Singapore: Founder’s Lee Kuan Yew House Crisis.

                       Two years after his death, no memorials, statues or streets in Singapore are named after Lee Kuan Yew, who established this city-state as a modern nation and built it into a prosperous showcase for his view that limited political freedoms best suit Asian values.

Now a bitter and public family dispute over the fate of his modest house has shattered Singapore’s image as an orderly authoritarian ideal and hinted at deeper divisions about its political future.

Two of Mr. Lee’s three children have accused their elder brother, the prime minister, of abusing his power to preserve the house against their father’s wishes. The motive, they said, is to shore up his own political legitimacy and ultimately to establish a dynasty for which he is grooming his son.

These charges have transformed what on the surface is an ugly estate battle into a national crisis that has raised questions about how this island nation is governed, the basis of the governing party’s uninterrupted 58-year rule and how the country’s leaders are chosen.

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And in a place where criticizing the government can land a blogger in jail, the public airing of these grievances from within the ranks of the revered founding family is nothing short of extraordinary.

SAITM should be abolished, Minister Patali champika

        On the outbreak of the country, the SAITIM should be shut down and put into a state university, said the JHU General Secretary and Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka on Monday at Battaramulla.

The Minister who called on the President of the Sri Lanka Medical Council, Prof. Carlo Sandesa, to be re-appointed to the post, said that he cannot find a solution to this problem by removing him from his post.

This was stated at a media conference held at Jathika Hela Urumaya Headquarters.

The minister further said that around 12000 students have been suspended for a year due to this problem.

The Supreme Court only solves legal matters.But this has become a huge social, political crisis that has gone beyond that today.If this situation persists, The country will not be allowed to move to the darkened stage, except for the government

The government has decided to abolish this by statutory abolition and become a state university.

Media freedom is again threatened by Myanmar

             

                    Senior reporter for The Irrawaddy Ko Lawi Weng,
Under the military junta that ruled Myanmar for nearly 50 years, the media were tightly controlled.

The European Union on Monday urged Myanmar to protect journalists from "intimidation, arrest or prosecution" after several cases of reporters running into trouble with the law, including three detained by the army last week.

The three reporters were accused of breaching the colonial-era Unlawful Associations Act after covering the burning of drugs by the rebel Ta'ang National Liberation Army to mark International Day Against Drug Abuse.

Family members of journalists detained in northern Shan State said their loved ones are “in good health” after they were allowed prison visits for the first time on Monday.

Lawi Weng, also known as U Thein Zaw, from The Irrawaddy, and U Aye Nai and Pyae Bone Aung from the Democratic Voice of Burma were arrested by the Myanmar Army on Monday, June 26, and and handed over to the police last Thursday. They have been charged under the Unlawful Associations Act and are being detained at Hsipaw Prison in northern Shan State.

2.5 tons of trash, mostly containing alcohol bottles from the Bhivpuri waterfall near Ashane village, have been removed.

                                    Bhivpuri waterfall  in India
          2.5 tons of trash — mostly comprising alcohol bottles — from Bhivpuri waterfall near Ashane village, almost 90 km from Mumbai.

Mumbai NGO Environment Life, which has completed clean-up drives at eight waterfalls near Nerul — Anandwadi, Jummapatti, Tapalwadi, Khopoli–Zenith, Vasai–Chinchoti, Kondeshwar and Pandavkada — requested Mumbaiites and Ashane villagers to refrain from disposing of trash at these tourist sites.

Garbage damages local ecosystems, and threatens plant and animal life. Bottles made of glass or plastic can injure animals, who may also fall sick if they consume other types of garbage.