Pencak Silat Unites Jokowi and Prabowo at Asian Games

Jakarta Globe, Amal Ganesha, August 30, 2018

Indonesian athlete Hanifan Kusumah, with the national flag draped over his
shoulders, hugs President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo and Gerindra chairman Prabowo
Subianto after winning gold in the 2018 Asian Games pencak silat final at Taman Mini
Indonesia Indah in East Jakarta on Wednesday (29/08). (Antara Photo/Inasgoc/
Aditia Noviansyah)

Jakarta. President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo joined the leader of the opposition, Prabowo Subianto, and other prominent figures to watch the 2018 Asian Games pencak silat final at Taman Mini Indonesia Indah in East Jakarta on Wednesday (29/08).

Indonesia won six of the eight gold medals at stake in pencak silat, which made its debut at this year's Asian Games.

Jokowi, who only arrived in time to watch the last two events, was seated next to Prabowo, who is also chairman of the Indonesian Pencak Silat Association (IPSI). They were accompanied by Vice President Jusuf Kalla, Coordinating Human Development and Culture Minister Puan Maharani, Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) chairwoman Megawati Sukarnoputri and Syafruddin, chef de mission of the Indonesian 2018 Asian Games contingent.

Indonesia's Hanifan Yudani Kusumah, who won gold after defeating Nguyễn Thái Linh of Vietnam in the men's Class C event, made a victory lap after his match and ran to the VIP seats to embrace Jokowi and Prabowo in a group hug, in a gesture of unity.

His spontaneous act saw the capacity crowd of more than 3,000 spectators erupt in thunderous applause and cheering.

"Jokowi and Prabowo are both great people. We are a nation, we should not be divided because of something unimportant," Hanifan said later, referring to political tensions between the two leaders' followers in recent years.

Prabowo, founder and chairman of the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), has challenged Jokowi to a rematch in next year's presidential election, after the former Army general lost in a tight race in 2014.

"Through pencak silat, I want to show that Indonesia is a safe and peaceful country," the 20-year-old athlete said.

In his response, Prabowo said: "Whatever it is, for the sake of our nation and country, we will be united."

Indonesia bagged another five gold medals in pencak silat on Wednesday, courtesy of Wewey Wita in the women's Class B, Pipiet Kamelia in the women's Class D, Sugianto in the men's single art, Ni Made Dwiyanti and Ayu Wilantari in the women's doubles art, and Pramudita Yuristya, Gina Lestari and Lutfi Nurhasanah in the women's team art events.

Indonesia has won 14 gold medals in the 2018 Asian Games pencak silat competition, which has now been concluded.

Each gold medal will cost the government Rp 1.5 billion ($102,000) and Jokowi has assured the athletes that they will receive their bonuses on time.

"I will coordinate this tonight so that the bonuses will be paid out as soon as possible," the president told reporters.

"Pencak silat has made the government broke, having to pay all these bonuses," he said with a smile, while looking at Prabowo.

Indonesia is now in fourth place on the 2018 Asian Games medal table with 30 gold, 22 silver and 36 bronze medals.

Cars, houses, heroes: North Koreans win hearts at Asian Games

Yahoo – AFP, Daniel HICKS, Aug 28, 2018

The North Koreans were joined by the South Korean weightlifting team to celebrate
 the end of the competition with an unprecedented joint team photo.  (AFP Photo/
CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN)

North Korea's athletes are not only scooping record numbers of medals at the Asian Games, they are winning hearts with an unprecedented charm offensive and will go home as heroes -- rewarded with new cars and houses.

At the weightlifting competition which concluded Monday with an eighth gold -- smashing North Korea's previous best of four in 2014 -- the team's attitude has been the polar opposite from Incheon four years ago.

There, every medallist trotted out a well-worn script of thanking leader Kim Jong Un for his inspiration to reporters before being whisked away.

But over eight days at the Jakarta International Expo their athletes have gone off-piste to talk frankly about their nerves, fears, emotions and life back home while mingling freely with spectators and reporters.

They even were joined by the South Korean weightlifting team to celebrate the end of the competition with an unprecedented joint team photo.

"I think we have shown the world that the people of Korea are the greatest as one," +75kg winner Kim Kuk Hyang told AFP after posing with her South Korean counterparts, an astonishing statement from a North Korean given that the two countries have technically remained at war for the past 65 years.

Then she was off to grab tiny 4ft 7in (140cm) Ri Song Gum, the 48kg class gold medallist, and carry her aloft around the stage with the pair laughing, joking and punching the air.

Little and large: Kim Kuk Hyang carries Ri Song Gum around as North Korea 

celebrated their record weightlifting haul (AFP Photo/CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN)

Selfies and smiles

Hardly a single request for a selfie by a fan or Games volunteer has been turned down -- most have been accommodated with huge smiles. At the 2014 Asian Games none was entertained.

The shackles are off, athletes are revelling and happy to reveal their personal stories for the first time.

Om Yun Chol even thanked South Koreans for helping him to win 56kg men's gold.

"The passionate support from the South Korean cheerleading squad is my source of great strength," he said while posing for pictures.

Was this really the same man who four years earlier had thanked leader Kim for teaching him how to "crack a rock with an egg"?

O Kang Chol cried buckets for his dead mother after his maiden gold medal in the men's 69kg.

It was a touching moment as he mourned his mum who passed away earlier this year and whose ambition had been to see him win a first title.

Gold medallist O Kang Chol of North Korea celebrates during the victory ceremony 

of the men's 69kg weightlifting event  during the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta 

on August 22, 2018. (AFP Photo/MONEY SHARMA)

"I will visit mother's grave and give her this gold medal," he told reporters, still weeping and unabashed at baring his grief -- a huge contrast to the robotic strongmen and women paraded at previous championships.

It is an eye-opening change, which appears to have gone hand-in-hand with the thawing of global diplomatic relations culminating in the historic summit between Kim and US President Donald Trump in Singapore in June.

South Korean observers have been taken aback. "We have never see the North Koreans like this," Yonhap news agency reporter Joo Kyung-don told AFP.

The new open attitude appears to have been encouraged right from the top.

North Korean Sports Minister Kim Il Guk, one of Kim Jong Un's right-hand men, was in attendance Sunday and giving his blessing to team officials spilling the beans on previously taboo topics.

'They are not scary'

"The weightlifting champions who raise the country's honour will be rewarded with a new house and a new car," head coach Kim Kwang Dok told AFP, for the first time confirming something that had long been suspected in the secretive nation -- that sporting glory is a way out of grinding poverty.

"Our athletes will get national hero status once they return and will get big attention from our people. Everyone will be proud."

It is not just at the weightlifting arena that heads have been turning and relationships opening up.

The two Koreas marched together at the opening ceremony, fielded a joint team in women's basketball and so far have won a historic gold and two bronzes in dragon boating.

North Korean team members mingle with the public in the stands at the Jakarta 

International Expo during the Asian Games weightlifting (AFP Photo/CHAIDEER

MAHYUDDIN)

"They are not scary or anything like portrayed on the internet," South Korea basketball player Kim Han-byul said. "It's been the normal girl talk with them."

Weightlifting sisters Rim Un Sim and Rim Jong Sim tenderly cried tears of joy at each other's success as they pulled off a golden double and said they couldn't wait to get home to show off their medals to their family.

Rim Jong Sim was one who did remember, albeit briefly, to thank Kim Jong Un. "This gold medal isn't for me, but it's for my country and our supreme leader," she said.

But such expressions were few and far between and her sister had soon changed the subject.

"I can't describe how happy I am," Rim Un Sim said. "We competed together and won medals at the university championship last year, but this is the Asian Games."

Related Article:

Science & Spiritually Conference 2018, BC – Canada (4), June 16-17, 2018 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Predictions - Text version) - New 

"The second thing I told you about was this: There's a 50% chance that the new leader of North Korea, the son, would not follow in the footsteps of his father. I told you there was a 50% chance of this. Then I started itemizing the reasoning why this might make sense, especially to the Korean leader. I then told you it might take a long time if it manifested at all. I told you the problems would be within the old advisors for his father's family. He had to tread slowly and lightly to do something against all odds. This will all come out someday because of the handshake.

Here was the potential or the prediction of what might happen: Those who had the machine guns in the DM zone would drop them, because this North Korean leader would unify the two Koreas. There would be no nuclear weapons in his land and there would be the beginning of abundance for his people. His people and the world would then give him something he had always wanted and was imbued with from birth - the desire for accolades and more accolades. Like his father before him, he was the premier egotist, and this would be the unexpected way to create a world at his feet. That's what I said. Then I said, "Watch for it, but don't be anxious." I talked about that in 2013, and five more times since then. In August 2017, I itemized my advice for him, point by point. The advice that I gave followed the potentials that were there and those were the very points in the handshake this week in June of 2018.

Now, you tell me what happened. "Kryon, you're going to be famous because you predicted these things!" Dear ones, all I did was look into a field that is being shown to you today [by the scientists at the conference]. And all I did was to show you the potentials that were already there. In other words, he was thinking about these things and talking to others behind the scenes about them. No matter what his advisors told him right up to the brink of sending his missiles, he was always thinking that there might be another way that would gain him ultimate fame. Dear ones, this has been in progress since his father died! Therefore, it was in the field, but not a given, dear ones - a potential.

Next, I want to show you the bias of humanity at this time, something I have spoken of many times. This potential of the handshake is amazing, and it has started to be manifested. What should the reaction be to something that deflects the potential of war, or saves thousands lives? Instead of joy or amazement or celebration, Humans go for the reverse: It can't happen. It's a trick. It's a bad deal.

I want you to start reading the reactions of the press. I want you to read the reactions even from the South Koreans. They said, "Well, we know North Koreans, and that's never going to happen. We know who they are, and we know their nature. Because in the past, they never performed what they said they would. So it's a joke." That is a quote from a South Korean. "It's a joke."

What happened to this comment? "Isn't this a beautiful potential? Look at this amazing thing - against all odds!" Now, your free press, the reporting segment of our culture, has decided not only to report it, but to let you know it's probably not going to happen! They say: "Nay. Maybe yes, maybe no. We'll see. We expect the worse." And this continues and continues, and all it shows you is the monstrous bias of the dark side that wants to pull anything good back to what the past gave to you."

Indonesian woman jailed for complaining about mosque noise

Yahoo – AFP, 21 August 2018

Loudspeakers used to call the faithful to prayer are pictured atop a tower at a
Jakarta mosque: a woman in Medan has landed in jail for complaining about the noise

A woman in Muslim-majority Indonesia was sentenced to 18 months in jail Tuesday for complaining about the volume of a mosque's call to prayer -- the latest conviction under a controversial blasphemy law.

Meiliana, 44, an ethnic Chinese Buddhist, was found guilty of insulting Islam for asking her neighbourhood mosque to lower its sound system because it was too loud and "hurt" her ears.

There are some 800,000 mosques across the archipelago, with the five-times-a-day call to prayer heard everywhere in the biggest cities and smallest towns.

Tuesday's verdict will likely fuel fears that Indonesia's moderate brand of Islam is coming under threat from increasingly influential radicals.

The court in the city of Medan on Sumatra island said the woman's comments two years ago triggered riots that saw angry Muslim mobs ransack Buddhist temples.

Some ethnic Chinese in the area fled in fear.

The defendant's lawyer said his client would appeal the decision while Amnesty International urged a higher court to quash the sentence.

"This ludicrous decision is a flagrant violation of freedom of expression," said its Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid in a statement.

"Sentencing someone to 18 months in prison for something so trivial is a stark illustration of the increasingly arbitrary and repressive application of the blasphemy law in the country."

Indonesia, which has the world's biggest Muslim population, is officially pluralist with six major religions recognised, including Hinduism, Christianity and Buddhism. Freedom of expression is supposed to be guaranteed by law.

But criticising religion -- particularly Islam, which is followed by nearly 90 percent of Indonesia's 260 million citizens -- can land offenders in jail.

Rights groups have long campaigned against the nation's blasphemy laws, which they say are frequently misused to target minorities.

Last year Jakarta's former governor -- the city's first Christian leader of Chinese descent -- was sentenced to two years in jail for blasphemy.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla made a plea in 2015 for places of worship to turn down the volume slightly to placate nearby residents.

Fresh 6.9-magnitude quake rocks Indonesia's Lombok island

Yahoo – AFP, August 19, 2018

The already quake battered island of Lombok was hit by fresh tremors
on August 19, 2018 (AFP Photo/Handout)

Mataram (Indonesia) (AFP) - Multiple earthquakes -- including a powerful and shallow 6.9-magnitude tremor -- struck Indonesia's Lombok on Sunday, sending fresh panic coursing through the already battered island.

Four significant quakes were recorded by seismologists on Sunday, the first measuring 6.3 shortly before midday which triggered landslides and sent people fleeing for cover.

It was followed nearly twelve hours later by a late evening quake measuring 6.9 and two aftershocks of 5.9 and 5.3 strength, according to the US Geological Survey.

The picturesque island is already reeling from two devastating quakes on July 29 and August 5 that killed nearly 500 people and made hundreds of thousands homeless.

There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage from the late evening quakes on an island where many have chosen to sleep in tents in recent weeks because of regular aftershocks.

One local resident said the powerful tremor jolted him awake.

"The earthquake was incredibly strong. Everything was shaking," Agus Salim told AFP.

"We were all sleeping in an evacuation tent. I had just fallen asleep when suddenly it started to shake.... Everyone ran into the street screaming and crying."

A dozen foreign guests at the hotel Lina Senggigi, which is in a popular tourist spot, were ushered out of the building as the quake struck.

"The jolt was strong and quite long... Tonight we will ask our guests to sleep in the parking lot. It's safer that way," a staff member told Kompas TV.

National disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho tweeted that blackouts had hit much of the island after the evening quakes.

"Aftershocks are still happening across Lombok," he tweeted. "It's pitch black.... We are still coordinating with officials on the ground."

A woman and boy watch as men clear the wreckage of houses damaged by an 

earthquake in Menggala, North Lombok (AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

Landslides and collapsed buildings

Earlier in the day he said that the morning quake caused panic but no widespread reports of damage. One person died from a suspected heart attack and there were reports of localised damage.

Landslides were reported in a national park on Mount Rinjani where hundreds of hikers had been briefly trapped after the quake in late July. The park has been closed since then.

Local disaster mitigation agency spokesman Agung Pramuja said several houses and other structures in the district of Sembalun, on the slopes of Mount Rinjani, collapsed on Sunday after being damaged by the previous two quakes.

The structures included checkpoints once used by trekkers climbing the mountain, Pramuja said, adding that the exact number of damaged buildings was still being checked.

Sunday's tremors were also felt on the neighbouring resort island of Bali but there were no reports of damage.

'Ring of Fire'

The latest tremor comes two weeks after a shallow 6.9-magnitude quake on August 5 damaged tens of thousands of homes, mosques and businesses across Lombok.

At least 481 people died and thousands were injured.

The hardest-hit region was in the north of the island, which has suffered hundreds of aftershocks.

A week before that quake, a tremor surged through the island and killed 17.

The August 5 quake left more than 350,000 displaced, with many sleeping under tents or tarpaulins near their ruined homes or in evacuation shelters, while makeshift medical facilities were set up to treat the injured.

Badly damaged roads, particularly in the mountainous north of the island, are a headache for relief agencies trying to distribute aid.

The economic toll of the quake is estimated to be at least five trillion rupiah ($348 million).

Indonesia sits on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire", where tectonic plates collide and many of the world's volcanic eruptions and earthquakes occur.

In 2004 a tsunami triggered by a magnitude 9.3 undersea earthquake off the coast of Sumatra in western Indonesia killed 220,000 people in countries around the Indian Ocean, including 168,000 in Indonesia.

The Indonesian island of Lombok has experienced 30 earthquakes since July 28 pic.twitter.com/3V85JqhOAm

— AFP news agency (@AFP) August 19, 2018

Two Koreas march together as Asian Games burst into life

Yahoo – AFP, Faisal KAMAL, August 18, 2018

The two Koreas also marched together at this year's Pyeongchang Winter
Olympics opening ceremony. (AFP Photo/CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN)

North and South Korea marched together in a stirring display of unity as the Asian Games, one of the world's biggest sports events, opened in a blaze of colour in Jakarta on Saturday.

South Korean women's basketball player Lim Yung-hui and North Korean footballer Ju Kyong-chol jointly held the Korean Unification flag aloft as they led the athletes out to an ovation from the packed crowd.

It is the second such symbolic gesture this year by the two Koreas, who also walked together at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics opening ceremony -- an event that heralded an unprecedented warming of ties.

The North and South, still technically at war, are joining forces in women's basketball, canoeing and rowing during the 40-sport, two-week regional Olympics in the Indonesian capital and Palembang, a port city on Sumatra island.

South Korean Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon and North Korean Deputy Prime Minister Ri Ryong-nam, watching from the VIP seats, rose together holding hands and beaming as the Korean athletes marched.

The ceremony opened with a skit purportedly showing President Joko Widodo doing stunts on a motorbike in Jakarta's streets before riding into the Gelora Bung Karno stadium, to roars from the crowd.

About 1,500 dancers in traditional dress then performed a tightly choreographed routine before Afghanistan led the athletes' parade into the stadium.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo declared the Games open. (AFP 

Photo/Jewel SAMAD)

There were huge cheers when the two Koreas, whose athletes together number about 1,000, marched into the stadium together wearing pristine white and blue uniforms.

'You can feel proud'

Widodo was then seen dancing in his seat as Indonesian singer Via Vallen took to the stage, before the stadium fell silent to honour the victims of the recent Lombok earthquake.

"You can feel proud of your home country Indonesia," said Sheikh Ahmed Al-Fahad Al-Sabah, president of the Olympic Council of Asia, before Widodo declared the Games open.

Indonesian badminton great Susi Susanti, the women's singles Olympic champion in 1992, lit the Games cauldron and the ceremony closed with a noisy music performance and spectacular fireworks.

It provided a vibrant start to the Games, whose build-up has been dogged by logistical headaches and security fears after Indonesia suffered its deadliest terror attack in a decade in May.

The sprawling archipelago has also been grappling with its latest earthquake disaster after strong tremors in Lombok, an eastern island, left more than 400 people dead.

Indonesia, a country of about 270 million, stepped in to host the Games at short notice after Vietnam pulled out, citing the event's eye-watering costs.

Indonesia is hosting one of the world's biggest sporting events. (AFP 

Photo/BAY ISMOYO)

Indonesia has a poor track record in hosting multi-sports events -- the 2011 Southeast Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang suffered serious corruption problems and delays, and two people died in a stadium stampede.

Rights group Amnesty International said at least 31 people were killed in a "shoot first and ask questions later" police crackdown on petty crime.

But officials say all venues are ready for competition and tournament-related problems so far have been relatively minor, from the ticket website crashing to misspelt words on signs.

About 18,000 athletes and officials from 45 Asian countries will be at the Asiad, organisers said, looking to make their mark across a range of sports from swimming to sepak takraw and bridge.

The Asian Games encompass nearly the full Olympic programme and are considered the pinnacle by many participating nations, for whom Olympic success often proves elusive.

Indonesia is about to open the #AsianGames but its traffic-clogged capital Jakarta remains shrouded in a toxic haze of air pollution, despite drastic efforts to cut down on congestion https://t.co/ukFXJoXVIl pic.twitter.com/qVoOaPt9LO

— AFP news agency (@AFP) August 17, 2018

Related Article:

Science & Spiritually Conference 2018, BC – Canada (4), June 16-17, 2018 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - (Predictions - Text version) - New 

"The second thing I told you about was this: There's a 50% chance that the new leader of North Korea, the son, would not follow in the footsteps of his father. I told you there was a 50% chance of this. Then I started itemizing the reasoning why this might make sense, especially to the Korean leader. I then told you it might take a long time if it manifested at all. I told you the problems would be within the old advisors for his father's family. He had to tread slowly and lightly to do something against all odds. This will all come out someday because of the handshake.

Here was the potential or the prediction of what might happen: Those who had the machine guns in the DM zone would drop them, because this North Korean leader would unify the two Koreas. There would be no nuclear weapons in his land and there would be the beginning of abundance for his people. His people and the world would then give him something he had always wanted and was imbued with from birth - the desire for accolades and more accolades. Like his father before him, he was the premier egotist, and this would be the unexpected way to create a world at his feet. That's what I said. Then I said, "Watch for it, but don't be anxious." I talked about that in 2013, and five more times since then. In August 2017, I itemized my advice for him, point by point. The advice that I gave followed the potentials that were there and those were the very points in the handshake this week in June of 2018.

Now, you tell me what happened. "Kryon, you're going to be famous because you predicted these things!" Dear ones, all I did was look into a field that is being shown to you today [by the scientists at the conference]. And all I did was to show you the potentials that were already there. In other words, he was thinking about these things and talking to others behind the scenes about them. No matter what his advisors told him right up to the brink of sending his missiles, he was always thinking that there might be another way that would gain him ultimate fame. Dear ones, this has been in progress since his father died! Therefore, it was in the field, but not a given, dear ones - a potential.

Next, I want to show you the bias of humanity at this time, something I have spoken of many times. This potential of the handshake is amazing, and it has started to be manifested. What should the reaction be to something that deflects the potential of war, or saves thousands lives? Instead of joy or amazement or celebration, Humans go for the reverse: It can't happen. It's a trick. It's a bad deal.

I want you to start reading the reactions of the press. I want you to read the reactions even from the South Koreans. They said, "Well, we know North Koreans, and that's never going to happen. We know who they are, and we know their nature. Because in the past, they never performed what they said they would. So it's a joke." That is a quote from a South Korean. "It's a joke."

What happened to this comment? "Isn't this a beautiful potential? Look at this amazing thing - against all odds!" Now, your free press, the reporting segment of our culture, has decided not only to report it, but to let you know it's probably not going to happen! They say: "Nay. Maybe yes, maybe no. We'll see. We expect the worse." And this continues and continues, and all it shows you is the monstrous bias of the dark side that wants to pull anything good back to what the past gave to you."

More than 2,000 tourists evacuated after Indonesia quake kills 98

Yahoo – AFP, Kiki Siregar, August 6, 2018

The Lombok quake has already killed 91 people with fears the toll could rise
(AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

Mataram (Indonesia) (AFP) - Indonesia Monday sent rescuers fanning out across the holiday island of Lombok and evacuated more than 2,000 tourists after a powerful earthquake killed at least 98 people and damaged thousands of buildings.

The shallow 6.9-magnitude quake sparked terror among tourists and locals alike, coming just a week after another deadly tremor surged through Lombok and killed 17 people.

Rescuers on Monday searched for survivors in the rubble of houses, mosques and schools destroyed in the latest disaster on Sunday evening.

National disaster agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said there were fears a number of people were trapped in the ruins of a collapsed mosque in the northern village of Lading-Lading. Footage he posted on Twitter showed the large concrete mosque had pancaked.

A lack of heavy equipment and shattered roads were hampering efforts to reach survivors in the mountainous north and east of the island, which had been hardest hit.

Najmul Akhyar, the head of North Lombok district, estimated that 80 percent of that region was damaged by the quake.

"We expect the number of fatalities to keep rising," Nugroho said. "All victims who died are Indonesians."

He said up to 20,000 people may have had to quit their homes on Lombok and paramedics, food and medication were badly needed.

The spokesman said search and rescue teams also rescued between 2,000 and 2,700 tourists from the Gili Islands, three tiny, coral-fringed tropical islands a few kilometres off the northwest coast of Lombok.

Authorities initially said 1,200 people were stuck on the islands but scaled up the figure early in the evening. Some tourists chose to stay behind.

Footage posted online by Nugroho showed hundreds crowded onto powder-white beaches desperately awaiting transport off the normally paradise Gilis.

"We cannot evacuate all of them all at once because we don't have enough capacity on the boats," Muhammad Faozal, the head of the tourism agency in West Nusa Tenggara province, told AFP, adding two navy vessels were on their way.

"It's understandable they want to leave the Gilis, they are panicking."

By early afternoon, hundreds of weary tourists had arrived with their baggage at Bangsal harbour, the main link between Lombok and the Gilis.

Margret Helgadottir, a holidaymaker from Iceland, described people screaming as the roof of her hotel on one of the islands collapsed.

"We just froze: thankfully we were outside," she told AFP tearfully from a harbour in Lombok to where she had been evacuated. "Everything went black, it was terrible."

Seven Indonesian holidaymakers died on the largest of the three islands, Gili Trawangan, while another local woman died on nearby Bali.

Foreign tourists were among those injured on Lombok and the nearby Gili 

islands (AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

Night of aftershocks

But it was Lombok which bore the brunt of Sunday evening's quake.

The shallow tremor sent thousands of residents and tourists scrambling outdoors, where many spent the night as strong aftershocks including one of 5.3-magnitude rattled the island.

The quake knocked out power in many areas and parts of Lombok remained without electricity on Monday.

Hundreds of bloodied and bandaged victims were treated outside damaged hospitals in the main city of Mataram and other hard-hit areas.

Patients lay on beds under wards set up in tents, surrounded by drip stands and monitors, as doctors in blue scrubs attended to them.

Anguished relatives were huddled around loved ones in front of the main clinic in Mataram, as medical staff struggled to cope with hundreds of patients. Many were yet to be attended to despite spending the night out in the open.

"I feel restless sleeping in a tent, I can't be at peace," Nurhayati told AFP outside one hospital where she had brought her sick 70-year-old mother.

"What we really need now are paramedics, we are short-staffed. We also need medications," Supriadi, a spokesman for Mataram general hospital, told AFP.

Singapore's Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam, who was in Lombok for a security conference when the earthquake struck, described on Facebook how his hotel room on the 10th floor shook violently.

"Walls cracked, it was quite impossible to stand up," he said.

Bali's international airport suffered damage to its terminal but the runway was unaffected and operations had returned to normal. Disaster agency officials said. Lombok airport was also operating.

Indonesia, one of the world's most disaster-prone nations, straddles the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire", where tectonic plates collide and many of the world's volcanic eruptions and earthquakes occur.

In 2014, a devastating tsunami triggered by a magnitude 9.3 undersea earthquake off the coast of Sumatra in western Indonesia killed 220,000 people in countries around the Indian Ocean, including 168,000 in Indonesia.

Infographic on the Indonesian holiday island of Lombok, where a 6.9-magnitude quake killed scores of people and damaged thousands of buildings https://t.co/PxrElscQ7A pic.twitter.com/a65Z8xV2qE

— AFP news agency (@AFP) August 6, 2018

Death penalty 'inadmissible' in Catholic teaching update

Yahoo – AFP, 2 August 2018

Francis has long opposed capital punishment, saying in June 2016 that "it doesn't
give justice to victims, but it feeds vengeance" and arguing that the biblical
commandment "thou shall not kill" applies equally to the innocent and the guilty

Pope Francis has declared the death penalty "inadmissible" in an update of Catholic believers' most important guide to Church teaching, the catechism, the Vatican said Thursday.

"The Church teaches, in the light of the Gospel, that 'the death penalty is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person'," the new text states.

Francis approved the change to the catechism, which covers a wide range of moral and social issues, during a meeting in May with the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Church's doctrinal watchdog.

The update also says the Church will "work with determination" for the abolition of the death penalty worldwide.

"Recourse to the death penalty on the part of legitimate authority, following a fair trial, was long considered an appropriate response to the gravity of certain crimes and an acceptable, albeit extreme, means of safeguarding the common good," the new text says.

"Today, however, there is an increasing awareness that the dignity of the person is not lost even after the commission of very serious crimes."

The Catholic Church has steadily hardened its opposition to capital punishment in recent decades, with Francis's calls for its abolition echoing similar pleas from his predecessors Benedict XVI and John Paul II.

The 1992 text of the catechism says authorities should take appropriate measures in the interest of the common good without excluding the use of the death penalty in extremely grave cases.

More than two-thirds of the world's countrys have abolished or suspended judicial 

killings. The United States is the most developed country where it is still used. Shown 

here in a Texas museum is "Old Sparky", the electric chair discontinued in 1965

'Inhuman remedy'

More recent updates said factors justifying capital punishment have become rare if not practically inexistent.

Francis has long opposed the death penalty, saying that the execution of a human being is fundamentally against the teachings of Christ because, by definition, it excludes the possibility of redemption.

Speaking in October last year, he acknowledged that the Vatican itself had historically had "recourse to the extreme and inhuman remedy" of judicial execution, but said past doctrinal errors should be put aside.

"It doesn't give justice to victims, but it feeds vengeance," he said in June 2016, arguing that the biblical commandment "thou shall not kill" applies to the innocent as well as the guilty.

Francis has also called for an "international consensus" on the abolition of capital punishment.

"Modern society has the ability to punish crimes effectively without definitively taking away the possibility of redemption for those who commit them," he said.

More than two-thirds of the world's countries -- including most predominantly Catholic countries -- have abolished or suspended judicial killings.

Francis has long opposed capital punishment, saying in June 2016 that "it doesn't give justice to victims, but it feeds vengeance" and arguing that the biblical commandment "thou shall not kill" applies equally to the innocent and the guilty

More than two-thirds of the world's countrys have abolished or suspended judicial killings. The United States is the most developed country where it is still used. Shown here in a Texas museum is "Old Sparky", the electric chair discontinued in 1965.