Fire at Genting Highlands theme park sparks evacuations - CNA

A fire broke out at the Genting Highlands theme park in Malaysia on Friday (Jun 14), prompting evacuations as the blaze sent plumes of black smoke into the air. 

Footage of the incident shared widely on social media showed flames raging from the SkyAvenue shopping mall in the Central Park area of Genting SkyWorlds Theme Park. 

Visitors described their panic as the fire spread across the building, with some worried that the building might collapse.

Tourist Hafiz Abdul Halim, 42, who was with his wife, said they became fearful when they realised that there was a fire in the building.

"We obviously panicked when we heard people screaming here and there. The police on duty did ask people to evacuate the premises and exit to safer locations," he told local news agency Bernama. 

Restaurant assistant Adrian Wong, 32, said that staff as well as visitors were asked to vacate the premises. 

"Everyone made it out. They vacated and left everything to save themselves," he said, adding that all floors were evacuated for safety purposes. 

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2024-06-14 15:33:18Z
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Fire at Genting Highlands theme park sparks evacuations - CNA

Local news outlet Kosmo reported that more than 5,000 people had to evacuate, with some in a state of panic. 

The Pahang fire and rescue department said it was alerted at 4.55pm with personnel arriving at the location about five minutes later. 

The fire started on the second floor before spreading to the fourth, it said in a statement. 

Genting Highlands, in the Malaysian state of Pahang, is a popular entertainment and tourist destination. It has both indoor and outdoor theme parks, casinos, as well as shopping malls. It also hosts a variety of concerts. 

This is a developing story, please refresh for updates. 

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2024-06-14 11:39:00Z
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China's Li signals demand for New Zealand dairy and meat - CNA

His comments came as Chinese firms formally applied for an anti-dumping probe into pork imports from the European Union, escalating tensions after the bloc imposed anti-subsidy duties on Chinese-made electric vehicles.

Global food companies from dairy producers to pork exporters are on high alert for potential retaliatory tariffs from China.

New Zealand and China on Thursday signed bilateral agreements on trade and climate during Li's trip, the highest level Chinese visit to New Zealand in seven years.

BOOMING TRADE

Li has promised that Beijing will further expand market access, create a market-oriented and internationalised business environment, and he encouraged entrepreneurs to seize opportunities, Chinese state media said.

Beijing sees itself as a key part of New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon's plan to double exports over the next 10 years.

China is already New Zealand's largest trading partner with bilateral trade totalling nearly NZ$38 billion (US$23.27 billion).

New Zealand remains keen to further boost trade ties with China but has also toughened its stance over the last year, accusing Beijing of hacking its parliament and noting what it characterises as a growing Chinese threat to Pacific security.

After his meeting with Li on Thursday Luxon said that as well as discussing trade, he had also raised concerns about issues such as Chinese interference.

Li's meeting with New Zealand opposition leader Chris Hipkins was cancelled on Friday, due to Hipkins facing travel issues.

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2024-06-14 10:06:36Z
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CNA launches in North America as part of international expansion - CNA

The launch event was hosted and moderated by CNA contributors and correspondents and will be advertised across the capital city this week.

Apart from Walk The Line, content available on CNA for North American viewers include:

• Daily news updates from the Asian region on the Asia Tonight programme and an in-depth look into developments from Greater China, Japan, and the Korean Peninsula on East Asia Tonight programme.
• Insight – An acclaimed investigative documentary that analyses political, social and economic issues impacting Asia and the rest of the world.
• The Great Migration: A New Eden – A programme showcasing a year-long journey with a team of specialists moving 3,500 birds into Asia’s largest bird park in Singapore. The programme won the gold award at the World Media Festivals.
• Preparing For Dangerous Storms: Inside the People’s Liberation Army – A three-part series on the world’s largest army taking measures to ensure technology, energy, and food self-sufficiency in China. The documentary won the gold award for best documentary in the global issues category at the World Media Festivals.

CNA’S INTERNATIONAL EXPANSION

CNA was established in March 1999. The news channel has correspondents in 15 major cities across Asia, and is supported by 23 bureaus in North America, Europe, and Africa.

Mediacorp, during CNA’s 25th anniversary celebration in March, announced plans to scale up growth and reach new audiences in regional and international markets.

“We are making deliberate inroads in these regions because surveys have shown there is a significant audience in the US, Canada and the United Kingdom who are hungry for news and documentaries about Asia – in particular, China, Japan, and Korea,” said chairman Niam Chiang Meng.

Mediacorp said CNA fills a crucial gap in the North American market by delivering authentic narratives and firsthand perspectives from the Asian region, with an aim to enrich audiences' understanding of Asia.

This includes in-depth coverage of the region’s political scene, business developments, lifestyle trends as well as human-interest features which reflect the diversity of Asia.

Earlier this year, CNA launched its FAST channel in the UK with six hours of programming repeated throughout the day with news updates, in-depth current affairs content, and documentaries.

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2024-06-14 06:53:00Z
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Ukraine's Zelenskyy says China's Xi told him he will not sell any weapons to Russia - CNA

KYIV: Chinese President Xi Jinping told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that China would not sell weapons to Russia during a phone conversation between the two men, Zelenskyy said on Thursday (Jun 13).

Zelenskyy was speaking at a joint press conference with US President Joe Biden at the G7 summit in Italy. He did not specify when the conversation with Xi took place.

"I had a firm conversation with (the) leader of China. He said that he will not sell any weapon to Russia. We’ll see if he’s (a) respectable person he will not, because he gave me (his) word," Zelenskyy said in English.

Biden chimed in as Zelenskyy finished speaking, saying: "By the way, China is not supplying weapons but the ability to produce those weapons and the technology available to do it, so it is in fact helping Russia."

Zelenskyy said that if Kyiv and China had the same views on peace there could be dialogue between them, and that if Beijing had an alternative view, it could prepare an alternative "peace formula".

The Ukrainian leader has promoted his vision for peace in Ukraine, which he calls his "peace formula".

Switzerland is scheduled to host international delegations from dozens of countries and organisation this weekend at a summit to try to bring peace in Ukraine closer.

The last publicly known phone call between Zelenskyy and Xi was in April 2023, the only such call since Russia’s full-scale invasion.

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2024-06-13 22:50:00Z
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Handcuffed and burnt to death: Indonesian cop's alleged killing of punter-husband sparks online gambling concerns - CNA

He noted that while Kominfo itself has prevented and taken down many online gambling apps, other parties must also take action since it involves financial institutions and cross-border online transactions.

"The internet is borderless, cross-country, the server is in another country's security apparatus … therefore, the eradication of online gambling is not the task of one ministry such as Kominfo," Mr Budi said.

The minister shared that more than 2 million online gambling sites have already been blocked, but new ones keep popping up.

About 3.2 million Indonesians are involved in online gambling, according to data from the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK) that was released in April by Coordinating Minister for Political, Legal and Security Affairs Hadi Tjahjanto.

“80 per cent of them play under the value of 100,000 rupiah," Mr Hadi said.

At the same time, data points to a significant increase in transactions related to online gambling. Online gambling transactions of Indonesian citizens have skyrocketed more than 8,000 per cent in value over the last five years.

It was 3.97 trillion rupiah in 2018. More recently, the figure hit 104.41 trillion rupiah in 2022, while last year’s tally was 327 trillion rupiah, according to PPATK data released in May.

For the first quarter of 2024 alone, transactions amounting to 100 trillion rupiah were recorded, said Mr Hadi as quoted by CNN Indonesia.

Government officials have suggested there are also links between online gambling and money laundering. 

"It is not just online gambling, because there are several cases (of money laundering) where they got the (illicit) money from winning in gambling," said communications minister Budi.

TRAPPED IN HIGH-INTEREST LOANS

Many people in Indonesia have resorted to taking out loans online as they get sucked into online gambling, according to PPATK head Ivan Yustiavandana. He said there is an increased flow of funds related to online loans which were used for online gambling.

While not specifying the amount of money involved, Mr Ivan said the value was not small, as reported by local news outlet Tirto on Wednesday.

Online loans usually come with high interest rates, particularly those offered by illegal lending platforms. Many who take out such loans to bankroll their punting habit have found themselves mired in debt and distress, especially when compounded with the losses from gambling.

There have been 14 suicides and attempted suicides as a result of online gambling since 2023 in Indonesia, with the victims’ ages ranging between 19 and 30, according to the Center for Financial and Digital Literacy as reported by Media Indonesia.

In April, a member of the Indonesian Navy took his own life by shooting himself in the head at his duty station in Yahukimo, Papua. The Indonesian National Army said in an official statement that the officer was in depression due to debts of up to 819 million rupiah incurred from online gambling.

Earlier this month, another member of the military in Bogor, West Java killed himself, also allegedly due to online gambling.

One online gambler who did not want to be named told CNA how he became depressed and had to sell his only motorcycle to satisfy his gambling habit.

The 40-year-old office worker became hooked in 2022 and ended up borrowing up to 50 million rupiah to feed his addiction.

He told CNA that while he has not been able to cut out online gambling entirely, he has been trying to curb the habit.

"Gamblers are addicted if they win and eager to win if they lose, so they keep playing." 

Nowadays, he only gambles whenever he has money and has stopped borrowing from online lenders. He hopes to be able to quit gambling completely one day.

"A gambler’s true victory is when he can stop gambling entirely," he added.

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2024-06-13 08:34:00Z
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Stormy Daniels Adds A Few Adjectives To Describe Donald Trump's Penis - Yahoo Singapore News

Stormy Daniels said she revealed intimate details about Donald Trump for a critical purpose.

“Describing his unique and horrifying penis was the only way to really prove that I had seen it,” she said in a trailer for The Daily Mail’s “Everything I Know About Me” podcast that launched Tuesday.

Daniels’ testimony about her 2006 hookup with Trump may have helped convict the former president in his hush-money trial last month. A jury found that Trump masked payments to silence Daniels about their Lake Tahoe tryst before the 2016 election.

But long before that, Daniels had described Trump’s penis in more lurid terms than “unique” and “horrifying.”

“It has a huge mushroom head. Like a toadstool,” she wrote in her memoir “Full Disclosure.”

“I lay there, annoyed that I was getting fucked by a guy with Yeti pubes and a dick like the mushroom character in Mario Kart,” she wrote, referring to “Toad” in the video game.

“It may have been the least impressive sex I’d ever had, but clearly,” she added, “he didn’t share that opinion.”

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2024-06-12 20:25:23Z
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