HK media club urged to cancel talk
HONG KONG • Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam joined mainland China yesterday in urging the city's Foreign Correspondents' Club (FCC) to cancel a planned speech by a Hong Kong independence advocate whose party is threatened with a ban. The FCC is due to host a talk by Mr Andy Chan, convenor of the tiny pro-independence Hong Kong National Party, on Aug 14.
Ms Lam said: "I hope our friends in the FCC will also respect that the Hong Kong SAR is an inseparable part of the People's Republic of China," she said, noting that its historic club building was government-owned.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Philippine mums back breastfeeding
MANILA • Hundreds of Philippine mothers simultaneously nursed their babies in public yesterday, in a government-backed mass breastfeeding event aimed at combating child deaths. About 1,500 women, some of them wearing tiaras and superhero T-shirts, sat on the vast floor of a Manila stadium and let their babies suckle to the beat of dance music. The annual event aims to draw public support for a government campaign to get more mothers to switch to breast milk.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Jho Low's superyacht now off Batam
KUALA LUMPUR • The US$250 million (S$342 million) superyacht Equanimity, purportedly belonging to fugitive businessman Jho Low, has reached the waters off Batam. A Malaysian government spokesman yesterday said Malaysia is making "some arrangement" with the Indonesian authorities to take ownership of the yacht.
The vessel was seized in Bali in February at the request of the US authorities as part of a multibillion-dollar corruption investigation launched by the Department of Justice relating to troubled Malaysian state fund 1MDB.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK