Religious tensions are rising in Malaysia following a High Court ruling which declared non-Muslims could use the Arabic word ‘Allah’ when referring to God.

Here are the thoughts of one Malay writer, Art Harum writing in The Malay Insider:

The controversy surrounding the usage of “Allah” by non-Muslims, particularly the Christians, in Malaysia continues to rage even as at the time of writing this article. The Malaysian Insider just reported that a ninth church — this time in Kota Tinggi, Johore — had been vandalised.

The year 2009 was about to end when Yang Ariff Justice Lau Bee Lan held that the word “Allah” may be used by the Herald in its newspaper. That decision has almost redefined the phrase “ending the year with a bang.”

Viewed with the benefit of hindsight, there were of course political opportunity loss on the part of the Barisan Nasional. In a land where everything from the slaughtering of cows for distribution to the poor and needy to the building of a free trade zone are perfect fodders for politics, the Allah issue was never far from being one as well.

In the last half of 2009, I actually thought that the Prime Minister was in the political driving seat. He was in control. His 1 Malaysia concept and sloganeering, although leaving much to be desired from the view point of the urbanites, was gaining support from the heartland. The Chinese and Indian supports were slowly coming back to him and his government despite the impotence and lameness of the two most important protagonists which were supposed to represent the two races within the government, namely the MCA and MIC respectively.

The public relation machinations of the government were working full steam and in overdrive. The Prime Minister and his men were all over the place, winning nods of approvals from the people on the street.

In the meantime, power base in Umno was being broaden. And his hard line approach towards the opposition was well received within the Umno circle, especially at the grass root level. The Perak power grab, orchestrated and executed by him, although crude and almost unrefined, served to cement the belief among Umno members that in Datuk Seri Najib Razak, Umno has a powerful leader who is not afraid to use his power for the benefit of Umno. Gone were the days of the lembik leadership that they had under the stewardship of Tun Abdullah Badawi.

And so, despite various issues ranging from Teoh Beng Hock’s death at the MACC state head office to the PKFZ debacle, the Prime Minister was looking good.

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Here is the Friday, January 8th, 2010 edition of what’s making news and interesting reads from around the world. Also please note that off to the left there are two widgets with updates on news from Asia and the world in a separate page: Around Asia & Around the World New Feeds.

Lashkar-e-Taiba Attack in Jammu & Kashmir
Indian authorities have killed one Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist in a protracted 22-hour gun battle in Jammu & Kashmir. As many as ten others, including one Indian policeman, have been injured in the second incident in as many days in the restive Indian state. The story in the Times of India. Lashkar-e-Taiba was responsible for the attack on Mumbai in November 2008 and the organization has deep ties to Pakistan’s ISI.

Argentina Central Bank President Removed By Cristina Fernández de Kirchner
A week-long stand-off between Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Martin Redrado, the President of Central Bank of Argentina, grew worse on Thursday. Issuing a decree, President Fernández de Kirchner removed Mr. Redrado from his post citing “misconduct and dereliction of duty by a public servant.” Earlier this week, President Fernández de Kirchner announced she had accepted Redrado’s resignation after the bank chief declined to support a plan to use $6.5 billion in reserves to pay the country’s debt. Redrado retorted that he had not resigned, and that only the Congress, not the president, could remove him. Opposition politicians advised Redrado not to abide by the decree and to seek an injunction to protect his rights. The move is likely to provoke a showdown between the President and the Argentine Congress. More from Bloomberg.

Turkmenistan Gas and an Emerging Economic Axis in Central Asia
The Asia Times reports how Russia, China and Iran are quietly tapping the vast natural gas in Turkmenistan for their benefit and in the process cementing a new economic axis in Central Asia.

We are witnessing a new pattern of energy cooperation at the regional level that dispenses with Big Oil. Russia traditionally takes the lead. China and Iran follow the example. Russia, Iran and Turkmenistan hold respectively the world’s largest, second-largest and fourth-largest gas reserves. And China will be consumer par excellence in this century. The matter is of profound consequence to the US global strategy.

The Turkmen-Iranian pipeline mocks the US’s Iran policy. The US is threatening Iran with new sanctions and claims Tehran is “increasingly isolated”. But Mahmud Ahmadinejad’s presidential jet winds its way through a Central Asian tour and lands in Ashgabat for a red-carpet welcome by his Turkmen counterpart, Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, and a new economic axis emerges. Washington’s coercive diplomacy hasn’t worked. Turkmenistan, with a gross domestic product of US$18.3 billion, defied the sole superpower (GDP of $14.2 trillion) – and, worse still, made it look routine.

Seven Militants Killed in Karachi
Seven suspected militants were killed on Friday when explosives being stored in a hideout in the Pakistani city of Karachi were apparently detonated accidentally according to police in Pakistan. The full story from Al Jazeera.

Scores Dead in Tribal Clashes in South Sudan
At least 139 people have been killed in tribal clashes following a cattle raid in southern Sudan, local government officials said. Armed attackers from the Nuer tribe raided Dinka cattle herders in the remote Tonj area in Warrap state on Saturday, seizing 5,000 animals. Violence between the Nuer and Dinka tribes has been increasing in recent weeks ahead of the independence referendum scheduled for next year. More from Al Jazeera.

Religious Violence Flares in Malaysia
Two Malaysian churches have been attacked, leaving one badly damaged, in an escalating dispute over the use of the word Allah by non-Muslims. From the Jakarta Post:

The attacks sharply escalated tensions in the Muslim-majority country ahead of planned protests later Friday against a Kuala Lumpur High Court verdict which struck down a 3-year-old ban on non-Muslims using “Allah” in their literature.

The Dec. 31 court decision incensed many Muslims, who see it as a threat to their religion. Hateful comments and threats against Christians have been posted widely on the Internet, but this is the first time the controversy has turned destructive.

The ruling was on a petition by the Herald, the main publication of Malaysia’s Roman Catholic Church, which uses the word Allah in its Malay-language edition.

Only the first floor office in the three-story Metro Tabernacle Church was destroyed in the pre-dawn blaze, said Kevin Ang, a spokesman for the Protestant church. The worship areas on the upper two floors were undamaged and there were no injuries.

He quoted a witness as saying she saw three or four men on a motorcycle break the main glass front of the church and throw a gasoline bomb inside. The church occupies a corner plot in a row of shops in Desa Melawati, a suburb of Kuala Lumpur.

Separately, a Molotov cocktail was thrown into the compound of a Roman Catholic church before dawn Friday but caused no damage or injuries, said the Rev. Lawrence Andrew, the editor of the Herald.

Andrew said most churches have employed extra security guards amid the protest threats. “Most churches are taking precautions. They are aware it may just blow up,” he said.

The government has appealed the court verdict and the High Court has suspended its decision’s implementation until the appeal is heard.

Muslims argue that “Allah” is exclusive to Islam, and its use by Christians would confuse Muslims and tempt them to convert to Christianity.

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One of the political events anticipated in 2010 is the elections promised by Myanmar’s military government. The polls scheduled to take place later this year would be the first since 1990.

But while the military rulers say people will be allowed to have their say, many remain sceptical that the polls will pave the way to democracy and change.

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An experimental vaccine being tested in Thailand has shown signs of protecting people from infection by the virus that causes AIDS.

US military and Thai health officials announced in Bangkok that for the first time ever, an experimental vaccine prevented infection from the HIV virus. Thai authorities say the treatment given to healthy volunteers cut the number of expected HIV infections by almost a third.

“It is found that the vaccine has 31.2 per cent efficacy in reducing the risk of HIV infection,” Withaya Kaewparadai, the Thai health minister, said.

The world’s largest AIDS vaccine trial included more than 16,000 volunteers in Thailand.

It is the first time any HIV vaccine has even partially succeeded in a clinical trial.

Every day, 7,500 people worldwide are newly infected with HIV. Scientists say the study used strains of HIV common in Thailand. Whether such a vaccine would work against strains in the US or Africa is unknown.

Al Jazeera’s Aela Callan reports from Bangkok.

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Few prognosticators predicted the sub-prime collapse, and even fewer economists forecasted that global demand would fall so dramatically in the wake of the financial crisis.

What are the systemic risks, industry dynamics and normative changes affecting global demand today?

The Panelists:
-David Dollar, Economic and Financial Emissary to the People’s Republic of China, US Department of the Treasury; Global Agenda Council on Trade
-Caio Koch-Weser, Vice-Chairman, Deutsche Bank Group, Deutsche Bank, United Kingdom
-Ilian Mihov, Professor of Economics, Novartis Chaired Professor of Management and the Environment, INSEAD, Singapore
-Vincent Van Quickenborne, Minister of Economy and Reform of Belgium
-Wu Ying, General Partner, CTC Capital, People’s Republic of China

Chaired by
Ian A. Goldin, Director, 21st Century School, University of Oxford, United Kingdom; Global Agenda Council on Global Institutional Governance

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Brunei is one of the world’s richest countries due to its oil and gas industry. For nearly 100 years, oil has provided generously for its 400,000 citizens.

It has also kept at bay, for now, any attempts to exploit the virgin rainforests which cover a large part of the country. But there are fears that may change as oil reserves begin to run out.

Divya Gopalan reports from Brunei.

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A decade after Timor Leste won its independence from Indonesia, a new report says less than 10 per cent of the estimated $8.8 billion spent on international aid and assistance for the fledgling nation has reached the Timorese economy.

The report by the Timor Leste-based La’o Hamutuk research institute says most of the money has been spent on security, UN salaries and fees to international consultants.

It says that despite international spending equivalent to about $8,000 dollars for each of Timor Leste’s 1.1 million people, nearly half of the population still live below the poverty line.

More from the Australian Broadcasting Company:

A group monitoring the foreign aid given to East Timor since it claimed independence 10 years ago says little has been achieved with the aid.

The group claims most of the estimated $10 billion has been spent on international salaries, administration, and imports.

Australia is East Timor’s largest donor and gives the country $100 million each year in aid, and the Federal Government is adamant it is not being wasted.

East Timor’s vice prime minister, Mario Carrascalao, says the country is making progress and in spite of some of the hiccups, the international community has helped create peace in his country.

“They succeeded at least to get Timor Leste to a position that we can say we’re proud that this is one of the country’s with the lowest per cepita crime in the world now,” he said.

But he says if $10 billion has been spent in East Timor there should be more signs of prosperity.

“If you look to the roads, the roads are the same that have been left by Indonesia,” he said.

“But I don’t see that beside peace and security that we have in East Timor … even the administration, the UN did not produce the people with enough skills that we need to run independence.”

Lut Hamutuk, an organisation that monitors aid in East Timor, estimates only 10 per cent of foreign aid ends up in East Timor’s economy.

East Timor President Jose Ramos-Horta says he too is concerned that too much aid money is not going to the East Timorese.

“A lot of aid money came into East Timor, really,” he said.

“You ask Australia, you ask the Japanese whether – what percentage of this money they claim to allocate to Timor every year, they spent in East Timor, or on dubious studies, evaluations, reports, more studies, more evaluations, more reports, telling us the obvious.

“A recent report from the World Bank assessing poverty in East Timor from 2001 to 2006-2007 concluded that the poverty increased. Well, but the World Bank itself should asked what have we done here in this country?”

During the recent anniversary celebrations, the president thanked Australia for its contributions to East Timor.

Australia’s overseas aid agency AusAid says East Timor is now peaceful and that is a key sign Australia’s aid has had a positive impact.

It also says Australia is helping to build the foundations for a strong and stable economy in East Timor and for a vibrant democracy.

A spokesman for the United Nations mission in East Timor says they are a peacekeeping mission that is accountable to the General Assembly for its budgets.

It says there have been very real results because the situation in East Timor is peaceful and calm.

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Deacon of Death is an independent film by Jan van den Berg. The film follows the story of Sok Chea, a Cambodian woman who confronts the man whom she holds responsible for the death of her family and other villagers under Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime when she was a child.

The film wants to make a contribution to the discussion concerning the impact of the Khmer Rouge genocidal regime. ‘If justice is not possible, then there should be recognition for the victims’ according to Willem vande Put of HealthNet-TPO. Cambodians must confront the past and be open. It gives the country the possibility to leave the past behind and to focus on the future. ‘You can’t clean dirty water with dirty water’ as the Buddhist monk says in the film.

Armed with spears and blowpipes, hundreds of indigenous tribesmen in the jungles of Borneo island have mounted a last-ditch attempt to try to save their land from logging.

Al Jazeera’s Divya Gopalan reports from Sarawak on the Penan, some of whom still live as nomadic hunter-gatherers in the rainforests of this Malaysian province.

They have been battling loggers since the 1980s, when large-scale industrial logging commenced in the Malaysian state. At times the Penan have faced intimidation and violent crackdowns at the hands of security forces hired by logging firms and Malaysian police.

Meanwhile, vast tracts of Sarawak’s rainforest has been stripped of its valuable timber. Now forestry firms are eyeing forest lands for conversion to oil palm plantations, which will likely leave the Penan even worse off since these estates support less game than even logged-over forest.

More from Mongabay:

Malaysia’s deforestation rate is accelerating faster than that of any other tropical country in the world, according to data from the United Nations. Analysis of figures from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) shows that Malaysia’s annual deforestation rate jumped almost 86 percent between the 1990-2000 period and 2000-2005. In total, Malaysia lost an average of 140,200 hectares—0.65 percent of its forest area—per year since 2000. For comparison, the Southeast Asian country lost an average of 78,500 hectares, or 0.35 percent of its forests, annually during the 1990s.

The Malaysian government failed to provide FAO with figures showing the change in extent of primary forests during the period. Primary forests—forests with no visible signs of past or present human activities—are considered the most biologically diverse ecosystems on the planet.

Declining forest cover in Malaysia results primarily from urbanization, agricultural fires, and forest conversion for oil-palm plantations and other forms of agriculture. Logging, which is generally excluded in deforestation figures from FAO, is responsible for widespread forest degradation in the country, and green groups have blamed local timber companies for failing to practice sustainable forest management. In late 2005—despite photographic evidence suggesting otherwise—the Samling Group denied claims from NGOs accusing the timber giant of recklessly harvesting timber in one of its Sarawak concessions on the island of Borneo.

Forest cover has fallen dramatically in Malaysia since the 1970s. While FAO says that forests still cover more than 60 percent of the country, only 11.6 percent of these forests are considered pristine.

Logging

During the 1980s, rampant logging in the Bornean states of Sabah and Sarawak allowed Malaysia to temporarily outpace Indonesia and become the world’s largest exporter of tropical wood.

On paper, Malaysia has probably one of the best rainforest protection policies in developing Asia, but in practice logging still carries on as it always has. The majority of Malaysia’s remaining forests are managed for timber production, and each state is empowered to formulate forest policy independently. During the past two decades, sustainable forest management has been non-existent. While Malaysia has the policy framework for sustainable forest management in the form of the National Forestry Act of 1984, it has failed to enforce the legislation.

Peninsular Malaysia’s primary forests are mostly gone, though some magnificent forest still exists in Taman Negara, a national park. Scientists believe that at 130 million years old, the rainforests of Taman Negara are the oldest in the world.

Most of Malaysia’s remaining primary forest exists on the island of Borneo in the states of Sabah and Sarawak, but the majority of the forest area in Malaysian Borneo—especially the lowlands—has been selectively logged, resulting in reduced biodiversity. Loggers are now operating in more marginal areas on rugged mountain slopes, which increases the risk of soil erosion and mudslides. In Sabah (Northeastern Borneo), cutting has slowed over the years after a period of rapid deforestation. Timber production appears to have shifted to Sarawak (Northwestern Borneo), where about half the forest cover is slated for logging. About 8 percent of the land area in Sarawak is designated as reserves, but these protected areas are generally understaffed and threatened by illegal logging and encroachment by colonists who settle along logging roads.

In the 1980s, through roadblocks and sabotage of logging equipment, the indigenous Penan of Borneo attempted to stop logging in their traditional homeland. Their protests were ruthlessly and savagely put down by the Malaysian government, which blocked media access to the region until the unrest was settled and the forest dwellers cleared. The attacks on the Penan brought international attention to the logging of Borneo’s forests but appear to have had relatively little long-term impact, since logging increased dramatically in the following years.

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Fresh clashes between Myanmar troops and millitias near the border with China have resulted in the death of at least one person and forced as many as 30,000 people to flee into China.

As a result, Beijing has issued a rare rubuke to Myanmar’s military rulers, calling on them to end the violence along its border.

Al Jazeera’s Azhar Sukri filed the above report. More from Monsters and Critics:

One Chinese national was killed and several others injured after a bomb exploded on the China-Myanmar border, as fighting in Myanmar’s Kokang region pushed refugees into China’s Yunnan province, state media reported Saturday.

The bomb was thrown onto the Chinese side of the border, He Yongchun, deputy president of the Red Cross’s Yunnan provincial branch, was quoted as saying by the state-run China Daily.

Between 10,000 and 30,000 refugees have crossed over from Myanmar’s Shan State into Yunnan’s Nansan district in the last few weeks, as fighting between Myanmar government troops and a faction of the local Kokang militia escalated, the UN refugee agency UNHCR said.

‘It’s difficult to get a real-time update of that number,’ Yu Chunyan, deputy press officer with the Yunnan provincial government, told the Global Times newspaper, as refugees continued to cross the border on Saturday.

The refugee influx came after fighting which followed a split in the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, as the Kokang army has been called since it signed a ceasefire with the Myanmar government 20 years ago.

Myanmar troops and Kokang rebels led by Peng Jiasheng clashed on Thursday in Mangpiang Village, near Laogai, according to the Shan Herald News Agency a resistance media that monitors news in the region.

A source close to Peng Jiasheng told the Global Times that several civilians had been killed in the conflict.

Calls to the Red Cross in Yunnan and the provincial government were not answered Saturday.

Seven designated camps on the Chinese side were already full, provincial government spokeswoman told the German Press Agency dpa Friday.

China, which has strong diplomatic and trade relations with Myanmar, urged the country to maintain stability in the border area.

‘China is following the situation closely and has expressed concern to Myanmar,’ the Foreign Ministry said.

Some analysts say the influx of refugees could put pressure on diplomatic and business relations between the two countries.

It could hurt up to 10,000 Chinese doing business in the border area, Song Qingrun, a senior analyst with the Institute of Contemporary International Relations, was quoted as saying by the Oriental Morning Post.

China’s oil and natural gas projects in the border area could also be affected, the paper added.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Jiang Yu, said that Beijing ‘asks Myanmar to protect the safety of Chinese citizens in their country, and their legitimate rights and interests.’

The Kokang are an ethnic Han Chinese minority group that has lived in north-eastern Myanmar for centuries. They formed a core fighting group in the now-defunct Burmese Communist Party.

Analysts blame the current fighting on the Myanmar junta, which has reportedly engineered a split within the Kokang army in a divide-and-rule tactic.

The junta is reportedly annoyed with Kokang leader Peng Jiasheng for refusing to accept its policy of forcing their troops to put down their arms and become a government border militia before the planned general election next year.

The Kokang conflict is significant as it may spread to much bigger rebel forces in the Shan State such as the United Wa State Army and Shan State Army, who command about 40,000 troops altogether.

Many of these former insurgencies signed ceasefire agreements with the government 20 years ago, allowing them a degree of autonomy in their traditional territories.

The Kokang are the first to end the ceasefire, and are appealing to the Wa and Shan to join them, resistance sources said.

Meanwhile in Yangon, Myanmar authorities reportedly put Kokang civilian leader Pheung Kya-shin under house arrest, officials said.

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