SINGAPORE: Police officers from six Asian jurisdictions have arrested 435 people – including 21 men in Singapore – for their suspected involvement in online child sexual exploitation activities.

Police forces from Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and Thailand conducted a cross-border operation from Feb 24 to Mar 28, the Singapore Police Force (SPF) said on Friday (Apr 4).

An additional 109 people are also assisting with investigations, bringing the total number of people targeted to 525 men and 19 women aged between 13 and 68.

During the five-week operation, officers from the specialised crime branch of Singapore’s Criminal Investigation Department, in collaboration with the five other police forces, conducted raids at 269 locations in Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, South Korea and Thailand.

Electronic devices, including 84 computers, 279 handphones, 32 tablets, 150 storage devices and 9 routers, as well as child sexual abuse materials created by generative artificial intelligence tools, were seized.

In Singapore, the 21 men – aged between 23 and 61 – were arrested for their suspected involvement in:

• Producing, possessing, gaining access and distributing child sexual abuse materials
• Sexual assault
• Threatening to distribute intimate images or recordings
• Sexual communication with a minor
• Sale and transmission of obscene materials
• Possession of obscene films

Possessing child abuse material carries a maximum jail term of five years, while distributing or selling such material is punishable with up to seven years’ imprisonment. Both offences also attract a fine or caning.

Preliminary investigations revealed that a 43-year-old man allegedly paid a young female victim over the span of several years in exchange for her live-streamed sexual acts.

Another 24-year-old man allegedly engaged in sexual communication with another young female victim and they had exchanged intimate photographs with each other.

SPF said the man also allegedly threatened to publish her photographs online if she refused to share more intimate materials of herself.

The two victims are non-Singaporeans based overseas, said SPF.

Both Malaysia and Indonesia have far thinner auto trade links with the US, with the countries’ total vehicle parts exports to the US worth US$86.3 million and US$73.8 million respectively in 2023, according to the UN trade figures.

While not all Southeast Asian countries may face dramatic economic impacts following the introduction of the new tariffs, the ripple effects could mean their automotive industries will face new market dynamics.

For example, Archanun feels that South Korean carmakers – considered relatively smaller global players that still produce most of their cars locally – will try to “divert” their car sales from the US to countries like Thailand.

“That seems to be in line with what we observed in Thailand, where Korean carmakers like Kia or Hyundai are participating in a price war intensively,” he said, noting that sticker prices on some models were slashed by nearly 25 per cent.

It is worth noting that ahead of the tariff deadline, Hyundai had announced it would invest US$21 billion in the US by building a new steel plant in Louisiana. Whether that move reaped any concessions with the Trump administration is unclear.

Likewise, larger Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) – global carmakers such as Toyota that Southeast Asian countries largely serve as local parts suppliers – will also be looking for alternative opportunities given that their vehicles are likely to be priced out of the US market, Patarapong said.

The solution may end up largely being within Southeast Asia itself, he suggested, contending that the impact of trade barriers to the US could in time be supplemented by a rise in intra-ASEAN trade, coupled with more investments within the broader ASEAN+6 group, which includes China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand and India.

“I think (the industry in Southeast Asia) can weather the storm to some extent,” he said. “In the long term, we think it may not be so bad.”

He expected more investment from countries such as China in the regional automotive industry because it wants “to rely more on the regional value chain rather than the US market”.

“For Japan, I think they will not withdraw their investments very easily, because right now they need to make sure that their investment is something controllable and ASEAN is like a backyard of Japan.

“You can also see more and more investment by the Korean automotive sector in ASEAN too, especially Vietnam and Indonesia. That’s going to increase over time,” he said.

Hyundai has invested US$415 million in Vietnam and employs about 2,300 people, with annual revenues of around US$2.6 billion.

International businesses serving the auto industry with presence in Southeast Asia, like Desoutter Industrial Tools, are already trying to chart a course where they no longer have dependence on the American market.

But they are “hesitating” about where and when to invest given the pace and unpredictability of Trump’s policy-making, according to Glenn Heed, the global business manager for the motor vehicle industry at Desoutter, which provides automotive assembly tools and process control technologies to major carmakers around the world. It has operations in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam.

“The economy is breaking or slowing down just because of the uncertainty,” Heed said. “Of course, I’m worried. But this affects everyone. It’s how agile you are. What kind of decisions are you taking? I do think it’ll be like this for a long time, so we are trying to change the way we see the world,” he said.

Importantly, he sees the “possibility to increase partnerships with neighbours and other parts of the world”, and drive the rise of “local for local” production. 

“Over a long time, I think it could be a positive thing for the rest of the world.”   

But Archanun cautioned that a self-serving strategy in Southeast Asia alone could not fill the gap for companies losing out on American business. 

He forecasted that demand for durable goods like vehicles would drop in the months to come given the broader economic shocks expected following the tariffs introduced to countries all around the world.

That could lead to strong competition among automakers facing constrained consumer demand in this region.

“The cake will be smaller. They will have to fight very fiercely in this market,” he said.

Thousands of people at a rally calling for Yoon’s ouster, including hundreds who had camped out overnight, erupted into wild cheers on hearing the ruling, chanting, “We won!”

The ruling caps months of political turmoil that have overshadowed efforts to deal with the new administration of United States President Donald Trump at a time of slowing growth.

Separately, 64-year-old Yoon faces a criminal trial on insurrection charges. The embattled leader became the first sitting South Korean president to be arrested on Jan 15 but was released in March after a court cancelled his arrest warrant.

The crisis was triggered by Yoon’s Dec 3 declaration of martial law, which he has said was needed to root out “anti-state” elements and the opposition Democratic Party’s alleged abuse of its parliamentary majority that he said was destroying the country.

Yoon lifted the decree six hours later after lawmakers defied efforts by the security forces to seal off parliament and voted to reject it. Yoon has said he never intended to fully impose emergency military rule and tried to downplay the fallout, saying nobody was hurt.

Months of protests have followed, and it remained unclear if the political chaos sparked by Yoon’s martial law declaration will now be eased by the court ruling.

Yoon used his legal career as a launchpad for elected office, according to a former colleague, winning the presidency in 2022.

“Yoon Suk Yeol was the most powerful prosecutor-general ever,” said Han Dong-soo, a former judge who was head of internal inspection at the prosecutors’ office under Yoon. “He used the office to carry out his plan to become president and in doing so, his actions were daring.”

Han recalls the future president remarking at a dinner he hosted with free-flowing drinks in 2020: “If I had gone to the military academy, I would have staged a coup.”

Yoon led high-profile investigations of the politically powerful, billed as a crusade against corruption that launched him into the public eye and generated the support that led to his victory in the presidential election.

But once in the presidency, he struggled to emulate his courtroom victories. Instead, he became increasingly embittered by unrelenting battles with opponents that drew out a recklessness that a former prosecution rival said was his defining trait.

By the time Yoon briefly imposed martial law in December, he was badly bruised politically.

SCANDALS, “AMERICAN PIE”

Yoon’s presidency was overshadowed by scandals involving his wife, Kim Keon Hee, who was accused of inappropriately accepting a Christian Dior handbag as a gift.

Yoon apologised after his conservative party suffered a crushing parliamentary election defeat last year, blamed on the scandal. But he continued to reject calls for a probe into the affair and into an allegation of stock price manipulation involving his wife and her mother.

The prosecutors’ office that investigated the allegations did not press charges against the first lady.

The past year was marked by repeated clashes with the opposition Democratic Party, while Yoon’s pro-business policies and initiatives to tackle an ageing society remained stymied. His 2025 budget was slashed by an opposition angry over his refusal to answer lingering questions about his wife.

Yoon’s struggles at home contrasted with his relative success internationally.

His push to reverse a decades-long diplomatic row with neighbouring Japan and join Tokyo in three-way security cooperation with their key mutual ally, the United States, are widely seen as his signature foreign policy achievement.

Yoon’s ability to bond on a personal level, seen as the trait that gave him his early career success, was on full display at a White House event in 2023, when he took the stage and belted out the 1970s pop hit “American Pie” for an astonished then-President Joe Biden and a delighted crowd.

SHAMANS, HIGH SCHOOL BUDDIES

Born to a well-to-do family in Seoul, Yoon excelled at school and entered the elite Seoul National University to study law. But his penchant for partying caused him to repeatedly fail the bar exam before passing on the ninth try at age 30.

Yoon shot to national fame in 2016 when, as the chief investigator probing then-President Park Geun-hye for corruption, he was asked if he was out for revenge and responded that prosecutors were not “gangsters”.

The role he played in jailing Park and his surprise appointment as head of the powerful Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office marked the start of a dizzying rise to power.

Two years later, as prosecutor-general, he spearheaded a corruption probe of a close ally of the next president, Moon Jae-in. That made him a darling of conservatives frustrated with Moon’s liberal policies, setting Yoon up to be a candidate for president in 2022.

His term got off to a rocky start when he pushed ahead with moving the presidential office from the traditional Blue House compound to a new site, sparking questions about whether it was because of a feng shui belief that the old compound was cursed. Yoon denied any involvement by himself or his wife with a shaman.

When Yoon refused to fire top officials after a 2022 Halloween crowd crush killed 159 people, he was accused of protecting his “yes men”. One was Safety Minister Lee Sang-min, a graduate of Yoon’s high school.

Another alumnus of the Choongam High School in Seoul was Kim Yong-hyun, who spearheaded the presidential office move, then served as the presidential security service chief and later as defence minister. Kim, the main figure advising Yoon to declare martial law, was also charged with insurrection. He too denies the charges.

Shin Yul, a Myongji University political science professor, said Yoon’s political near-demise was likely due to him listening to the wrong people and that he probably “still thinks he did the right thing” in declaring martial law.

TOKYO: Tokyo’s key Nikkei index fell on Friday (Apr 4), extending the previous day’s losses after US President Donald Trump sent Wall Street stocks tumbling with sweeping new trade tariffs.

In early trade, the Nikkei 225 index was down 1.8 per cent at 34,108.23, adding to a drop of 2.77 percent on Thursday. The broader Topix index was off 2.3 per cent, having lost 3.08 per cent the previous day.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan dipped 0.26 per cent in thin trade, with markets in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan closed for a holiday.

The STI was down about 1.4 per cent at 9.15am.

On Thursday, Wall Street’s tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite plunged 6 per cent, while the retreat in the S&P 500 was its biggest in a day since 2020.

In Europe, both the Paris and Frankfurt stock exchanges finished the day with losses of more than three percent.

Oil prices plummeted more than 6 per cent on concerns an economic downturn sparked by Trump’s trade policies would hit demand. The price of gold hit another new record.

The dollar slumped by as much as 2.6 per cent versus the euro, its biggest intraday plunge in a decade, and suffered sharp losses also against the yen and British pound.

On Friday, the US currency fetched 146.33 yen in early Asian trade, rebounding slightly from 145.99 yen in New York.

“US Treasury Secretary (Scott) Bessent has said the current figures are the upper limit, suggesting there is some room for individual negotiations,” Tokai Tokyo Securities said.

“But with some moves to impose retaliatory tariffs by other countries and regions, the situation seems to be becoming a trade war,” the brokerage said.

Demonstrators have gathered in the South Korean capital as they await the Constitutional Court’s ruling on Friday (Apr 4) on whether to uphold President Yoon Suk Yeol’s impeachment over a disastrous martial law declaration or to return him to power.

His Dec 3 attempt to subvert civilian rule plunged the country into political chaos after he sent armed soldiers into parliament.

Follow our live blog for the latest: 

SINGAPORE: Clean-up operations off the northern coast of Pulau Ubin and along Changi Beach are ongoing following an oil leak at Langsat Terminal in Johor, Singapore authorities said on Friday (Apr 4). 

Booms will be deployed at Chek Jawa Wetlands in Pulau Ubin as a precautionary measure to protect the biodiversity-sensitive areas, the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA), National Environment Agency (NEA), National Parks Board (NParks) and Singapore Food Agency (SFA) said in a joint media release. 

SFA is also working with fish farms in the East Johor Straits to take the necessary preventive measures.

The Johor Port Authority has informed MPA that the oil leak at Langsat Terminal has stopped and that the spill clean-up is ongoing.

An oil patch caused by the leak was sighted in the eastern Johor Strait off the northeastern coast of Pulau Ubin on Thursday evening.

MPA said in a Facebook post on Thursday night that it was in contact with the Johor Port Authority, which confirmed an oil spill incident within the terminal. 

MPA deployed three patrol craft and an oil spill response craft to survey the area and carry out mitigation efforts. 

The authorities said in an update early on Friday that drones and satellite imagery have been activated to monitor the surrounding waters for any additional oil patches.

An additional oil recovery system known as the Marine Oil Sweeper has also been deployed off Pulau Ubin and is on standby in case other oil patches at sea are detected.

NEA advised the public against swimming and other primary contact water activities at Changi Beach and Pasir Ris Beach until further notice.

Parts of the beachfront at Changi Beach Park will also be cordoned off to facilitate clean-up operations.

As a precautionary measure, public access to Chek Jawa Wetlands is temporarily closed until further notice. 

“No other oil patches at sea and ashore have been sighted at this time,” said the authorities.

“MPA and partner agencies continue to monitor the situation closely and will provide updates if there are significant developments.”

“Strategic anxiety” over Beijing’s assertiveness could have led Southeast Asian thought leaders to pick the United States over China in a scenario where the region is forced to choose between the two superpowers, said an expert.

Activities such as the militarisation of disputed islands in the South China Sea “have escalated the tensions from bilateral tensions to regional insecurity”, added Yenny Wahid, director of Indonesia’s Wahid Foundation, which promotes tolerance and multicultural understanding.

She was speaking at an online panel discussion organised by ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute to launch its 2025 The State of Southeast Asia Survey.

“So ASEAN probably feels that the US is the only actor that is willing to push back, that has the military capability and political willingness to push back,” she said.

“It is that fear of abandonment – not necessarily a full trust in Washington, but that fear of being left out, is what’s driving the US’ rising influence (in Southeast Asia).”

In last year’s survey, China was the region’s preferred partner over the US.

The bottom line, however, is that ASEAN does not want to be forced to pick sides, said fellow panellist Peter Varghese, chancellor of The University of Queensland in Australia.

“The larger interest of ASEAN is more in a stable balance than in aligning … with one or the other of the Indo Pacific superpowers.”

The speakers agreed the survey results might have turned out differently if conducted at a different time, noting more recent developments such as US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s visit to the Philippines, and fresh worldwide tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump on Apr 3.

The US’ engagement of Southeast Asia is complicated and “we should be very careful not to stereotype or simplify how ASEAN states will respond to Donald Trump, or how a Trump administration will necessarily work with ASEAN,” said Michael Green, chief executive of the United States Studies Centre in Australia.

“(Respondents) who thought that the Trump administration would increase engagement are right, but it’s largely going to be in defence and national security,” he said. 

“Those who believe the Trump administration will retreat are probably right when it comes to trade agreements and some of those other issues. It’s complicated.”

Overall, the survey shows “no single great power is dominating Southeast Asia” and Green said it could be considered a success for ASEAN diplomacy.

ISEAS’ survey also makes clear what the US and China can do to improve relations with Southeast Asia, he added.

Beijing would need to “peacefully resolve these conflicts in the South China Sea” whereas Washington would need to “respect international law and institutions”.

Green, who previously served in the US National Security Council, added he is doubtful either global power would take such action this year.

Professor Liu Lin, from the Party School of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee, said the survey shows respondents’ positive attitude towards China-ASEAN relations.

ASEAN is “hedging between China and the US”, she said. “China will not force ASEAN to choose sides. What we are doing is just to enhance cooperation with ASEAN so as to further develop our bilateral relations and contribute to the region and development.”

China has always wanted ASEAN to “play a bigger role in in dealing with (a) volatile geopolitical strategic environment, because ASEAN has its agency”, she said.

“ASEAN can exert its agency. It is also in the interest of China, with the solidification of the ASEAN-centred multilateral mechanisms.”

What will be the impact?

Since Trump first announced his trade plan in February, economists have said that higher tariffs could raise consumer prices and slow economic growth in the US.

These warnings continued after Wednesday’s announcement.

OCBC managing director for investment strategy Vasu Menon said the tariffs were likely to cause the US economy to slow down more than expected, and inflation to stall or rise.

But the US may not slip into a recession if Trump shows openness to negotiations, he added.

“Some comfort can be found from the fact that the White House is fully aware that an aggressive tariff agenda that hurts US growth badly, could also hurt the Republican party’s chances in the mid-term elections,” said Mr Menon. “This may see Trump dialling back on some tariffs in time.”

The tariffs also raise concerns about inflation, said JP Morgan Asset Management’s chief market strategist for Asia-Pacific Tai Hui.

Inflation could be impacted as the US struggles to increase manufacturing capacity and supply chains pass on costs to consumers, he said.

“US consumers may cut back on spending due to pricier imports, and businesses might delay capital expenditures amid uncertainty about the tariffs’ full impact and potential retaliation from trade partners,” he added.

DBS Group’s senior foreign exchange strategist Philip Wee said in a note that the reciprocal tariffs on emerging Asian economies were “notably high”.

This sends a message that the US is not just targeting China directly, “but also indirectly blocking the ‘China Plus One’ strategy many companies use to diversify supply chains to circumvent US tariffs”.

This is not the end of the road, and there’s still room for “negotiation, retaliation and further potential escalation”, said OCBC chief economist Selina Ling and ASEAN economists Lavanya Venkateswaran, Ahmad A Enver and Jonathan Ng.

In Southeast Asia, they expect Vietnam’s growth to be the hardest hit by tariffs, followed by Thailand and Malaysia, with Indonesia and India more insulated.

In an earlier note in March, DBS Group senior economists Chua Han Teng and Radhika Rao said that aside from the direct hit from higher tariffs, a second-order impact on Southeast Asian countries could also come from slower growth in the region’s key trading partners – China, and the US themselves.

BEIJING: China on Thursday (Apr 3) said it had “destroyed” an intelligence network set up by the Philippine espionage agency and arrested three spies from the country.

The announcement comes as the two countries continue to confront each other over disputed territory in the South China Sea and tensions mount over the Philippines’ security ties with its ally, the United States.

At least five Chinese nationals were arrested on suspicion of espionage in January and another two in February by Philippine authorities.

The latest arrests in China came two days after the Chinese embassy in Manila issued a travel warning to its citizens about frequent “harassment” from Philippine law enforcement agencies.

On Thursday, state broadcaster CCTV reported that authorities had identified one of the suspected spies as a Philippine national who had lived and worked in China long-term and had been found conducting espionage near military facilities.

The CCTV report included a video of his arrest and what appeared to be a recorded confession.

He was recruited by Philippine intelligence services to “take advantage of his long-term residence in China to conduct espionage activities in China and collect sensitive information, especially on military deployment”.

He came close to military facilities multiple times and “conducted close observation and secret photography”, CCTV said.

The three individuals had been recruited by the same Philippine spy since 2021 and received regular payment for their work, CCTV said.

They were also tasked with “assisting the Philippine spy intelligence agency in selecting and developing personnel, and expanding its intelligence network in China”.

They had provided “a large amount of military-related and confidential video materials” to Philippine agents, “causing serious harm to China’s national security and interests”, CCTV quoted a Chinese national security officer as saying.