A delicious mooncake photographed in 2015. It may be less delicious now. Phtoo: Tseen Khoo / Flickr
BEIJING — Four employees at Chinese internet giant Alibaba have lost their jobs after being accused of reprogramming an internal system to steal more than 100 boxes of mooncakes, a traditional delicacy shared during this week’s Mid-Autumn Festival.
State media reported Wednesday that Alibaba had offered a discount to employees for buying the circular treats, given during the festival that begins Thursday.
They said the fired employees exploited loopholes in the software to obtain more than the allotted amount and pilfered a total of 124 boxes of cakes.
An Alibaba statement said the firings were “unfortunate, but we wish them a better future.” The employees were not identified.
Alibaba is the world’s largest e-commerce platform. Its initial public offering in 2014 was the largest in the New York Stock Exchange’s history.
U.S. President Barack Obama, right, walks out with Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi at her home before the start of their joint news conference in 2016 in Yangon, Myanmar. Photo: Pablo Martinez Monsivais / Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Aung San Suu Kyi’s latest visit to Washington signals her transformation from long-imprisoned heroine of Myanmar’s democracy struggle to a national leader focused on economic growth.
President Barack Obama will meet with Suu Kyi at the White House on Wednesday to discuss rolling back more of the sanctions that were applied when the nation was under military rule. Suu Kyi will also be courting the American business community at a dinner where tables go for as much as $25,000.
Suu Kyi’s party swept historic elections last November, and the visit by the 71-year old Nobel peace laureate, deeply respected in Washington, is a crowning occasion in the administration’s support for Myanmar’s shift from pariah state to democracy, which it views as a major foreign policy achievement.
The U.S. has eased economic sanctions on the country also known as Burma since political reforms began five years ago but it still restricts dealings with military-owned companies and dozens of officials and associates of the former ruling junta. U.S. companies and banks remain leery of involvement in one of Asia’s last untapped markets.
Human rights groups, however, say there are powerful reasons for retaining sanctions. Military abuses continue in ethnic minority regions. Rohingya Muslims remain displaced by sectarian violence and denied citizenship.
Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said the U.S. wants to balance concerns about the “outsized” role of the military in politics and the economy without impeding growth and offering a “democratic dividend” for an impoverished population.
“We hear frequently that the ongoing sanctions regime serves as a chill on investment from the United States and in some cases from other international firms, and so we want to make sure that our sanctions are not preventing the type of economic development and investment that we believe can improve the livelihoods of the people of Burma,” Rhodes said Tuesday, adding that the administration’s decisions would be guided by consultation with Suu Kyi and her government.
Suu Kyi, who will also be meeting with lawmakers, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State John Kerry, last visited Washington in 2012 when she was still opposition leader. On that occasion, she was presented with the Congressional Gold Medal, the legislature’s highest civilian honor, which she had been awarded in 2008 while under house arrest.
Now she meets Obama as the de facto leader of the country with the title of state counsellor although a junta-era constitution still enshrines the military’s role in politics and bars her from the presidency. When Obama last visited Myanmarin November 2014, he voiced support for constitutional reform.
Suu Kyi’s stance on sanctions is unclear. When she met Kerry in Myanmar in May, Suu Kyi said that the U.S. was keeping sanctions not to hurt but to “help us,” and that if the country was on the right path, sanctions should be lifted “in good time.”
Her government is believed to support extension of U.S. duty-free benefits to help spur still meager trade with the U.S. Two-way goods trade with Myanmar totaled just $227 million in 2015, and U.S. companies account for less than 1 percent of total foreign investment.
Suu Kyi will speak on her government’s priorities at a dinner Thursday organized by U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council – a group that supports American business ties with Southeast Asia. The council offered companies the chance to book a table for eight and a seat at an off-the-record round-table with Suu Kyi for $25,000.
That event perhaps typifies the widening gulf between Suu Kyi and rights activists who championed her cause when she was under house arrest.
“With the democracy icon having won a popular mandate to govern and often taking the sole lead in shaping the civilian government’s policies, a number of civil society leaders feel excluded, ironically as the country moves toward greater democracy,” the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank said in a report this week.
Rights activists are speaking out in support of keeping sanctions. Global Witness said Tuesday that U.S. industry lobbying to roll back sanctions before critical reforms have kicked in risks undoing the country’s fragile progress to democracy. Last year, the transparency watchdog reported that Myanmar’s jade industry is worth nearly half of the nation’s economic output and remains firmly in the grip of military elite, U.S.-sanctioned drug lords and crony companies.
U.S. sanctions currently bar the import of jade and gemstones from Myanmar.
Suu Kyi enjoys deep respect among U.S. lawmakers who were instrumental in the imposition of sanctions in the first place and they will likely follow her lead on whether they should be lifted. Lawmakers engaged on Myanmar policy are deeply suspicious about opening up engagement between the U.S. and Myanmar militaries.
“I certainly believe it would be premature to get rid of all the sanctions at this point,” said Democratic Rep. Joe Crowley of New York, a prominent voice on the issue in Congress. “I have very strong reservations about military-to-military cooperation.”
A display panel at the Royal Thai Army's cyber unit taken Sept. 9, 2015. Photo: WeLoveRTA.org
Amendments to the criminal code removing judicial oversight of wiretapping combined with new laws on cybercrime, cyber security and even the digital economy all suggest the Good People running the country can no longer distinguish between internal security and external threats.
These laws, as written, may well criminalize satire such as internet memes and have other far-ranging repercussions for free speech and privacy. Proponents argue these new powers would only be used against enemies of the state and are necessary given how much of our lives are now online. Many others shudder at the thought, as the line between the state and those running it increasingly blur.
A government overhaul of the criminal code would allow police to intercept phone calls and computer communication without a court order. The interim cabinet secretly approved these amendments on Aug. 9, according to the Thai Netizen Network.
The reason, ostensibly, is that with more and more of society’s business conducted online, the old framework of communication intercepts led by the Ministry of Justice’s Department of Special Investigations, or DSI, is no longer workable. Computer crime is no longer novel or special. DSI investigators have their hands full – the logic goes – and police are powerless when it comes to intercepting digital communications and gathering evidence.
Because the courts take time to approve these intercept warrants, digital data must be gathered quickly before it is deleted; therefore, the new law eliminates judicial oversight, leaving us with a police force that can intercept our communications at the discretion of its officers – all in the name of efficient justice.
This is the alarming state of things as laid out by Thai Netizen Network’s Arthit Suriyawongkul on the sidelines of a Sept. 8 NBTC public forum oddly described as “stealing money via the mobile.”
Wrong Solutions to the Right Problems?
The forum itself was largely a non-event. It stemmed from a high-profile case last month in which someone lost his life savings of 1 million baht after a cyber-criminal used a bogus ID to get a replacement of the victim’s SIM card issued, which he then used to reset his e-banking passwords and clean out his account.
Thailand has suddenly discovered that phishing happens and real money is lost. Welcome, however belatedly, to the 21st century. In the end, Kasikorn bank refunded the million baht and TrueMove gave the victim a free iPhone 6+ with a year’s free service thrown in.
NBTC commissioner Prawit Leesathornwongsa cynically suggested KBank and True quickly settled the case because the government could not afford bad publicity while rolling out PromptPay, its new national e-payment system. But the PromptPay omnishambles is a story for another time.
It was on the sidelines of the NBTC event that Arthit, a champion for online rights, shared his concerns about the government’s new cyber security laws.
Topping his anxieties is the current revision of the Computer Crime Act, namely its revised Section 16. It would criminalize mere possession of images that are defamatory without even dissemination or, as the law likes to phrase it, “entering into a computer system.”
Section 16. Any person who imports into a publicly accessible computer system of computer data including images of other persons whether or not the images have been created doctored, amended or adapted by electronics means or whatsoever means and by doing so is likely to impair the reputation of such other person or to expose such other person to hatred or contempt shall be subject to imprisonment not exceeding three years and a fine not exceeding 200,000 baht or both.
Section 16/2. Any person who is aware that electronic data in one’s possession is the data ordered for seizure and destruction as to section 16/1, the person is obliged to destroy such data. Any violation shall result in the person having to serve half of the penalty as provided for by the law in Section 16.
Source: Unofficial translation of draft amendment
Yes, when this law is promulgated, merely possessing an image that is defamatory could land you in jail for 18 months.
Arthit said he had asked the MICT subcommittee about this and the reply was chilling: If you do not have any bad intentions, that’s fine. You will have your day in court and you will be cleared.
Since when did Thailand adopt the guilty-until-proven-innocent school of jurisprudence?
Being overseas or even being a foreigner overseas does not help either, as the new 17(2) says computer “misuse” crimes are an extraditable offense. One can imagine many a foreign judge laughing when the extradition requests start flying.
Worse still, the National Legislative Assembly is trying to extend Section 16(2) to cover Section 14. Section 16 is for images, while 14 applies to any information deemed untrue or defamatory. The punishment is incarceration for up to five years.
“So if I grab your phone and write 1+1=3 on it, you can be charged under the new, extended [Computer Crime Act] Section 16(2) if it goes through, couldn’t you?” I asked Arthit.
He laughed and called me silly. Then he paused to consider what he’d just said about presumption of guilt.
Officer SpyWare
The other issue is the ongoing secret amendment of the criminal code to allow police to order so-called lawful intercepts without court oversight.
Arthit said that the cabinet approved the new criminal code on Aug. 9, but that it was kept out of any public documents and did not appear in the official cabinet meeting reports.
“How can we even talk about or oppose a law when it’s kept secret?” he asked.
Arthit explained that the current DSI act requiring a judge’s approval strikes the right balance between investigatory needs and a reasonable desire that other methods have been exhausted first. None of this, he alleges, is present in the new criminal code for police interception.
Arthit said that in light of cybercrime developments, he’s not entirely opposed to expanding police powers, “but there needs to be checks and balances.”
He shared his fear that internal cyber security is increasingly being mixed up with external cyber defense. Granted, in a connected world the lines are blurring. But the lines must remain for good reason.
Bill Adama
As Commander William Adama said in the cult sci-fi series Battlestar Galactica:
“There’s a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people.”
The Good People running the country seem to be conflating national security and internal security with these legal amendments, perhaps without malice. Maybe that’s just how they were brought up.
Applying a totalitarian military mindset to internal security may indeed be efficient, but is it the path Thailand truly aspires to take? Are we really so happy with the absence of conflict that we are willing to turn a blind eye while the seeds of guilty-until-proven-innocent totalitarianism take root? Sadly it seems we are.
A memorial for David Miller, 24, and Hannah Witheridge, 23, as seen on Koh Tao on Sept.18, 2014.
BANGKOK — One night, two years ago tomorrow, Zaw Lin and his friend Wai Phyo were playing guitar and drinking beer on a beach. Today they are locked up in Thailand’s most notorious prison for a crime they say they didn’t commit.
“I miss home. Too much. Sometimes I [go] crazy,” Zaw Lin, 22, said Monday during visiting hours at Bang Kwang Central Prison on Monday. “If I killed anyone, I stay here. Why am I here? I think about that all the time.”
Two years ago, Woraphan Toovichien said, his family was respected and well-liked on Koh Tao, but that changed after many on social media accused his relatives of being responsible for killing two British backpackers on the island and covering up the murders.
“People already judged my family as guilty. My family has suffered so much … my family is in ruins,” said Woraphan, 51, who works as a local administrator on the small, comma-shaped island about 80 kilometers off the coast of Chumphon province.
It’s been two years since David Miller and Hannah Witheridge were found dead on a beach on Koh Tao in the early morning of Sept. 15, 2014. But both sides tangled in the murders that became an international sensation said they still felt injustice; one from a deeply flawed legal system, and the other from internet witch-hunting and uncritical reporting.
On Christmas Eve 2015, Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo were convicted of killing the two Britons. They were also found guilty of raping Witheridge before she died. For their crimes, the two Burmese men were sentenced to death. They’re now held on death row at Bang Kwang Central Prison, aka the Bangkok Hilton, awaiting appeal proceedings.
Inside the Tiger
Drive toward Bang Kwang Prison from the north and the first thing to see are paint-peeled guard turrets jutting over walls topped with electrified barbed wire. Most of the prisoners here are condemned to life behind bars or death for serious offenses like premeditated murder, armed robbery and kidnapping.
Citing security concerns, the prison only allows inmate visits from close relatives and those with the same surnames. Friends are turned away. Reporters have to get permission directly from the warden to interview Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo.
Wai Phyo, at left, and Zaw Lin are paraded in front of the media on Oct. 3, 2014, shortly after their arrest on Koh Tao.
“Oh, the two Burmese scapegoats?” one of the prison guards said upon reading the visitation document.
Several more forms and stamps later, I’m led through the last of three large metal gates that separate Bang Kwang Prison from the outside world.
Speaking from behind bars and glass panels through an intercom, Zaw Lin conversed cheerfully in passable English punctuated with frequent laughter. Wai Phyo was more quiet. He’s not confident enough with his English and mostly lets his friend speak on his behalf.
During the course of a 45-minute jailhouse interview, they recounted that night two years ago, discussed life behind bars, and insisted they will not seek a royal pardon as that would mean pleading guilty to something they did not do.
Of the crime, Zaw Lin offered the same version of events presented at their trial last year.
They didn’t know anything about the murders. They had finished working at the AC bar and were playing guitar on the beach. They drank some beer. They walked home at 2am.
He said he knew about the murders on the next day when he returned to work. Fifteen days later, Zaw Lin said, police arrived at the worker housing, took him and Wai Phyo to a safehouse, and beat them until they “confessed” to killing Miller and Witheridge.
Hannah Witheridge, at left, and David Miller, second from right, pose for a photo posted to facebook just hours before their murders on Sept. 15, 2014. Photo: Facebook
“They slap me many times. Me and him, in different rooms,” Zaw Lin said, gesturing to Wai Phyo seated next to him. “They also put a bag on me. Plastic bag. I couldn’t breathe. They kick me.”
The court also ruled there was sufficient evidence that Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo raped Witheridge before killing her and Miller on that night, including security footage, DNA traces and a phone of Miller’s found in Wai Phyo’s possession.
Lawyers representing the two defendants argued the evidence was circumstantial, and that police forensic testing procedures were unreliable and poorly documented. Wai Phyo also said, through Zaw Lin, that he picked up the phone on the way back home that night without knowing it belonged to Miller.
“I am angry – at police,” Zaw Lin said.
He said he felt that police targeted him because he and Wai Phyo were Burmese workers. Civil rights activists have long accused members of Thai law enforcement of exploiting and mistreating migrant workers from poorer neighboring countries such as Myanmar and Cambodia, who have little protection under the law.
Police say this security camera image shows Wai Phyo walking away from the beach after David Miller and Hannah Witheridge were murdered there Sept. 15, 2014.
Attorneys for Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo, who work pro bono, have already filed an appeal, but no court date has been set yet. Zaw Lin said he was recently told by his lawyers that the trial may convene in 2017.
Tainted by Suspicion
In the aftermath of the Sept. 15, 2014, murders, the Toovichien family quickly became prime suspects – not of the police, but of amateur keyboard sleuths.
There were grounds for suspicion: Witheridge and Miller were last seen at AC Bar, which was owned by Montriwat Toovichien, a brother of village chief Woraphan. A Scotsman who worked as a busker on the island also posted on social media that he was threatened by Montriwat into fleeing Koh Tao.
Led by Facebook group CSI LA, online attention soon turned to Woraphan’s son: Warot, aka Nom Sod, a student at Bangkok University. The page accused Warot, then 22, of murdering the two Britons before fleeing to Bangkok, leaving his family in charge of the cover-up.
Woraphan said the allegations were baseless. DNA tests later established that Warot didn’t kill the two victims, and CCTV footage indicated he was in Bangkok at the time of the killings, but that didn’t stop people from labeling his son a murderer to this day, Woraphan said.
“How many people believed it, and how many people bothered to correct the news and defend him?” Woraphan said. “He was just living his life. Then some people accused him of trumped up charges. This is not how things should be. Imagine if you have a son, you will understand my pain.”
A forensic police officer tests Warot Toovichien for DNA on Oct. 30, 2014, while his father Woraphan Toovichien, at right, looks on at Royal Thai Police headquarters in Bangkok.
Woraphan took particular offense at media agencies who took up claims on social media and reported them as facts. “How many months did the media bombardment that my son was a murderer go on? And how many of those media outlets apologized? None at all, except the newspaper that I sued,” he said.
In August 2015 Khaosod settled with the Toovichiens and published an apology for a Sept. 24, 2014, headline identifying Warot as the “son of Koh Tao mafia” who “killed [two] farangs.”
Both Khaosod and Khaosod English are part of the Matichon Group.
“I think it should be a moral lesson that every media agency should exercise judgement, they should be more professional than this. Don’t just sell news. Have some ethics. Present facts,” Woraphan said.
Woraphan said he and his son try to live as normally as they can, but their lives are still tainted by the suspicion.
Death Row Optimism
Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo are now held in two separate cells on Bang Kwang’s death row. They say they are treated well and their cells are larger than at the Koh Samui jailhouse. Prison guards let them read books in their free time, Zaw Lin said.
“I no have beating. Nobody makes problem,” Zaw Lin said. “I meditate. I read books. I am now learning English, because my English is bad.” Because they didn’t speak Thai, Zaw Lin said he and Wai Phyo communicate with prison guards mostly in hand gestures.
According to Zaw Lin, even people in prison believe he and Wai Phyo are innocent. “They know I don’t killing. So they make no problem,” he said.
“I want to say ‘thank you very much’ for supporting me. They write letters every week. Some people send money to help me. I am happy,” Zaw Lin said.
David Miller’s relatives tell reporters they accept the court’s verdict on Dec. 24, 2015, at Samui Provincial Court on Koh Samui.
Zaw Lin added that he still hopes to get out of prison one day and return to Myanmar (“I not come back to Thailand again!” he said with a laugh), but only if the court exonerates him. That’s why they won’t apply for a pardon.
“I need justice. I need truth. I will get out, with justice only,” Zaw Lin said. “I want people to know I no killing. I have the truth. I want justice.”
The court and prosecutors are still deliberating on the 200-page appeal files, so no trial date has been set yet, said Andy Hall, a migrant workers rights activist and member of the defense team.
New evidence and witnesses cannot be introduced in appeals; the proceedings will rest on re-interpretation of previous evidence. Hall said the defense team hopes to convince the new judges that police DNA testing procedures were flawed.
Update Oct. 18: The rest of the series has been canceled due to the national period of mourning for HM the Late King.
BANGKOK — Get in the mood for the season of scare with some cinematic chills by slating your bloodlust with a roster of creepy, mostly European horror films.
This week through Halloween, seven spooky films will show every Thursday at free screenings on the second floor of an art space-gallery-shophouse on Charoen Krung Road.
The mini-frightfest begins Thursday inside a British horror-film-within-a-horror film in “Berberian Sound Studio,” then survive past the end of the world in “Le Temps Du Loup” (Time of the Wolf) – it’s a ghastly place.
Does going on a late-September honeymoon in Paris sound good? Well you’ll regret it in “Trouble Every Day” which chronicles an increasingly creepy and blood-splattered American couple. Bonus(?): A lot of sex and biting.
Taking point in October, an ex soldier-turned-hitman (with a disturbing past!) in “Kill List.” A college student accepts a job as babysitter only to find out there is no baby in “The House of the Devil.” Before he made movies about giant robots, Mexico’s Guillermo del Toro made atmospheric creepy movies such as “The Devil’s Backbone,” which teamed him with legendary Spanish director Pedro Almodovar.
Scare Season ends Oct. 27 in the United States, home of blockbuster splatter, for “Drag Me to Hell.” After achieving Spider Man fame, director Sam Raimi returned to his “Evil Dead” horror roots in 2009 with a gonzo bloody tale of a loan officer who falls victim to a gypsy’s dark curse.
Admission is free. All shows start at 8:30pm and will show with English subtitles.
Bridge Art Space is located on Charoen Krung Soi 51. To reach the shophouse-gallery, head to BTS Saphan Taksin and walk from exit No. 4.
Toby Jones in ‘Berberian Sound Studio’ (2012)“Trouble Every Day” (2001)“The Devil’s Backbone” (2001)
Israel's President Shimon Peres speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in 2014 at his residence in Jerusalem. Photo: Dan Balilty / Associated Press
JERUSALEM — Former Israeli President Shimon Peres suffered a “major stroke” on Tuesday and experienced heavy bleeding in the brain, hospital officials said, as doctors raced to stabilize the 93-year-old Nobel laureate.
Dr. Itzik Kreiss, director of the Sheba Medical Center, told reporters outside the hospital near Tel Aviv that Peres experienced “lots of bleeding” as a result of the stroke. He said he had undergone a battery of tests, and that doctors planned to hold another assessment in a few hours.
Standing alongside Kreiss, Peres’ son Chemi said the situation was “not simple,” but that the family was trying to stay positive.
“My father is very special. I am keeping optimistic. Hoping for the best. But these hours are not easy,” he said.
He thanked the Israeli public for offering its support and prayers.
Peres’ office issued a statement early Wednesday describing his condition as “serious but stable.” It said he remained hospitalized in the intensive care unit.
Earlier, Israeli media reported the bleeding had stopped. Dr. Shlomi Matezsky, one of the doctors treating Peres, told Channel 2 TV that Peres had regained consciousness and was on a respirator.
“He is on a respirator and lightly sedated but is conducting actions, what is called in medical terms ‘simple actions’ and is not currently unconscious,” he said.
He said doctors were meeting to decide how to proceed. “The way things seem now, we don’t think surgery in the next few hours would benefit Mr. Peres’ condition,” he said.
Peres is the elder statesman of Israeli politics and the last surviving link to the country’s founding fathers.
Over a seven-decade career, he held virtually every senior political office in Israel, including three terms as prime minister and stints as foreign and finance minister. He won the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in reaching an interim peace agreement with the Palestinians.
He had remained active since completing his seven-year term as president in 2014, and even uploaded a video to his Facebook account earlier in the day.
In the video , in which Peres encourages the public to buy locally made products, he appears weary but is otherwise alert and coherent. Channel 10 TV said Peres had also delivered an hour-long lecture earlier in the day.
Earlier this year, Peres was twice hospitalized for heart problems but quickly released. His office said Peres received a pacemaker last week.
As president, a largely ceremonial office, he cultivated an image as the country’s elder statesman and became one of its most popular public figures.
He also became a fixture at international conferences like the World Economic Forum in Davos. Earlier this month, he participated in the Ambrosetti Forum in Cernobbio, Italy.
Since leaving the presidency, Peres frequently hosted public events at his peace center, bringing together Arabs and Jews in efforts to promote coexistence.
In a message posted on Facebook, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wished Peres a speedy recovery. “Shimon, we love you and the entire nation wishes you get well,” he said.
The cover to Norway's largest circulation newspaper, Aftenposten, displayed on Friday in Oslo, Norway. Photo: Cornelius Poppe / Associated Press
HELSINKI, Finland — Facebook’s chief operating officer has apologized to Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg for deleting a photograph from its pages and conceded that “we don’t always get it right.”
Sheryl Sandberg said in a letter to Solberg that she’d raised important issues about Facebook’s decision to remove postings of an iconic 1972 image of a naked, screaming girl running from a napalm attack in Vietnam. On Friday, following protests in Norway the tech giant reversed its decision and allowed the photo “Terror of War” to be seen on its pages.
In a letter dated Oct. 10, Sandberg conceded that historical importance “sometimes … outweighs the importance of keeping nudity off Facebook,” after Solberg had reposted the 1972 image and other iconic photos with black boxes covering parts of the images.
Conservationists prepare to release Royal Turtles on Tuesday at a conservation center in Mondul Seima, Koh Kong province, Cambodia. Photo: Mengey Eng / Associated Press
PHNOM PENH — Conservationists say they have transferred more than 200 of the nearly extinct Royal Turtles to a new purpose-built breeding and conservation center, easing fears the rare species will disappear in Cambodia.
“Cambodia’s national reptile is facing a high risk of extinction.”
In a statement Tuesday, the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society said 206 Royal Turtles have been released into the facility, the Koh Kong Reptile Conservation Center, in western Cambodia.
The center is a joint effort between the government’s fisheries department and the society.
“We hope in time to have other species like Siamese crocodiles at the center, and may even develop it into a site for ecotourism to generate revenue to be used for conserving the turtles in the center,” Ross Sinclair, the society’s country director for Cambodia, said in the statement.
The Royal Turtle is one of the world’s 25 most endangered tortoises and freshwater turtles. Also known as the Southern River Terrapin, the Royal Turtle is so named because in historical times only the royal family could consume its eggs.
The species was designated as Cambodia’s national reptile in 2005.
It was believed extinct in Cambodia until 2000 when a small population was rediscovered. Since 2001, a joint project between the government and conservation society has saved 39 nests with a total of 564 eggs that resulted in 382 hatchlings. The hatchlings are raised in captivity and later released into the wild.
Eng Mengey, a society spokesman, said by telephone from Koh Kong province where the center is located that it consists of five big ponds with grass and sand banks for the resettled turtles to nest.
“With very few Royal Turtles left in the wild and many threats to their survival, Cambodia’s national reptile is facing a high risk of extinction,” said Ouk Vibol, director of Fisheries Conservation Department.
“By protecting nests and head starting the hatchlings, we are increasing the chances of survival for this important species for Cambodia,” he said.
Roads flood due to the rain Tuesday in the northern province of Phayao.
BANGKOK — The daily downpour will get heavier still in Bangkok and most provinces despite the downgrade of tropical storm Rai.
Strong wind conditions and rough waters prevail in the Andaman Sea and upper Gulf of Thailand, although the Meteorological Department on Tuesday afternoon reclassified tropical storm Rai to a tropical depression, inbound from southern Laos and expected to arrive tonight.
Meteorologists expect it to weaken further as it passes over Isaan.
Bangkok was forecast to experience 80 percent rainfall Tuesday evening.
Small craft advisories are in effect on both coasts.
One of the Guerrilla Boys in a photo from Aug. 6 at the Democracy Monument mocking Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha for saying earlier this year ‘We’re 99.99 percent democratic.’ Photo: Guerrilla Boys / Courtesy
BANGKOK — In New York, they drew lipstick penises in subway stations to protest the art world’s gender imbalance. In South Korea, they struck at its democratic principles. In Bangkok, they marched on the Democracy Monument a day before the charter referendum.
They are the Guerrilla Boys. Drawing inspiration from Guerrilla Girls – an anonymous American feminist group formed in 1985 New York City – the three artists say they share a similar purpose: fighting sexism in institutional art through provocative acts.
Comprised of one Thai and two farangs, they are indeed boys. Boys who adopt the same collectivist, transgressive chic of provocateurs such as Pussy Riot – but without the vaginas. For that, they’ve also been criticized for appropriating the tools and symbols used in feminist agitprop.
One of the three is an artist in Thailand. He said they started the group about two years ago after seeing Guerrilla Girls fought in vain three decades ago without success.
Contacted over Facebook, where the group publicizes its work, the Thai member agreed to be identified as GB1. He said they can’t reveal their identities or exact locations for fear of getting into trouble or interference with their projects.
They were wandering the Museum of Modern Art in New York, GB1 said, where they noticed much fewer works by female artists than men. Doing some research on the matter, they found only 10 percent of the work in most galleries were by female artists.
Most of their work finds their audiences online through social media.
Frustrated by the imbalance in the art world, the three vandalized subway station signs, walls and ads using colored lipstick for their first project in April 2015, “F(eminist) Train.”
One month later they made headlines in South Korea where they protested an exhibition at the Gwangju Museum of Art for including a Thai artist’s work in support of the movement which helped pave the way for the 2014 coup.
Much of the Thai art establishment was outraged when the museum included “Thai Uprising” by Sutee Kunavichayanont, created to support the Bangkok movement against the democratically elected government. Many complained it was a poor choice for an exhibition commemorating South Korea’s uprising against dictatorship.
GB1 took action by showing up at the museum and taking photos in a gorilla mask holding an A3-size paper reading: “This work still waiting ‘junta’ create democracy for them!!!”
The demonstration was captured in Polaroids stuck to walls throughout the museum by chewing gum.
“We wanted to send a direct message to the museum’s curator,” the anonymous activist said. “It’s not a small issue that the curator can just let go.”
One of the Guerrilla Boys poses in front of Sutee Kunavichayanont’s ‘Thai Uprising’ on May 25 at the Gwangju Museum of Art. Photo: Guerrilla Boys / Instagram
Divided Response
It was in Bangkok late last year that Guerrilla Boys met a strong reaction. Their first activity in Thailand was an installation called How Many Female Artists Do You Know? at gallery-bar Speedy Grandma just off Charoen Krung Road.
That day at Speedy, dozens of attendees wore simian heads and scribbled messages on the gallery’s walls in red lipstick, but the monkey business got intense when some present openly challenged them.
“Why define women with lipstick,” read one message on the wall. “You sexist swine.”
Some present strongly disagreed with their purpose and bona fides, according to gallery co-founder Unchalee “Lee” Anantawat.
“Since they focus on a controversial issue, they have to be prepared for the questions raised as well,” Lee said. “In terms of their success, I think it only has impact on a specific group of people – not people in general.”
A Guerrilla Boys-made Polaroid at the Gwangju Museum of Art. Photo: Guerrilla Boys / Facebook
Lee expressed her own uncertainty over the group’s authenticity, adding that, for her, it would take time to prove.
GB1 said some negative reactions were expected. He blamed that on the state of feminism in Thailand.
“[Other countries] have Free the Nipple campaign, but we don’t. We’re still stuck,” he said in reference to a Western campaign to normalize the sight of breasts. “[So] our strategy is to provoke women to do something. We’ve talked about this that if we put this kind of work in Thailand, some people would be panicked,” he said.
But artist Grisana “Chris” Eimeamkamol was at the event and said he appreciated their use of masks to bring a message into focus without distracting the audience with their identities.
“It’s public art raising questions without the essence of the author,” Chris said, noting the unexpectedly high turnout for the event. “With LGBT and feminism the hot topics now, I think it’s good to have someone provoking and getting people to exchange opinions.”
Boys Will Be Boys
The counterculture mystique of the whole “guerilla operative” thing certainly seems part of the appeal.
“I’m a risky person. It’s exciting,” GB1 said. “Once I sneakily placed works by Thai artists onto a restroom wall at a museum in England.”
Believing that just leaving petroleum-based graffiti won’t draw the limelight, the boys post their work online and tag the galleries and individuals involved, from New York’s Museum of Modern Art and its director Glenn D. Lowry to London’s Tate Modern gallery.
“Museum of Modern Art tapped a heart at one of our Instagram photos,” GB wrote. “New York Times did it as well while many other museums subscribed us.”
This recognition fills them with pride. At Speedy Grandma, they hung banners showing likes of their Instagram photos by Big Media and Big Art. One seemed intended just to show they were followed online by The Guardian’s photo team.
They definitely appear to relish the attention of the same institutions they raise their middle fingers at.
“Right now I still doubt whether they really are interested in feminism or only want to spark a trend,” said Lee of Speedy Grandma. “I’m really interested in what they will do next.”
In response, GB1 said it’s more complicated than that.
“We define ourselves as f(ak)eminists. If we identify ourselves as feminists, there would be only feminists who come to see our work,” he said. “So we redefine ourselves and just do it. Let the audience be the judge.”
Top: One of the Guerrilla Boys in a photo from Aug. 6 at the Democracy Monument mocking Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha for saying earlier this year ‘We’re 99.99 percent democratic.’ Photo: Guerrilla Boys / Courtesy
Photo: Guerrilla Boys / InstagramPhoto: Guerrilla Boys / InstagramA Speedy Grandma wall during Guerrilla Boys’ How Many Female Artists Do You Know? exhibition. Photo: Guerrilla Boys / Facebook
