S. Korea prepares for possible eruption of volcano on N. Korea, China border

South Korea's ministry of unification is considering forming a task force team to respond to the possible eruption of Mount Baekdu, a volcano on the border between China and North Korea.

“As the possibility of a Baekdu eruption is raised by many academics and experts, we are considering setting up a task force team regarding the issue,” a ministry official said Tuesday (November 16).

In order to come up with effective measures, critics here said, the government needs to work together with the North Korean government based on the improved relationship between the two Koreas.

Some experts here and abroad have recently warned of the possible eruption of the dormant Baekdu in the near future.

Yoon Sung-hyo, geology professor of Pusan National University, said during an academic conference in June that a Baekdu eruption could happen in 2014 or 2015, citing the opinions of Chinese experts.

“I cannot be sure about the exact dateline due to a lack of accessible data. However, clear signs are being witnessed that the mountain may erupt in the near future,” he said.

According to him, minor tremors have begun to occur 10 times more frequently, close to the mountain peak since 2002 when a magnitude-7.3 earthquake rattled China’s Jilin province.

In February this year, another strong quake measuring 6.9 on the Richter scale hit the nearby area, probably agitating the magma fluid concentrated below Cheonji lake at Baekdu’s peak.

“If the coming eruption is the similar to the previous massive one 1,000 years ago, the consequence could be 1,000 times the recent Iceland eruption,” Yoon said.

In its 2010 macroeconomic report, published in October, the ministry of strategy and finance also predicted that if Mount Baekdu erupted in winter, volcanic ash could disrupt imports and exports by air and cause a drop in temperatures, leading to soaring food prices.

Burning Building in China killed 53

A huge fire engulfs a high-rise in Shanghai, after construction scaffolding surrounding the building initially caught fire, spreading to the building itself.

The accident left at least 53 people dead, sending billowing plumes of black smoke over the city, state media and officials said.

Asian Games: S'pore bowlers secure silver and bronze in singles

SINGAPORE: Singapore's rising starlet Shayna Ng has won a silver medal in the women's singles bowling competition.

Over a series of six games, the 21-year-old scored a total of 1,342 pinfalls. She was 53 pins behind gold medallist Sun Ok Hwang from South Korea.

En route to her silver success, Shayna created history by becoming the first bowler to score a perfect game of 300 in the competition.

The Asian Games debutant achieved that mark in her fourth game and she is joined on the winners' podium by her team-mate New Hui Fen, who claimed the bronze medal.

At the age of 18 and as the youngest member of the Republic's 12-member bowling team, Hui Fen finished behind Shayna by just a single pin.

Meanwhile, former world champion and Singapore's Flag-bearer Jasmine Yeong Nathan was forced to settle for 15th place and Geraldine Ng finished in ninth spot.

Singapore's medal tally stands at three silver and two bronze medals.

In badminton, Singapore's Shinta Mulia Sari and Yao Lei are through to the quarter-finals of the women's doubles after a straight games win over their Malaysian opponents.

The Singapore Open champions won 21-16, 21-16.

They will next face Chinese second seeds Tian Qing and Zhao Yunlei in the last eight on Wednesday.

Onto sailing, Singapore lead in three of the 12 events at the half way point of competition.

Rachel Lee and Cecilia Low maintained their perfect record with six race wins out of six to lead the women's 420 Double Handed Dinghy.

Colin Cheng finished third in both of his races today but still leads the standings in the mens' Laser Radial with seven points.

And Men's 420 Double Handed Dinghy pair of Justin Liu and Sherman Cheng were third and second in their two races to remain first overall on eight points.

Singapore are third overall in five other events.

Bishops launch a million rosaries against abortion law in Philippines

Manila (AsiaNews) – The Catholic Church and the Filipino government are still at loggerheads over a birth control bill currently before Congress. Card Ricardo Vidal, archbishop of Cebu, and other prelates have posted a message on YouTube urging Catholics around the world to recite a rosary for life and the family. Their goal is to have a million prayers, sent by e-mail or regular post, to force the Filipino Congress to abandon the draft bill. Dubbed ‘Rosary Christ Crusade’, the initiative was launched on 31 October at the parish level and is set to last until 16 January 2011.

Not all Catholics agree with the hard line taken by the bishops. For them, the Church hierarchy should accept the government’s offer of mediation, after the latter said it was ready to eliminate those parts viewed as pro-abortion.

For his part, Card Vidal said on YouTube that with “this movement [. . .] we offer authentic offerings [. . .] to God, to the Blessed Mother [. . .] for the sake of our country”.

Other prelates have followed the archbishop of Cebu and released their own message. They include Mgr Paciano Basilio Aniceto, archbishop of San Fernando, head of the Episcopal Commission for life and the family, who describes the bill as a great danger because it spreads a culture of death.

The debate over the Reproductive Health bill has lasted for four years. The law bans abortion, but promotes family planning. It encourages couples to have only two children and favours voluntary sterilisation. Medical professionals who do not uphold the law could be fined or jailed.

The Church and Catholic associations are instead in favour of the Natural Family Programme (NFP), which aims at encouraging a culture based on responsibility, love and Christian values.

This Saturday, Catholic lay organisations and pro-life associations will hold a prayer vigil in Lipa City (Batangas) to protest against the bill and show their support for the bishops’ media campaign.

120,000 S Koreans won over by documentary about Fr Lee Tae-suk

Seoul (AsiaNews) – More than 120,000 people have seen ‘Don’t cry for me, Sudan’, a documentary film that has set a box-office record for its genre in South Korea, this despite limited promotional work and advertising. The movie is about the life of John Lee Tae-suk, a Salesian missionary, and has achieved critical and public acclaim.

Tens of thousands of people of all ages, sex and religious backgrounds, have seen the movie. Enthusiastic comments and reviews have been posted in online movie forums. Ordinary moviegoers have loved the story.

The movie is scheduled for release in Los Angeles, the capital of the US film industry, and should be in the schedule of the 61st Berlin International Film Festival next February.

"Don't cry for me Sudan" tells the story of Fr John Lee Tae-suk, a South Korean missionary, who was a medical practitioner before he took the cowl. He died on 14 January of this year at the age of 48 from colon cancer.

After his ordination in 2001, he travelled to Tonj, a town in southern Sudan deeply affected by war. Since then, he was priest, doctor, teacher, musician, showing loving care to everyone. He also founded a hospital, a school and a youth movement.

On his deathbed, he invoked the figure of St John Bosco. His last words were “Don’t worry. Everything is good.”

Thanks to the documentary, many non-Catholics can now appreciate the priest who achieved a small miracle for the Youth Education Foundation, whose list of donors shot up from 3,000 to 10,000.

Today, medical supplies are guaranteed, new school and hospital buildings are under construction and young people can look forward to the future, because “the seeds of hope Fr Lee sowed in the fields of Tonj will bear fruit in abundance”.

Apple Begins Selling Beatles Music Through ITunes

Apple Inc. began offering Beatles songs through iTunes for the first time, ending an almost decade-long stalemate with the best-selling group.

The band’s 13 studio albums, along with boxed sets and single tracks are available, Cupertino, California-based Apple said today in a statement. ITunes, music’s largest retailer, is selling single tracks for $1.29 and a set of the band’s entire collection for $149.

“In 1964, the band that changed everything came to America,” Apple said on its website. “Now they’re on iTunes.”

The absence of the Beatles has been the highest-profile hole in the catalog of Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs’s digital store. The band had kept its focus on physical media, even as a decline in compact discs sent other artists to the Web. Formed about 50 years ago, the Beatles have remained a top-seller, with customers buying more than 30 million albums in the last decade, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Apple and the Beatles had been embroiled in a long-running legal feud. In 2007, the company and Apple Corps Ltd., the entity that handles the Fab Four’s business affairs, settled a trademark dispute about the apple name and logo.

“It has been a long and winding road to get here,” Jobs said in the statement.

Single albums cost $12.99 and double albums are priced at $19.99, Apple said. The albums also will feature unique mini- documentaries about their creation.

Complex Ownership

Ownership of the Beatle’s music catalog rests with various parties, including surviving members of the band Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, as well as Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison, the widows of John Lennon and George Harrison. The band’s record label EMI Group Ltd., Sony Corp. and the estate of Michael Jackson also control some rights.

“The Beatles music is one of the most complex sets of copyrights and ownership situations in the entire history of the music industry,” said Aram Sinnreich, a media professor at Rutgers University, who follows the music business.

EMI and its owner, Terra Firma Capital Partners Ltd., will see a much-needed boost as it faces debt payments to Citigroup Inc., which helped pay for the 2007 acquisition, Sinnreich said. The Jackson estate, also grappling with debt amassed by the late pop singer, also will benefit, he said.

Apple will sell digital versions of the Beatle’s music exclusively into 2011, said Dylan Jones, a spokesman for EMI, without being more specific.

Sales Value

Adding albums such as “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” “Revolver” and “Abbey Road” to the iTunes library will be “easily” worth more than $100 million in sales, Sinnreich said.

ITunes, introduced in 2001, is the largest destination for buying music in the U.S., bigger than Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., according to NPD Group Inc.

The Beatles had the best-selling stand-alone album between 2000 and 2009 with their collection of greatest hits called “1,” which sold 11.5 million copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan. They are the top-selling band in history, with more than 1 billion albums sold worldwide, according to London-based EMI.

Apple may be able to invigorate digital download purchases, which have slowed mainly as a result of reduced spending by consumers 35 years and older, said Russ Crupnick, an analyst at NPD Group. The question is whether people who already own Beatles music will download another copy from iTunes, he said.

Too Late?

“Many of us have already ripped their entire catalog from CDs,” Crupnick said. “This is really going to depend on whether it’s the equivalent of what the Michael Jackson events were for Sony last year, or if they are a bit late to the party.”

Jackson was the top-selling artist last year following his death, according to SoundScan.

Before today, Beatles material found its way online as a popular target on illegal peer-to-peer file-sharing sites, said Eric Garland, CEO of BigChampagne, which tracks consumption of media online at legal and unauthorized websites.

“For more than a decade, unauthorized copies of the entire Beatles catalog have been available and popular online, but your only legitimate option to buy the music was on CD,” he said.

The rock band AC/DC is among artists who have kept their music from being sold through iTunes, where the range of prices is set by Apple.

Apple fell $4.54 to $302.50 at 12:29 p.m. New York time in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The stock had gained 46 percent this year before today.

Adding the Beatles won’t cure the ills of the music industry, which has faced a decade-long slump in album sales, said Mark Mulligan, an analyst who tracks the music industry for Forrester Research.

“The digital music market (and the young music fans record labels’ desperately need to get engaged) need new music products, not yesteryear’s hits repackaged,” Mulligan said today in a blog post.

Indonesia Travel Discoveries

Indonesia is officially the Republic of Indonesia (Indonesian: Republik Indonesia), is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia comprises 17,508 islands. With a population of around 238 million people, it is the world's fourth most populous country, and has the world's largest population of Muslims.

Indonesia is a republic, with an elected legislature and president. The nation's capital city is Jakarta. The country shares land borders with Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Malaysia. Other neighboring countries include Singapore, Philippines, Australia, and the Indian territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Indonesia is a founding member of ASEAN and a member of the G-20 major economies.

The Indonesian archipelago has been an important trade region since at least the seventh century, when Srivijaya and then later Majapahit traded with China and India. Local rulers gradually absorbed foreign cultural, religious and political models from the early centuries CE, and Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms flourished. Indonesian history has been influenced by foreign powers drawn to its natural resources.

Muslim traders brought Islam, and European powers fought one another to monopolize trade in the Spice Islands of Maluku during the Age of Discovery. Following three and a half centuries of Dutch colonialism, Indonesia secured its independence after World War II. Indonesia's history has since been turbulent, with challenges posed by natural disasters, corruption, separatism, a democratization process, and periods of rapid economic change. The current nation of Indonesia is a unitary presidential republic consisting of thirty three provinces.

Across its many islands, Indonesia consists of distinct ethnic, linguistic, and religious groups. The Javanese are the largest and the politically dominant ethnic group. Indonesia has developed a shared identity defined by a national language, ethnic diversity, religious pluralism within a majority Muslim population, and a history of colonialism including rebellion against it.

Indonesia's national motto, "Bhinneka Tunggal Ika" ("Unity in Diversity" literally, "many, yet one"), articulates the diversity that shapes the country. Despite its large population and densely populated regions, Indonesia has vast areas of wilderness that support the world's second highest level of biodiversity. The country is richly endowed with natural resources, yet poverty remains widespread in contemporary Indonesia.

Fossilized remains of Homo erectus, popularly known as the "Java Man", suggest that the Indonesian archipelago was inhabited two million to 500,000 years ago. Austronesian people, who form the majority of the modern population, migrated to South East Asia from Taiwan. They arrived in Indonesia around 2000 BCE, and as they spread through the archipelago, confined the native Melanesian peoples to the far eastern regions.

Ideal agricultural conditions, and the mastering of wet-field rice cultivation as early as the eighth century BCE, allowed villages, towns, and small kingdoms to flourish by the first century CE. Indonesia's strategic sea-lane position fostered inter-island and international trade, including links with Indian kingdoms and China, which were established several centuries BCE. Trade has since fundamentally shaped Indonesian history.

From the seventh century CE, the powerful Srivijaya naval kingdom flourished as a result of trade and the influences of Hinduism and Buddhism that were imported with it. Between the eighth and 10th centuries CE, the agricultural Buddhist Sailendra and Hindu Mataram dynasties thrived and declined in inland Java, leaving grand religious monuments such as Sailendra's Borobudur and Mataram's Prambanan. The Hindu Majapahit kingdom was founded in eastern Java in the late 13th century, and under Gajah Mada, its influence stretched over much of Indonesia.