Taiwan begins 3-day mourning period after typhoon

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Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou hugs the relative, dressed in a traditional funeral gown, of a victim of Typhoon Morakot during a visit to the destroyed village of Shiao Lin, in southern Taiwan, Wednesday Aug. 19, 2009. During his visit, victims on Wednesday berated Taiwan's president over his slow response to Typhoon Morakot, while two more senior officials offered to resign as anger against the government mounted. (AP Photo)

Soldiers carry the body of a victim near the site of a major landslide caused by Typhoon Morakot which destroyed the mountain village of Hsiao Lin in Kaohsiung county, southern Taiwan August 19, 2009. REUTERS/Stringer

Taiwan soldiers carry an injured person to a typhoon rescue centre in the town of Chiashien in Kaohsiung county, southern Taiwan. A political storm surrounding Taiwan's Typhoon Morakot gained force as the defence minister and cabinet secretary offered to resign over the government's slow response. (AFP/Peter Parks)

Taiwan soldiers clean up a damaged road following Typhoon Morakot in Chuchi, Chiayi County, southern Taiwan August 20, 2009. REUTERS/Taiwan Military News Agency/Handout

A soldier smells the ground while looking for the bodies of flood victims in the mudslide-affected village of Sinkai, following Typhoon Morakot in Kaohsiung County, southern Taiwan August 17, 2009. REUTERS/Stringer

Taiwan soldiers rest inbetween assisting with a cleanup operation following Typhoon Morakot, in the town of Chiashien in southern Taiwan's Kaohsiung county. More than 460 people were missing nearly two weeks after Typhoon Morakot hit Taiwan, unleashing floods and mudslides that left more than 150 confirmed dead, emergency officials said Friday. (AFP/Peter Parks)

Taiwan soldiers help to clean up a street covered with mud following Typhoon Morakot in Linbian, Pingtung County, southern Taiwan August 20, 2009. REUTERS/Taiwan Military News Agency/Handout

Soldiers search for bodies on a street covered with mud, following Typhoon Morakot in Liugui, Pingtung County, southern Taiwan August 21, 2009. More than 600 people were listed dead or missing in Taiwan on Friday after one of the island's worst typhoons as the military began digging up bodies buried deep under rocks and mud. REUTERS/Taiwan Military News Agency/Handout

By PETER ENAV, Associated Press Writer

TAIPEI, Taiwan – Taiwan began a three-day mourning period to remember the victims of Typhoon Morakot on Saturday, two weeks after the island's worst weather disaster in 50 years devastated its mountainous south.

The storm took at least 500 lives and caused more than $2 billion in property damage. It triggered landslides and widespread flooding that trapped thousands of people in remote villages for days.

Early Saturday flags around Taiwan were lowered to half staff, and government officials attended religious events paying homage to the storm victims.

Since the full dimensions of the Morakot disaster became clear about 12 days ago, President Ma-Ying-jeou has struggled to assuage widespread anger over the government's slow response.

His approval rating has now dropped to below 20 percent — a 30 percent decline in only three months — amid an almost daily battering in Taiwan's hypercritical media — including in outlets normally friendly to the administration.

The Liberty Times — which normally supports the opposition — published details on Saturday of the $110 Japanese meal enjoyed by Ma's economic minister on the first day of a massive rescue operation aimed at saving the lives of thousands of flood-stranded villagers.

Three other senior officials — the vice-foreign minister, the defense minister and the Cabinet secretary-general — have already offered to resign, their reputations pummeled by a growing perception that the government was either indifferent to the fate of Morakot's victims or incapable of offering them succor.

Ma has been visiting hard-hit areas in the south over the past two days, bowing before the families of the dead and promising that a planned $3 billion reconstruction program will be carried out with exemplary efficiency.

A major question now facing Ma is how quickly he will be able to reverse the considerable political damage he has sustained and get back to dealing with the signature enterprise of his presidency — improving relations with rival China, from which Taiwan split amid civil war in 1949.

In his 15 months in office, Ma has reversed the pro-independence policies of his predecessor, moving rapidly to link Taiwan's economy with that of the mainland, and even speaking of a peace treaty between the sides.

So far the pro-independence opposition has been cautious about raising the issue of whether someone whose leadership has been so badly wounded can be counted on to effectively manage the complex and politically sensitive China opening.

Ma himself appeared to address the issue at a press conference on Tuesday, saying management of China ties is unrelated to Morakot and the difficult questions it raises.

Malaysian chain to raise its presence in Cambodia by multiple boutique hotels

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The Phnom Penh Post
Thursday, 20 August 2009
Nathan Green

LEADING Malaysia hotel chain Holiday Villa Hotels and Resorts expects to open two properties in Cambodia over the next eight months and is scouting locations for "four or five" boutique hotels, regional manager Charles Bain said.

The company will open a hotel in Kampot province in around six weeks, but a three-star hotel originally slated to open in Sihanoukville next month will now open next February, he said. He would not give the reason for the delay.

Construction on a second hotel in Kampot province will begin in "two to three months", he added.

The company. which currently operates one hotel in Cambodia on Phnom Penh's Monivong Boulevard, is looking to capture a growing market for boutique hotels in Cambodia.

The "four to five" boutique hotels would all be located "around coastal areas", Bain said.

Bain was speaking to the Post after an article in Malaysia's Business Times Monday said the chain plan to open a hotel in Sihanoukville and another in China's Henan province.

The company is owned by Malaysian-listed Advance Synergy Group. Bain refused to disclose further details on the company's Cambodia plans, citing disclosure requirements on the Malaysian bourse.

The company has 3,390 guest rooms and suites in 18 hotels and resorts worldwide, according to its Web site.

Its latest, the Holiday Villa Hotel and Residence City Centre in Doha Qatar, opened on July 20, and the company also opened properties in Halong Bay, Vietnam, and Shenzhen, China, this year.

The company's current Cambodia property, Holiday Villa Hotel and Suites Phnom Penh, has 74 rooms.

Thailand to protest Cambodian patrol in disputed area

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Bangkok Post
http://www.bangkokpost.com/

Writer: WASSANA NANUAM
Published: 20/08/2009

The Defence Ministry plans a strongly-worded protest over a Cambodian patrol entering a disputed maritime area near Koh Kut in Trat province, a source says.

The protest will be lodged through the Foreign Ministry.

Two Cambodian warships were seen patrolling in the disputed area last week.

The patrol was in breach of an agreement on disputed and overlapping areas which requires the two countries to inform the other of any plans for a patrol and for the patrol to be a joint operation.

The source said the Cambodian patrol was probably in response to the Thai navy's move to set up a new base on Koh Kut to reinforce its patrol missions following a report that Cambodia had allowed a French oil company to carry out surveys in the disputed area.

Meanwhile, the navy has apologised to Cambodia after a patrol plane strayed into Cambodian airspace.

The Phnom Penh Post yesterday cited Cambodian general Bun Seng as saying the commander of the Chanthaburi-Trat airbase had written that the incident was due to bad weather affecting the aircraft's navigation system."We accepted the letter of apology by the Thai military but we have warned Thailand's airbase that we will not take responsibility for a second repeated airspace violation," Gen Bun Seng said.

Navy spokesman Prachachart Srisawat said it was not unusual for planes from Thailand and Cambodia to accidentally cross over into each other's territory.

Beyond the cliches: a clear-eyed look at corruption in Thailand

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Thai protesters carry red sheet-wrapped boxes said to be containing a petition ahead of a march to the royal offices at the Grand Palace, in downtown Bangkok on Monday. AFP

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go to thailand, get drunk, steal stuff, get caught, abuse the police and you will probably be arrested.
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Decline in asian travel seen slowing: abacus

The rate of decline in Asia’s travel industry should slow in the second half of this year as the global economy stabilises, but risks remain. Abacus International, an Asian air ticketing and reservations firm, forecast travel bookings from July to December would fall between 4.0 and 6.0 percent from a year earlier, compared with the 10 percent drop seen in the first half. “It’s true that there is evidence of green shoots sprouting and lining the path that the industry is travelling on right now, which is great news,” said Abacus President and Chief Executive Robert Bailey. “However, this road is still likely to be a bumpy one.” The risks include terrorist attacks like the hotel bombings in Jakarta last month and a further escalation of the swine flu virus. Despite the travel industry being hammered by the global economic slump, there were also bright spots, with China, Kazakhstan, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam registering travel growth in the first half, he said. More people were also booking for short-haul and domestic trips, he said. Corporate travel, however, will remain subdued and could recover only by mid-2010, Bailey said. RELAXNEWS

The Phnom Penh Post
Wednesday, 19 August 2009
Stuart Mcdonald

After a spate of widely publicised recent scandals, Thailand has a particularly bad rap for corruption. But is the situation there really worse than in neighbouring countries?

IT seems barely a week passes without some new ghastly story hitting the airwaves about corruption in Thailand. Be it beer mat-nabbing mums in Phuket, tourists being extorted at the airport or the old tried-and-tested gem scam story, it seems Thailand should be slapped with a "buyer beware" sticker.

Over the last year, and far more seriously, we've seen ongoing political uncertainties, street protests in Bangkok, border clashes with Cambodia and the never-ending shifting sands of visa regulations. Does Thailand really want tourists to come at all?

It's true, Thailand has problems with corruption - as do most of its neighbours. On the one hand, tourists are seen as walking money bags and on the other, an ample supply of corrupt (and underpaid) police and assorted dodgy con men and shysters are on the loose. The current economic situation has seen an increase in reports of theft and fraud - though I'd guess this isn't unique to Thailand.

What does seem to be unique to Thailand is the amount of press some of these cases get. We're all for exposing police corruption and scams - and the attention given to the recent extortion case at Bangkok's international airport is a great example of the foreign press helping to get a few backsides kicked.

But let's get a bit of perspective here. Thailand will receive in excess of 10 million foreign visitors in 2009, and the vast majority of these people will have no problems whatsoever. In many of the cases you read about - but not all - the people being taken advantage of have put themselves in a situation where they are going to be taken advantage of. We're not excusing the corruption, but we are saying that if you conduct yourself in a sensible manner, familiarise yourself with the laws and customs of the land, and don't forget to pack your brain, chances are you will have few, if any, problems in Thailand.

Take this example of a recent post on Travelfish:
"After visiting Ko Sukorn twice over a period of four years we decided to buy a lease on some land and build a school. We used our life savings. Then the police and the land office demanded 500,000 baht extortion money. We were teaching up to 100 students at the time (for free). We have been threatened with a two-year prison sentence and deportation for teaching without a work permit (unless we pay). I think all travellers should know just how corrupt Thailand can be. We have no problem with the people on the island and still keep in contact. If you go to Ko Sukorn please ask about Small Sea School and what happened to it. We have lost our life savings of four-million baht."

A Thai Muslim during Thai Queen Sirikit’s birthday celebrations in the troubled southern province of Pattani on August 12. AFP

We're getting only one (very limited) side of the story here, but one wonders if they'd done some basic research, they'd have found out that you need a work permit to teach in Thailand - even if you are not being paid. Did the school have a license? Was there a Thai director? Pure and simple, it's Thai law. While undoubtedly the police and land office were corrupt, if you aren't completely legal, you're setting yourself up as prey to the local predators and lowlife.

We lived in Bangkok for seven years and have been in Asia upwards of a dozen. In all that time we've been extorted once (in Indonesia) and it was our fault - we hadn't got an exit permit and in the end had to pay a bribe to get out of the country.

We've had friends who have been extorted. One was caught with a small amount of grass at a Bangkok bus station and marched to an ATM to be liberated of about 70,000 baht. Yes, the police who caught him acted corruptly, but he was breaking the law and so put himself in a vulnerable position.

I'm not saying all the cases that hit the press should be discounted as happening to naive foreigners. Undoubtedly there have been some tragic cases, with the murders of foreigners in Chiang Mai, Kanchanaburi and Pai (all by police) coming to mind. But these are individual aberrations and do not point to a larger "problem" of gun happy corrupt cops running around shooting tourists willy-nilly.

Yes, we run a Web site for people heading to Thailand, so it's in our interests to talk this down. We're rather asking for a bit of perspective. Go to Thailand, get drunk, steal stuff, get caught, abuse the police and you will probably be arrested - as would probably happen in your home country. Thailand isn't a magical fairyland where you can behave however you want because the laws don't apply to you. The laws apply.

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