and the Middle East. But that’s prompted interest in places in the region that are perceived as safe and just as compelling culturally, including Morocco and Jordan. In Africa, Ethiopia also popped up on a couple of where-to-go lists. Its magical attractions include the churches in Lalibela, carved from soft stone and dating to the 12th century.
Asia
U.S. visitors to Japan increased 10 percent January-October 2017 compared with the same period in 2016, and the upward trend is expected to continue as Japan pushes tourism ahead of the 2020 Summer Olympics. Where-to-go lists are highlighting not just Tokyo but also places like Sapporo and the Kii Peninsula, honored as a UNESCO World Heritage site for its pilgrimage routes and sacred mountains.
These days, many well-traveled millennials have already hopscotched around Western Europe by the time they’re done with college, so it makes sense that they’re turning to Asia for spring breaks and backpacking trips with stops in Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, India and Singapore. The youth-oriented travel company StudentUniverse says bookings for 18- to 25-year-old U.S. passport holders to Asia from the U.S. have risen more than 700 percent since 2014. And many of those travelers stay in Asia three weeks or more.
Another area that’s starting to intrigue travelers as they expand bucket lists beyond familiar destinations is Central Asia, which includes the countries of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and others with names ending in “-stan.” The country of Georgia also turns up on several where-to-go-in-2018 lists. Geographically it’s considered part of Asia but culturally it’s more Eastern European.
People walks past Sinarmas Land Plaza during a car-free day at the main business district in October in Jakarta, Indonesia. Photo: Dita Alangkara / Associated Press
JAKARTA — Despite its denials, one of the world’s biggest paper producers has extensive behind-the-scenes ties and significant influence over wood suppliers linked to fires and deforestation that have degraded Indonesia’s stunning natural environment, The Associated Press has found.
Indonesia’s Sinarmas – better known by its international trade name, Asia Pulp & Paper – has insisted in company publications, public events and to the media that most of the companies that supply it with wood are “independent,” not owned by it or in other ways affiliated with it.
But the AP has found links between Sinarmas, its pulp and paper arm and nearly all the 27 plantation companies that it has told the outside world are independent. The company’s apparent aim: to “greenwash” its image for the global market.
The AP reviewed nearly 1,100 pages of corporate records related to the purportedly independent plantation companies, which show they are owned by 10 individuals. Six are employees of the Sinarmas group and two are former employees, one with links to the Widjaja family, which owns Sinarmas. Several work in the finance department of Sinarmas Forestry.
The AP identified the eight by matching biographical details in the documents, including birth dates, to information in social media profiles, news reports, forestry industry documents and other sources.
The ownership of 25 of the 27 suppliers is exercised through layers of shareholding companies that are almost always based in Sinarmas offices and in most cases have Sinarmas employees, ranging from top executives to humble IT workers and accountants, as their directors and commissioners.
At times, the documents show, the directors have included the adult children and grandchildren of the Sinarmas founder, all of whom have prominent roles in the Sinarmas empire. It acknowledges it owns six other suppliers.
An internal Asia Pulp & Paper document seen by AP states it has “significant influence” over an unspecified number of its wood suppliers through the provision of loans, assets and services, long-term wood purchasing agreements and “unusual trading relationships.” The same document still insists these companies are “independent.”
The AP also found that a company owned by two employees of Sinarmas Forestry has been cutting down tropical forest on the island of Borneo since 2014. Official forestry and industry production reports seen by AP show some of that wood has been sold on the local market and some has been sold to a company that is turning it into pellets marketed as a sustainable energy source. Sinarmas vowed in 2013 to stop deforestation.
And despite another 2013 commitment to gain prior and informed consent of local communities for new plantations, Sinarmas is pressing ahead with plans to turn 66,000 hectares (163,000 acres) of state land in the Bangka Belitung island chain off Sumatra into industrial forestry plantations despite substantial opposition from locals. The move puts the company on a collision course with villages that farm on the land and which some 100,000 people call home.
AP outlined its findings to Sinarmas five days ago. A spokeswoman said it would respond “shortly,” which was later amended to promising a response to questions by Tuesday. As of Wednesday, it had not responded.
Indonesia is cutting down its rainforests faster than any other country, swelling the profits of a handful of paper and palm oil conglomerates while causing massive social and environmental problems. The rapid forest loss combined with its greenhouse gas emissions has made Indonesia the fourth biggest contributor to global warming after China, U.S. and India.
Its emissions swelled dramatically in 2015 when record dry season fires burned 2.6 million hectares (10,000 square miles). The fires blanketed much of Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and southern Thailand in health-damaging haze that a Harvard and Columbia study estimated hastened 100,000 deaths in the region. The World Bank said the fires cost Indonesia USD $16 billion.
Part of the reason for the disaster: the drainage of swampy forest land by palm oil and pulp companies including Sinarmas suppliers for industrial plantations, making it highly combustible. Some fires – set by villagers to clear land for planting, or by plantation workers – spread wildly because of this drainage.
Sinarmas is one of Asia’s major conglomerates and its products touch consumers and businesses around the world, from photocopy paper, tissue and cigarette boxes to bottle labels, burger wrappers and noodle cups. To U.S. giants such as Office Depot it supplies notebooks, for Dollar General it makes writing pads and self-sealing envelopes, and to American Greetings it supplies colorful gift bags. Its Livi brand tissues and toilet paper are sold on Amazon.
The 96-year-old family patriarch, Eka Tjipta Widjaja, the son of migrants from Fujian in China, built Sinarmas from scratch in the 1930s when he was a coconut oil trader on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. He had several wives and according to some reports as many as 40 children.
The family-owned empire’s finances are mostly opaque, but it has yearly sales of more than USD $7 billion through just one of its five major business arms: palm oil producer Golden-Agri Resources, which trades on Singapore’s stock exchange. Some of its pulp and paper mills are traded on Jakarta’s stock exchange and had sales of USD $3.7 billion last year.
For years Sinarmas was notorious for land grabs and deforestation but after a worldwide campaign by Greenpeace that caused it to hemorrhage sales, it vowed in 2013 to become a paragon of sustainability. Its Asia Pulp & Paper and Sinarmas Forestry arms declared in an agreement with Greenpeace they would end the clearing of natural forests and resolve land conflicts with dozens of villages.
Now it is seeking a good-behavior seal of approval from the influential Forest Stewardship Council, which withdrew its endorsement a decade ago but is now reassessing it. Re-endorsement could convince still wary customers to return just when the company needs buyers for the output of a giant new pulp mill in south Sumatra that it financed with Chinese loans.
Evidence Sinarmas is indirectly violating its no-deforestation pledge comes from drone photos and satellite images of 13,000 hectares of forest in Borneo that a plantation company, Muara Sungai Landak, has a government permit to exploit. Government records that track levies companies pay when cutting tropical timber on such so-called concession lands also show the deforestation is taking place.
Muara Sungai Landak is owned through layers of holding companies by a 36-year-old IT employee of Sinarmas Forestry and a 43-year-old auditor at Sinarmas Forestry.
This combination of satellite images taken on July 7, 2015, June 29, 2016, and March 13, 2017 provided by DigitalGlobe shows the progress of deforestation that show further exploitation will occur on land managed by by PT Muara Sungai Landak, a company with links to Indonesian conglomerate Sinarmas, near Jungkat, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Despite its denials, Sinarmas, one of the world’s biggest paper producers, has extensive behind-the-scenes ties and significant influence over wood suppliers linked to fires and deforestation that have degraded Indonesia’s stunning natural environment. Photo: Associated Press
The full picture of what benefits Sinarmas obtains by obscuring the true extent of its ties to the plantation companies is unclear. But the perception that these suppliers are independent has been a crucial public relations weapon in the past few years, allowing it to minimize responsibility whenever controversy strikes.
The AP findings suggest Sinarmas has a greater degree of responsibility for Indonesia’s annual dry-season fires than previously known.
Indonesia sanctioned five Sinarmas suppliers for burning their land in 2015 and Singapore’s National Environment Agency is investigating four companies that Sinarmas characterizes as independent suppliers for contributing to unhealthy levels of haze in the city-state in 2015.
Singapore retailers pulled Sinarmas products such as tissue from shelves during the haze and Sinarmas bought ads in the city’s media declaring the fires unacceptable and asserting, “We do not burn our land.”
In an email to the AP, the agency said its investigation has made little progress due to lack of information from the companies and Asia Pulp & Paper. Earlier this year, it obtained a court warrant to detain an unnamed director of one of the accused companies if he enters Singapore.
During the fires, Asia Pulp & Paper said it temporarily stopped doing business with two of them, telling Singapore’s state media that they were “independently owned and operated entities.” But AP found all those companies were owned by Sinarmas employees and based in Sinarmas offices.
One of the companies, Bumi Mekar Hijau, which in English means “Blooming Green Earth,” was found guilty by an Indonesian appeals court last year of burning land in 2014 and fined 78.5 billion rupiah (USD $5.9 million), a sliver of the 7.8 trillion rupiah (USD $5.9 billion) sought by the Ministry of Environment and Forestry. No fine has been paid because both sides are appealing to the Supreme Court.
The two defendants in the case were directors of Bumi Mekar Hijau but did not include its owner, a U.S.-educated 37-year-old Indonesian who has worked at Asia Pulp & Paper since at least 2008.
In corporate filings related to Bumi Mekar Hijau, the address of the 37-year-old father of two is given as the staff dormitory of a Sinarmas pulp and paper mill on the outskirts of Jakarta. People who answered the phones at the dormitory didn’t recognize his name.
One of the defendants was part of a group photo of Sinarmas Forestry finance department employees posted on Facebook earlier this year.
Also in the photo: Three of the other men identified by the AP as the owners of other plantation companies that Sinarmas claims it doesn’t control.
A correspondent working in Nairobi poses with a placard to protest at the imprisonment of three journalists from Al Jazeera's English-language channel in 2015 in Egypt. Photo: EPA / Dai Kurokawa
PARIS — A total of 65 journalists and media workers were killed in 2017, the lowest toll in 14 years, according to figuresreleased on Tuesday by Reporters Without Borders.
The non-governmental organization said 60 percent of those killed were murdered. It added that 326 people working in media – including 202 professional journalists – are also being detained.
According to RSF, 26 people “were killed in the course of their work, the collateral victims of a deadly situation such as an air strike, an artillery bombardment, or a suicide bombing.”
It said the remaining 39 “were murdered, and deliberately targeted because their reporting threatened political, economic, or criminal interests.”
Overall, RSF said the decrease in deaths is due to journalists fleeing “countries such as Syria, Yemen and Libya that have become too dangerous.” But it also noted “a growing awareness of the need to protect journalists.”
RSF stressed that some countries which are not at war have become as dangerous for reporters as war zones, with 46 percent of deaths occurring in such places in 2017, as against 30 percent the previous year.
Syria was the deadliest country for journalists, with 12 killed, one more than in Mexico where many journalists have “either fled abroad or abandoned journalism.”
The overall downward trend did not apply to women, as 10 female reporters were killed this year, double the previous year’s total.
RSF said many of the female victims were “experienced and determined investigative reporters with an abrasive writing style.”
Behind Syria and Mexico, the deadliest countries for reporters were Afghanistan, where nine journalists were killed in 2017, and Iraq where eight perished. With four journalists gunned down, the Philippines was Asia’s deadliest country.
RSF said there was a drop of six percent in the number of journalists detained, with nearly half of them held in just five countries, China, Turkey, Syria, Iran and Vietnam.
RSF added that 54 journalists are currently being held hostage by groups such as Islamic State and the Houthis in Yemen.
“Almost three quarters of these hostages come from the ranks of local journalists, who are usually paid little and often have to take enormous risks,” RSF said. “The foreign journalists currently held hostage were all kidnapped in Syria but little is known about their present location.”
File photo of Gen. Prawit Wongsuwan in a May 2016 photo. Photo: Defense Ministry / Lakmuangonline.com
BANGKOK — As if three undeclared wristwatches were not enough, deputy junta leader Gen. Prawit Wongsuwan was spotted wearing what appears to be a fourth pricey timepiece in a photo Tuesday as an anti-corruption agency awaits clarification on the first.
The watch, discovered in a May 2016 photo on a Defense Ministry website, appeared to be a stainless steel Patek Philippe Annual Calendar Chronograph (model 5960/1A with flyback function). It originally went viral via the same Facebook page where two other images were discovered through crowd-sourcing.
The image was posted on CSI LA, a page which became a popular forum for discussing evidence after a 2014 double homicide on Koh Tao. The group has posted two other photos in recent days of Prawit wearing multi-million baht watches.
The photo indicates it was taken in May 2016 near the Government House. The timepiece sells at Bangkok’s Cortina Watch shop for 1.63 million baht.
To quell recent public criticism, junta leader Gen. Prayuth Chan-ocha said this afternoon that he was wearing a Seiko watch that he waved before a crowd of people.
The National Anti-Corruption Commission has given Prawit until Jan. 8 to clarify why the assets are not listed among his mandatory asset declarations when he took office in the wake of the 2014 coup d’etat.
PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island — Imagine a cat that can keep a person company, doesn’t need a litter box and can remind an aging relative to take her medicine or help find her eyeglasses.
That’s the vision of toymaker Hasbro and scientists at Brown University, who have received a three-year, USD$1 million (32.8 million baht) grant from the National Science Foundation to find ways to add artificial intelligence to Hasbro’s “Joy for All” robotic cat.
The cat, which has been on the market for two years, is aimed at seniors and meant to act as a “companion.” It purrs and meows, and even appears to lick its paw and roll over to ask for a belly rub. The Brown-Hasbro project is aimed at developing additional capabilities for the cats to help older adults with simple tasks.
Researchers at Brown’s Humanity-Centered Robotics Initiative are working to determine which tasks make the most sense, and which can help older adults stay in their own homes longer, such as finding lost objects, or reminding the owner to call someone or go to a doctor’s appointment.
“It’s not going to iron and wash dishes,” said Bertram Malle, a professor of cognitive, linguistic and psychological sciences at Brown. “Nobody expects them to have a conversation. Nobody expects them to move around and fetch a newspaper. They’re really good at providing comfort.”
Malle said they don’t want to make overblown promises of what the cat can do, something he and his fellow researcher — computer science professor Michael Littman — said they’ve seen in other robots on the market. They hope to make a cat that would perform a small set of tasks very well.
They also want to keep it affordable, just a few hundred dollars. The current version costs USD$100 (32,800 baht).
They’ve given the project a name that gets at that idea: Affordable Robotic Intelligence for Elderly Support, or ARIES. The team includes researchers from Brown’s medical school, area hospitals and a designer at the University of Cincinnati.
It’s an idea that has appeal to Jeanne Elliott, whose 93-year-old mother, Mary Derr, lives with her in South Kingstown. Derr has mild dementia and the Joy for All cat Elliott purchased this year has become a true companion for Derr, keeping her company and soothing her while Elliott is at work. Derr treats it like a real cat, even though she knows it has batteries.
“Mom has a tendency to forget things,” she said, adding that a cat reminding her “we don’t have any appointments today, take your meds, be careful when you walk, things like that, be safe, reassuring things, to have that available during the day would be awesome.”
Diane Feeney Mahoney, a professor emerita at MGH Institute of Health Professions School of Nursing, who has studied technology for older people, said the project showed promise because of the team of researchers. She hopes they involve people from the Alzheimer’s community and that “we just don’t want to push technology for technology’s sake.”
She called the cat a tool that could make things easier for someone caring for a person with middle-stage dementia, or to be used in nursing homes where pets are not allowed.
The scientists are embarking on surveys, focus groups and interviews to get a sense of the landscape of everyday living for an older adult. They’re also trying to figure out how the souped-up robo-cats would do those tasks, and then how it would communicate that information. They don’t think they want a talking cat, Littman said.
“Cats don’t generally talk to you,” Littman said, and it might be upsetting if it did.
They’re looking at whether the cat could move its head in a certain way to get across the message it’s trying to communicate, for example.
In the end, they hope that by creating an interaction in which the human is needed, they could even help stem feelings of loneliness, depression and anxiety.
“The cat doesn’t do things on its own. It needs the human, and the human gets something back,” Malle said. “That interaction is a huge step up. Loneliness and uselessness feelings are hugely problematic.”
BANGKOK — Driven from their homes and subjected to what’s been described as systematic rape and murder, things have not improved for Myanmar’s Rohingya population in Bangladesh.
That’s where more than 600,000 Rohingya are seeking refuge. Despite alarms in the international community and aid efforts from NGOs, things have been getting worse in the Bangladesh camp.
In Thailand, empathy seems in short supply.
“Thais do not identify with the Rohingya,” said Ben Svasti Thomson, an honorary British consul living in Chiang Mai and director of the Mother Child Foundation. “I often say to people in Chiang Mai that the tragedy is happening on our doorstep, just 600 [kilometers] away, closer to us than Bangkok; it is too close to ignore.”
Tonight, Thomson is co-hosting a Rohingya Benefit Concert to raise funds for Rohingya living in the Kutupalong Refugee camp, which he visited last month to monitor how donations were being used and to identify areas needing funding.
Popular singers Hugo, Nga Caravan and Mai Siplor will perform at 7pm in The Small Theatre at Thammasat University’s Tha Prachan campus in the old quarter. Tickets are 200 baht, with all proceeds going to the Children on the Edgecharity which will be used to buy urgent supplies, supply clean food and water, and create safe environments and makeshift schools. Tickets can be purchased at the door or reserved online. More information is available online.
It’s not the first Rohingya benefit in Bangkok. Earlier this month, bar/gallery WTF hosted Rage for the Rohingya to raise funds.
Photo: Andre Malerba / Courtesy
There, a mostly expat crowd gathered before wall-projected images of Rohingya suffering and mingled with some of the photographers who took them.
Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch, was on hand recounting frustrating stories of atrocities.
“They stabbed a knife in her side while raping the woman,” he said of one documented encounter.
More help is needed, Robertson said, especially for the remaining 40,000 children.
“They have lost their parents and will be trafficked into the sex trade,” he said.
Andre Malerbra, a photojournalist at the event, said it’s crucial to remind people of the tragedy by taking more photos of what’s happening.
“I don’t think people lacked empathy [about the Rohingya situation],” Malerbra said, “they have emotions when they see these photos, but they don’t really know what to do about it.”
Lauren DeCicca, another freelance photographer, described seeing a young girl weepingafter her father collapsed and died trying to escape their home in northern Rakhine state on foot.
“They have a look of having too much of life on their face, they’ve faced more hardships than I ever had already,” DeCicca said.
An endangered Asian giant softshell turtle is seen near a nest of eggs on a sandbar in the Mekong river between Kratie and Stung Treng, northeastern Cambodia. Photo: Associated Press
PHNOM PENH— Conservationists have found a nest of the endangered Asian giant softshell turtle on a Mekong River sandbar in northeastern Cambodia, while 115 new species of various other animal and plant life have been discovered in the greater Mekong region.
The New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society said Tuesday that a nest of Asian giant softshell turtles was found on the Mekong between Kratie and Stung Treng provinces by conservationists from Cambodia’s fisheries administration, the WCS and local communities. It said it was the first spotting of such a nest so far this season.
It said the area is the only remaining location in Cambodia where the huge turtles still breed.
The Asian giant softshell turtle has been listed as globally endangered. It was thought to be extinct in the Cambodian portion of the Mekong River until conservationists rediscovered the turtles in 2007 along a 48-kilometer (30-mile) stretch of the river between Kratie and Stung Treng provinces.
The WCS said that since 2007, some 378 nests have been protected and 8,528 hatchlings released.
Meanwhile, the WWF issued a statement Tuesday saying that some 115 new species in the Greater Mekong region had been discovered by scientists.
It said that scientists from around the world conducted research in Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam, and discovered 11 species of amphibians, two fish, 11 reptiles, 88 plants and three mammals.
The discoveries include a beautifully colored frog found in the limestone karst mountains of Vietnam, according to the statement.
The watch, discovered in a May 2016 photo on a Defense Ministry 
