American Buddhist Net

Before we get to the new stuff, we must recap: Two "Japanese nationals" (who may not actually come from Japan) were caught in Italy just as they were about to take $134.5 billion dollars in bonds into Switzerland. Most of these bonds, we are told, were of such a ridiculously high denomination ($500 million each) as to make them non-negotiable by normal humans. Only states could hope to use such things.

Mystery number 1: What did the "Japanese nationals" hope to do with these instruments?

Mystery number 2: Are the bonds counterfeit or real? If real, Italy stood to gain a windfall -- Italian law allows the government of that country to take 40 percent of the booty.

Mystery number 3: Why has the American press kept mum about a possible swindle that dwarfs the Madoff affair? The Europeans and the Asians are all over it.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- In what a U.S. military official calls an "inadvertent encounter," a Chinese submarine hit an underwater sonar array being towed by the destroyer USS John McCain on Thursday.

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Of the 195 countries in the world, only three do not currently allow for divorce and that number will be further reduced by one next year when Malta officially adopts a divorce law. This total includes all 53 countries in Africa, 52 out of the 53 in Asia, 47 out of the 48 in Europe, all 13 in South America, and all 7 in Central America. Each of these incredibly diverse countries—whether Christian, Muslim or Buddhist, democracy or dictatorship—have adopted some form of divorce law except for the Philippines and Vatican City.

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These pictures show the carnage caused after a water buffalo went wild during a religious festival in the Philippines.

Four people were injured in the town of Pulilan, north of Manila, after farmers lost control of the beast, who was part of a procession of 300.

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Some 90,000 women in the Philippines were hospitalised for post-abortion care in 2008. Abortion remains llegal in this predominately Catholic nation of more than 95 million inhabitants

When Jocelyn Cruz, 36, fell pregnant with her seventh child she decided the family could not afford another baby and tried to induce an abortion by jumping up and down.

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April 7, 2009—In just a short time, one of the rarest sharks in the world went from swimming in Philippine waters to simmering in coconut milk.

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Dozens of Catholic devotees were nailed to crosses, scores more whipped their backs and others chanted the Passion of Jesus Christ as Filipinos mixed faith and gory ritual on Good Friday.

Frowned on by church authorities, the voluntary crucifixions in villages north of the capital Manila are one of the most extreme displays of religious devotion in Asia's largest Roman Catholic state.

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MANILA — Hundreds of Filipinos, many of them minors suspected of petty crimes, have been killed by death squads in the Philippines in the past several years, with the local authorities tolerating these killings and the police even complicit in several of them, Human Rights Watch said Tuesday.

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Manila - A Hong Kong journalist was under fire in the Philippines on Sunday for calling the South-East Asian country a "nation of servants" in a column about disputed areas in the South China Sea.

In his March 27 column for HK Magazine, titled "The War At Home," Chip Tsao denounced the Philippines' claims to the Spratly Islands, which are also claimed in whole or in part by China, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei, Malaysia.

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A Philippine woman who secured a rape conviction against a US marine more than two years ago has now suggested the sex was consensual.

A statement from the woman, known as Nicole, says she is tormented by guilt.

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February 18, 2009—A rare quail from the Philippines was photographed for the first time before being sold as food at a poultry market, experts say.

Found only on the island of Luzon, Worcester's buttonquail was known solely through drawings based on dated museum specimens collected several decades ago.

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An unusual beauty pageant took place in the capital of the Philippines, Manila, last week. The pageant, Amazing Philippines Beauties 2008, was held to choose the beauty queen among transsexuals and transvestites.

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MANILA, Philippines (AP) - The last of 16 miners trapped in a flooded gold mine in the northern Philippines was rescued after 11 days _ and then arrested by police.

George Baywong, a Mines and Geosciences Bureau officer who supervised the rescue efforts, said on Saturday that Joseph Anayasan was pulled out of the mine in Itogon township in Benguet province late Friday.

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MANILA — Three weeks ago, the government of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo was to sign a peace agreement that promised to cede part of Mindanao, the main island in the south of the Philippines, to Muslim separatists who have fought for decades to establish an autonomous Islamic state.

The signing was aborted after local officials of Christian-dominated provinces petitioned the Philippine Supreme Court in protest. In response, some members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the separatist group, went on a two-day rampage in which 33 people were killed and dozens of houses burned. That violence left the peace process in tatters.

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August 11, 2008
By CARLOS H. CONDE

MANILA — The number of Filipinos displaced from their homes since fighting began late last week between government forces and Islamic separatists in the southern Philippines reached 130,000 on Monday, officials said. The military and the police sent more troops to fight the rebels.

Social welfare officials warned of a potential humanitarian disaster as the fighting between troops and elements of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which had been confined to two provinces, threatened to spill over to other areas. The Moro Islamic Liberation Front is a separatist group that has been fighting for an Islamic state in the southern region of Mindanao for several decades.

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By Thomas Bell, South East Asia Correspondent
Last Updated: 10:40PM BST 22/06/2008

More than 800 passengers and crew are feared to have died when a ferry capsized during a storm off the Philippines.

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06/10/2008

...Voluntary simplicity makes good, practical sense. For one thing, it makes for less clutter, waste and pollution. Writer Carey Goldberg said that despite its philosophical underpinnings, voluntary simplicity is “a path of practical details and idiosyncratic choices.” Those who subscribe to it say: “Buy only what you need; don’t go shopping for entertainment. Buy what you can use, and wear things out before replacing them. Dump household clutter. Move to a smaller place.”

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Tuesday, May 13, 2008
By Bruce Wallace

MANILA, Philippines — Ask Josephine Gonzalez how many children a family should have, and the stick-figured 31-year-old mother answers without hesitation. "I only wanted three," she says, trying to soothe the naked baby boy who tugs at her ragged dress.

But Gonzalez is, in fact, a mother of six. Her sister, Angie Maquiran, two years older, has seven children. Together with the fathers, the pair are raising their families in a public park across the street from one of Manila's oldest Roman Catholic churches, sleeping on the ground, their possessions stuffed into a small cart that marks where home is.

Maquiran says the priests at the church tell her, "Children are riches, and the more you have, the more blessed you are." But health officials and some politicians here say that the Philippines has too many poor mouths to feed, an overpopulation problem that condemns millions of children to poverty.

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Wed Apr 23, 2008
By Manny Mogato

BANAUE, Philippines (Reuters) - As the Philippines grapples with its worst food crisis in years, many farmers in its cradle of rice cultivation are abandoning farming for more lucrative trades.

Lambuyong Burnag, a 70-year old tribal farmer, now poses for tourists' pictures in his multi-colored loincloth and plumed head-dress with the postcard-perfect Ifugao rice terraces in the northern Philippines as a scenic backdrop.

Instead of cultivating his own rice on the small patch of land he inherited, he uses the payment he receives from tourists to buy cheap rice distributed by the government to poor communities.

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Agence France-Presse
First Posted 15:20:00 04/02/2008

MANILA, Philippines -- Fifty rivers in the Philippines have been destroyed because people are using them to dump their rubbish, leaving some ecologically dead, Environment Secretary Joselito Atienza said Wednesday.

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Wednesday, March 05, 2008

ZAMBOANGA CITY - As public outrage against high-level corruption in government continues to snowball, different religious groups will hold a protest and prayer rally on Friday in Zamboanga City.

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By Luzi Ann Javier

Feb. 21 (Bloomberg) -- Twenty years ago, Juan Diego fought wealthy Philippine landowners and the government for the rights to a one-hectare (2.5-acre) rice paddy north of Manila. Now he's worried the Chinese may take his farm.

Chinese companies last year agreed to lease 1.2 million hectares in the Philippines to grow rice, corn and sugar. While President Gloria Arroyo says the $5 billion deal will help increase food production for Filipinos, local farmers and lawmakers have stalled the deal.

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By LISA A. BACON
Published: February 22, 2008

RICHMOND, Va. — A retired Roman Catholic priest was sentenced Thursday to more than five years in prison for bilking two churches out of hundreds of thousands of dollars while he led a double life as a husband and father.

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Nov 29, 200
By Karen Lema and Raju Gopalakrishnan

MANILA, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Philippine military and police teams stormed a luxury hotel in Manila on Thursday to end a short-lived coup attempt by a small group of soldiers and others who had called on the army to mutiny.

Government forces fired teargas into the lobby of the Manila Peninsula Hotel and used an armoured personnel carrier (APC) to batter down its glass doors before storming in under cover of repeated bursts of fire in the air.

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By DJ Yap
Inquirer
Last updated 06:58pm (Mla time) 10/26/2007

MANILA, Philippines -- It was “flower power” in the ’60s, “people power” in the ’80s, and now, activists are pinning their hopes on “panty power.”

Women activists hurled thongs, red bikinis, even granny underwear at the Myanmar Embassy in Makati City Friday, in an odd but culturally relevant protest targeting the military junta’s violent crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrations in the reclusive nation.

Mirroring protests in Australia, the United Kingdom and Thailand, the “panty protest” held particular significance for members of the junta who believe any contact with women’s undergarments could sap their strength.

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Posted: 04 October 2007 1604 hrs

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia-led ceasefire monitors will stay in the southern Philippines for now but Kuala Lumpur wants progress in stalled peace talks between Manila and Muslim rebels, a report said Thursday.

"They (Malaysian troops) will be extended but their extension cannot be indefinite," Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak was quoted as saying by The Star newspaper.

"We want to see progress in the talks," he added.

Najib, who is also defence minister, did not give details on how long Malaysian troops will remain in the troubled region.

A foreign peace monitoring team landed in the southern Philippines in October 2004. But talks between the Philippine government and Muslim rebels stalled last September.

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By Margaux Ortiz
Inquirer
Last updated 10:31pm (Mla time) 09/07/2007

MANILA, Philippines -- Agents of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) recently raided a Buddhist temple in Manila and apprehended six Taiwanese monks allegedly working without the required missionary visas.

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July 11, 2007
Agence France-Presse

Italian priest Father Giancarlo Bossi knew the dangers when he moved to his parish in the southern Philippines almost a decade ago.

In an area troubled by Muslim extremists, the tall mild-mannered 57-year-old Roman Catholic priest shared the hardships of both his Filipino parishioners and their Muslim neighbors.

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Wed Apr 18, 9:47 AM ET

MANILA (Reuters) - Dozens of men who whipped and cut their backs for a gory Good Friday ceremony in the Philippines risk contracting rabies after a fellow flagellant died of the virus earlier this month.
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The men shared a blade to rip their skin before flaying it to a pulp with a bamboo whip in the northern province of Pampanga. The ritual, which also involves voluntary crucifixions, is meant to mark the suffering of Jesus Christ.

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