And PAP Chiak Sai minister still want to dupe people with this shit! PUI!
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/new...-summit-test-proved-saf-capabilities-10485780
ingapore
Short of real war, Trump-Kim summit was a test that proved SAF’s capabilities: Ng Eng Hen
The recent Trump-Kim summit was a real test that validated Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) capabilities, Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said, as he praised the military for passing with flying colours. Ahmad Khan reports.
By Aqil Haziq Mahmud @AqilHaziqCNA
30 Jun 2018 06:00PM (Updated: 30 Jun 2018 11:29PM)
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SINGAPORE: The recent Trump-Kim summit was a
real test that validated Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) capabilities, Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said, as he praised the military for passing with flying colours.
“Short of a real war or terror attack, this is a real threat that the SAF can respond to,” Dr Ng told reporters on Friday (Jun 29) ahead of SAF Day. “I guess in exam terms, this is the prelim test which I think we scored an ‘A’.”
About 2,000 personnel and a wide array of assets, including fighter jets, surface-to-air missiles and a landing ship tank, were deployed for the Jun 12 summit.
Dr Ng said the mission was clear: Provide “absolute security” for the two high-profile leaders. “Pictures showed manicured gardens but around them there was a hive of activity,” he added. “There was no margin for error, the consequences are unthinkable.”
With only two weeks to prepare, the SAF spared no detail.
Even before US President Donald Trump landed at Paya Lebar on Jun 10, it deployed hundreds of soldiers around the air base, ensuring no-one could target Air Force One. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s arrival before him was no different.
And throughout the summit period, security operations continued.
In the air, fighter jets carrying live missiles – rare for local operations – were scrambled. At sea,
security teams checking for malicious intent boarded every ship passing through the Singapore Strait. On land, special forces took up discreet positions on Sentosa.
Sentosa’s proximity to busy shipping links proved challenging, Dr Ng said, as vessels passing by its exposed shorefront could make a sudden turn and break land in a matter of minutes.
Singapore also coordinated maritime security with Indonesia, which only last year jailed militants who planned to fire a rocket at Marina Bay from nearby Batam.
The ever-present terrorist threat in the region meant intelligence agencies were on high alert, Dr Ng said, as they screened chatter to sniff out potential plots.
“You’re publicising to the world where you’re going to be and what time,” he added. “The situation lends itself to mischief makers who want to draw world attention.”
The assets deployed for the Trump-Kim summit. (Source: MINDEF)
While Dr Ng said there eventually was no direct proof of malicious intent, it did not mean there was no danger.
“Let me just say that sophisticated networks or terror elements can hide threats quite well,” he said. “We had to deal with scenarios like 9/11 where some determined terrorist cell would want to attack by air, or munitions from offshore islands south of Sentosa.”
The SAF only stood down after Mr Trump left Singapore on the evening of Jun 12. It was a "sigh of relief", then mission accomplished.
“It was a very clear sign that the SAF means business,” Dr Ng said, calling it a strong show of deterrence. “It’s a reassurance that all these years of stable investments into defence, building up unit by unit, tells us that when the test comes we can perform.”
Chief of Defence Force Major General Melvyn Ong thanking servicemen deployed during the Trump-Kim summit. (Photo: Gaya Chandramohan)
In addition, Dr Ng said it was a "measure of strength" that authorities managed to keep Singapore running throughout the summit.
"The more you secure your systems, and yes there were inconveniences, but by no means that Singapore has to shut down airports or highways for the whole duration of the summit," he added. "All that we have invested, these are our payoffs, that we can function even if there is no margin for error."
But the minister was not entirely pleased with the performance.
“I will give it an ‘A’ grade, not ‘A+’, because we identified some gaps which we are closing,” he said. “Sometimes an even greater success is learning gaps in your system, and that’s very valuable.
“Obviously, I’m not going to share with you because I’m going to plug those gaps.”
Nevertheless, Dr Ng said SAF’s showing was a “very strong confidence booster”. “Singaporeans can take heart that when we need to defend Singapore, the SAF can do it.”
Source: CNA/hz
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These CB PAP ministers should bring Kim Jong Nuke to visit these Orchard Road & Geylang Kang-Tao! PAP! PAP! PAP! PAP! PAP! PAP!
https://www.thestar.com.my/news/reg...chard-road-of-singapore-hides-in-plain-sight/
Sex, spas, sleaze: what Orchard Road of Singapore hides in plain sight
It is evening on a sultry Sunday and a meandering crowd of families, tourists and food delivery riders jostle for space on the footpath outside Concorde Hotel. Yet all is still and silent inside the building’s shopping wing, except for two units offering massage and facial services.
In one of them, located beside the security desk, a middle-aged lady wearing a lime green halter top and beige miniskirt performs a series of jumping jacks in full view of passers-by.
Her eyes dart occasionally at male tourists, cajoling them to join her. For those who do stop by to chat, she gesticulates towards a partitioned room behind her and indicates that “it’s safer to talk inside” while pointing to the CCTV cameras near the unit.
On the floor above, a group of toddlers run amok at the lobby of Concorde Hotel while other hotel guests read, dine and natter.
Orchard Road, the barber’s pole of capitalism in Singapore, is a conglomeration of contemporary urban lifestyle clichés that is home to world-renowned hotels, Michelin-star restaurants and global brands such as Hermès, Cartier and Apple.
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Yet, beneath this well-curated veneer of glitzy malls and high-end living lies a thriving sex trade catering to tourists and locals alike. In a country with strict anti-vice laws and legalised brothel areas, the existence of a covert sex trade in a high-end shopping district touted as the “Milan of Asia” is something of a social anomaly.
“I’ve worked at Orchard Road for more than 30 years and till today I get tourists who get so surprised when they see the seedy side of Orchard Road,” says a 63-year-old tailor at Orchard Plaza who asks to be known only as Richard. “As long as there are desperate men around, there will always be sex even in the cleanest of places – you can be 100 per cent assured of that.”
The open secret
The vice central of the shopping belt is Orchard Towers, only a short walk from the Shangri-La Hotel and St. Regis where US President
Donald Trump and North Korean leader
Kim Jong-un stayed, respectively, for their recent summit.
Built in 1975, the 18-storey office building is notorious for its assortment of girlie bars, massage parlours and seedy nightlife that occupy four storeys, earning it the nickname “Four Floors of Whores”.
A visit to the building after midnight on a Friday is illuminating. Four law enforcement officers attend a report of disorderly conduct outside a hostess bar on the second floor, while less than 20 metres away, three massage parlours continue to operate with scantily clad women on high stools calling out to male passers-by.
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Outside the building, taxi drivers roll down their windows and offer to take male tourists to places where they can have “extra fun” depending on their budget.
But if Orchard Towers is an open secret, there are many other lesser-known spots of sleaze along Orchard Road, most of which coexist quietly, if somewhat bizarrely, with family-friendly services.
The rise of vice
At Far East Plaza on Scotts Road, throngs of families tuck into hotpots and sizzling hotplates at a Muslim food place named Puncak while three massage parlours located just behind the eatery carry on with their business having Vietnamese and Thai women proposition men.
University undergraduate Nasruddin Islam Ramli, 26, frequents the eatery with his grand-aunt and brothers and he says that there is a mutual respect for the space that allows everyone to coexist.
“It’s a well-known secret that there are spas here that offer sexual services, so I know which routes to take and what corners to avoid when coming here,” he says.
“The women from the spas don’t approach couples or families. So as long as that level of respect is there, I think most people don’t mind that the sex trade is a few metres away.”
The tilt to sleaze is partly due to the low rental rates in this mall, according to a report in
The Straits Times newspaper last month, part of an overall slump in visitors experienced by malls along Orchard boulevard.
A study this year by real estate service provider Savills Singapore revealed retail vacancy rates of 8.4 per cent at Orchard Road, which is higher than the island-wide rate of 7.4 per cent.
The Orchard Road Business Association declined to comment.
The exodus of retail and F&B shops are making shop owners desperate enough to rent out their units to just about anyone willing to take them.
Prostitution to redemption: a Chinese farm girl’s journey
But it is not just the low rental rates that fuel the surge in vice. It is also the promise of big money in the
human-trafficking trade.
Earlier this year in nearby Lucky Plaza, a cashier was brought to court for pimping out bar hostesses at his pub. By paying a S$300 (HK$1,700) “bar fine”, customers were allowed to engage in sexual services with the hostesses from the Philippines.
The plight of old malls
For now, most of the Orchard Road sleaze occurs in the older malls, such as Ming Arcade, which is across the road from Orchard Towers.
Rows of women line the shops located in the upper levels of the building after dark, approaching men for “happy massages”. A 42-year-old shop owner from the same building who asks to be known as Mr Cheng says that vice is unavoidable given the reputation of hostess bars in the building.
“You have army boys to older men coming to Ming Arcade for cheap beer and good fun so it’s a place that everyone knows about. If you want to clean up the place, you need to start with the bars, but the reputation of the building is already gone so who will want to take up the unit even if you do away with the bars?”
With expat enclave Forum The Shopping Mall, known for its child- and family-friendly outlets, located just across the street, Cheng predicts the days of old Orchard malls as places of vice are numbered.
‘I was forced to sell my body in a Hong Kong bar’: a Filipino’s tale
“There are plenty of older shopping malls around Orchard that will probably not stay around for long. This is prime land so I’m sure there will be plans to revamp the space in the next few years,” he says.
For the regular tourists, these malls are usually not on their itineraries. But some continue to thrive by offering bespoke, targeted sexual services for foreigners.
Bermuda triangle
At Orchard Plaza, another ageing building, the Singapore sex trade forms what local netizens refer to as a “Bermuda triangle” of vice, along with the Concorde Hotel and Cuppage Plaza, an enclave popular with male Japanese tourists.
Brightly lit sex shops brazenly advertise their wares, offering the ladies who bring Japanese clients a small commission.
Just across the street is Cuppage Plaza, also known as “Little Ginza” for the Japanese bars and restaurants that cater to a specific clientele.
Vietnamese women and Filipinas greet throngs of Japanese salary men at night with loud exclamations of “
Konbanwa”, Japanese for “good evening”.
Hostesses in skimpy tops strategically position themselves beside the escalator landing areas to lure men into the bars. Most of the bars here cater strictly to Japanese men.
Over in a famous five-star hotel off Orchard Road, the clients are mostly Caucasian men. The hotel bar turns a blind eye to the Russian and Thai women who enter after midnight, sidling up to men waiting for company.
Singapore’s sex trade: licensed brothels, ‘sugar babies’, and laws you can run rings around
By the time the clock hits 4.30am, many have left the bar to proceed to the rooms above, or to grab a cab at the hotel’s lobby area.
A former police officer who used to patrol the Orchard Road belt says it is common to get reports of altercations and incidences because of the sex trade.
“The irony is that you don’t have to look far to notice the sleaze that takes place along this stretch of road,” he says, asking not to be named. “A walk up the wrong flight of stairs or missed turn at a corridor of a notorious mall and you’ll see what I mean.
“The vice has become so normalised that it’s already part of the road’s identity – one cannot exist without the other.” ■
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