Police blocked a Singapore opposition politician on Saturday from holding a march through the city to protest restrictions on freedom of speech ahead of the IMF-World Bank meetings.
Singapore, which had hoped to show off its economic success by hosting the IMF and World Bank meetings this month, has instead attracted surprisingly strong criticism from the two bodies and from NGOs when it blacklisted accredited activists.
With some 16,000 delegates in town for the meetings, including central bankers and finance ministers from around the world, Singapore's curbs on its critics have come under scrutiny.
Opposition politician Chee Soon-juan, secretary-general of the tiny Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) and six other activists wearing white tee-shirts with slogans such as "Freedom Now" held a rally at "Speaker's Corner."
But police stopped their planned march to the convention center, where the meetings are taking place.
"The objective of this rally is to highlight that it is our right as citizens of Singapore to gather freely," Chee told a crowd of about 200 people, including journalists. "Singapore is the only economically developed country to oppress its citizens to this extent."
WOLFOWITZ CRITICISM
Under Singapore law, public gatherings of more than four people require a police permit. Before Chee arrived, police asked members of the crowd for their names and their reason for gathering at the park.
The moves to stop the protest march came a day after Singapore said it would allow 22 blacklisted globalization foes to enter the country.
Following withering criticism from World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, Singapore said on Friday night it would allow 22 of the 27 activists on an immigration blacklist into the country. The remaining five would be "subject to interview and may not be allowed in," the Singapore organizing committee for the meetings said in a statement.
The World Bank said it was pleased that the government had relented, but called for the other five to be allowed in, too.
"The World Bank still requests that all accredited individuals be permitted to participate, consistent with our Memorandum of Understanding with the Government of Singapore," the bank said in a statement late on Friday.
It added that open dialogue with civil society is important for the effective operation of the institution.
On Friday, Wolfowitz said Singapore had damaged its own reputation by imposing "authoritarian" restrictions on the entry of activists for the meetings.
SOME DEPORTED
Anti-globalization activists have staged sometimes violent protests at similar meetings in the past, criticizing rich countries for being callous about the poor and the environment.
Some would-be participants have already been deported or refused entry.
ActionAid said that Maria Clara Soares, its head of policy for the Americas Region and a former economic advisor to the Brazilian Ministry of Finance, was held for 30 hours and subsequently deported on Friday.
Three other senior ActionAid activists, all officially accredited by the World Bank and IMF, were detained at the airport for several hours, and repeatedly interrogated and fingerprinted before being released, the group said.
Singapore police say the tight controls are necessary because the tiny island state with the most advanced economy in Southeast Asia was a terrorist target.
More than 160 civil society organizations, who have been meeting on the Indonesian island of Batam on Friday -- a 40-minute boat ride from Singapore -- declared a boycott of the meetings, in response to Singapore's restrictions.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not