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(Vice Canada) Roughly 800,000 Maryland drivers with license plates designed to commemorate the War of 1812 are now inadvertently advertising a website for an online casino based in the Philippines.

In 2012, to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, Maryland redesigned its standard license plate to read “MARYLAND WAR OF 1812.” The license plates, which were the default between 2012 and 2016, have the URL www.starspangled200.org printed at the bottom.

Sometime within the last year, www.starspangled200.org stopped telling people about how Marylander Francis Scott Key was inspired to write the national anthem “The Star Spangled Banner” after watching British ships bombard Fort McHenry in Baltimore during the War of 1812 and started instead redirecting to a site called globeinternational.info, in which a blinking, bikini-clad woman advertises “Philippines Best Betting Site, Deposit 100 Receive 250.”.. Read More

(Korea Herald) A murder suspect fleeing from South Korean and Philippines’ authorities has been apprehended in the Philippines capital Manila, South Korean police said Tuesday.

According to the South Korean police agency, the suspect was spotted at a condo in Manilla on Monday. The suspect is a South Korean male in his 30s who fled to the Philippines after allegedly murdering his wife, a national of the Philippines, earlier this year.

Police believe the suspect murdered his wife and disposed of the body at a reservoir in Gonam-myeon, South Chungcheong Province.

The suspect had initially been apprehended in the Philippines in February, but he escaped from the detention center at Ninoy Aquino International Airport in Manila while waiting for the Philippines government’s decision on his deportation to South Korea.

“We will investigate the case in depth as soon as the suspect is brought back to South Korea,” police here said… Read More

(Boston Herald) MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine officials began evacuating thousands of villagers, shut down schools and offices and imposed a no-sail ban Monday as Typhoon Mawar approached the country’s northern provinces a week after battering the U.S. territory of Guam.

The typhoon is packing maximum sustained winds of 155 kpm (96 mph) and gusts of up to 190 kph (118 mph) but is forecast to spare the northern mountainous region a direct hit. Current projections show the typhoon veering northeast by mid-week toward Taiwan or southern Japan.

Authorities warned of dangerous tidal surges, flash floods and landslides as it blows past Cagayan and the northernmost province of Batanes from Tuesday to Wednesday. Gusty winds lashed eastern villages of Cagayan on Monday, causing an old and unoccupied warehouse in a wharf to collapse and prompting more villagers to move to evacuation centers.

Nearly 5,000 people have sought shelter in Cagayan, Batanes and other provinces, said Assistant Secretary Raffy Alejandro of the Office of Civil Defense. He said the number was expected to rise given the precautionary evacuations that were underway in flood- and landslide-prone regions.

Classes and office work, except those involved in disaster-preparedness, have been suspended. Flights to and from the provinces have been canceled and fishing and passenger vessels prohibited from sailing. In at least one province, officials imposed a liquor ban… Read More

(FijiTimes) Vietnam aims to cut its rice exports to 4 million tonnes a year by 2030, the government said in a document detailing its rice export strategy, down from 7.1 million tonnes last year.

Vietnam is the world’s third-largest rice exporter, after India and Thailand.

The move is aimed at “boosting the exports of high-quality rice, ensuring domestic food security, protecting the environment and adapting to climate change,” according to the government document, dated May 26 and reviewed by Reuters.

Rice export revenue will fall to $2.62 billion a year by 2030, down from $3.45 billion in 2022, the document said.

“Although Vietnam’s rice farming area is shrinking due to climate change and some farmers are switching to growing other crops and raising shrimp, the strategy appears to be too aggressive,” a rice trader based in Ho Chi Minh City said on Saturday… Read More

(SCMP) Kuwait has suspended all new visas for Philippine nationals indefinitely, the interior ministry confirmed this week, in an escalation of a row between the oil-rich Gulf state and Manila over worker protections and employers’ rights.
Philippine nationals make up around 6 per cent of Kuwait’s 4.7 million population, government data shows. Kuwaitis make up 32 per cent.
The visa suspension comes after the Philippines in February stopped the first-time deployment of domestic workers to Kuwait after the body of domestic worker Jullebee Ranara was found in the Kuwaiti desert in January. The son of Ranara’s employer, was arrested.
Large numbers of Philippine citizens work overseas, with around 10 per cent of its gross domestic product coming from remittances… Read More

(Mother Jones) Is the federal government helping companies sell surveillance technology to repressive governments? Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) wants to know, but a federal subagency has been cagey about the information.

In a letter sent on Friday, Wyden asked the International Trade Administration (ITA), a subagency of the Department of Commerce, for details about its role in helping US firms sell their surveillance technology to other countries. In the letter, Wyden—a privacy-minded lawmaker who chairs the Senate Committee on Finance—noted that he had been asking for an answer on the matter since last summer.

In August of 2022, the ITA confirmed to Wyden that it “provides assistance” to companies selling surveillance technology. But when asked, the subagency, Wyden writes, “did not provide details on these activities” or the specific help ITA has offered because of “unspecified legal barriers to revealing more [information].” In theory, this work falls within ITA’s purview of promoting US exports: ITA’s website touts that it will help companies compete in foreign markets on everything from “Steel” to “Aerospace and Defense.” But that does not account for the potential buyer: repressive regimes looking to crack down on civil liberties… Read More

(Guardian London) A lawmaker in the Philippines has proposed banning schools from setting homework at weekends, saying students are overworked and need to recharge.

Sam Verzosa, a member of the House of Representatives, said the Philippines was in an “educational crisis”, with students spending long hours studying but underperforming in test scores.

He cited international rankings, such as the Programme for International Student Assessment, which in 2018 listed the Philippines as the lowest performing of 79 countries in reading, and second lowest in science and maths… Read More

(BusinessWorld) A TOTAL of 5,982 inmates have been freed under the administration of President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr., the country’s Justice secretary told the United Nations (UN) on Monday.

“The principal guiding principle in our prison reform program is to consider PDLs (persons deprived of liberty) not as numbers but as human beings with dignity and rights,” Justice Secretary Jesus Crispin C. Remulla told the UN Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in Vienna on May 22.

“Making our prison facilities in the Philippines more humane and more dignified is one of our priorities,” he said in his UN speech, a copy of which was sent to reporters on Wednesday.

He added that the Department of Justice (DoJ) had recommended granting executive clemency to 533 inmates who are elderly and sick.

The speech was delivered during a side event at the UN Commission’s 32nd session. .. Read More