3 killed, 1 injured in a plane crash in South Florida near a major highway

World

April 12, 2025

BOCA RATON, Florida (AP) — Three people were killed and one was injured when a small plane crashed Friday morning in South Florida near a major interstate highway and pushed a car onto railroad tracks, officials said.

Boca Raton Fire Rescue assistant chief Michael LaSalle said the plane crash that killed all three people on board emitted a fireball when it hit the ground, injuring a person in a nearby car. LaSalle said several roads near the Boca Raton Airport will remain closed near Interstate 95.

The Federal Aviation Administration identified the plane as a Cessna 310 with three people on board. It went down about 10:20 a.m. after departing from Boca Raton Airport bound for Tallahassee, the FAA said in an email.

Fire officials told the South Florida Sun Sentinel that the aircraft appeared to have pushed a car onto the railroad tracks, leading to the tracks’ closure.

Emergency crew inspect the site of a small plane crash Friday, April 11, 2025 in Boca Raton, Florida. PHOTO: AP Photo

Josh Orsino, 31, said he was stopped at a red light at a nearby overpass when he heard a loud explosion and saw a huge fireball come toward him.

Orsino said everyone was honking and trying to get off the overpass, not sure if it was going to collapse.

Miguel Coka, 51, who works near the Boca Raton airport, said he is used to seeing planes flying low as they prepare to land. But this time, he and his colleagues noticed something was off.

“There was a rumble and everyone in the building felt it,” he said when the plane crashed. “We are all shocked.”

He captured the smoke and flames from the crash from his office balcony on video.

Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer said the investigation was just beginning.

“We are deeply saddened to confirm that a plane crash occurred earlier today within our community. At this time, details are still emerging, and we are working closely with emergency responders and authorities,” Singer said in a statement. “Our thoughts are with all those affected by this tragic event. We ask for patience and respect for the families involved as investigations continue.”

The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating, with the NTSB leading the probe.

NTSB officials arrived at the scene Friday afternoon and began collecting evidence and taking photos as part of their preliminary investigation. The plane wreckage will be taken to a salvage facility in Jacksonville for further investigation. The NTSB will release a preliminary report in 30 days, followed by a final report with the likely cause of the crash in 12 to 24 months.

Emergency personnel respond to the area where a small plane crashed on the railroad tracks beneath the overpass near Interstate 95 in Boca Raton, Florida, on Friday, April 11, 2025. PHOTO: South Florida Sun-Sentinel via AP

The small plane crashed in South Florida a day after a New York City sightseeing helicopter broke apart in midair and crashed upside-down into the Hudson River, killing the pilot and a family of five Spanish tourists.

Federal officials have tried to reassure travelers that flying is the safest mode of transportation, and statistics support that. But aircraft collisions and near-misses have been drawing more scrutiny.

A midair collision killed 67 people near Washington in January. An airliner clipped another in February while taxiing at the Seattle airport. In March, an American Airlines plane caught fire after landing in Denver, sending 12 people to the hospital.

European countries pledge billions in military aid for Ukraine

World

April 12, 2025

BRUSSELS (AP) — European countries vowed Friday to send billions of dollars in further funding to help Ukraine keep fighting Russia’s invasion, as a U.S. envoy pursued peace efforts in a trip to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin amid growing questions about the Kremlin’s willingness to stop the more than three-year war.

Russian forces hold the advantage in Ukraine, with the war now in its fourth year. Ukraine has endorsed a U.S. ceasefire proposal, but Russia has effectively blocked it by imposing far-reaching conditions. European governments have accused Putin of dragging his feet.

In Russia, the Kremlin said Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff met with Putin in St. Petersburg. Witkoff, who has been pressing the Kremlin to accept a truce, initially met with Putin envoy Kirill Dmitriev, footage released by Russian media showed.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Witkoff during his visit to Russia was discussing efforts to end the war with Putin and other officials. “This is another step in the negotiating process towards a ceasefire and an ultimate peace deal,” she said.

Russian state news agency RIA Novosti said Witkoff’s meeting with Putin lasted 4 1/2 hours, and cited the Kremlin as saying that the two discussed “aspects” of ending the war, without providing any details.

After chairing a meeting of Ukraine’s Western backers in Brussels, British Defense Secretary John Healey said that new pledges of military aid totaled over EUR21 billion (USD24 billion), “a record boost in military funding for Ukraine, and we are also surging that support to the frontline fight.”

Healey gave no breakdown of that figure, and Ukraine has in the past complained that some countries repeat old offers at such pledging conferences or fail to deliver real arms and ammunition worth the money they promise.

NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said last week that Ukraine’s backers have provided around USD21 billion so far in the first three months of this year. European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Friday that more than USD26 billion have been committed.

Britain’s Defense Secretary John Healey, left, talks with Ukraine’s Defense Minister Rustem Umerov during a meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Friday, April 11, 2025. PHOTO: AP

Ahead of the “contact group” meeting at NATO headquarters, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said a key issue was strengthening his country’s air defenses.

Standing alongside Healey at the end of it, Umerov described the meeting as “productive, effective and efficient,” and said that it produced “one of the largest” packages of assistance Ukraine has received. “We’re thankful to each nation that has provided this support,” he said.

Britain said that in a joint effort with Norway just over USD580 million would be spent to provide hundreds of thousands of military drones, radar systems and anti-tank mines, as well as repair and maintenance contracts to keep Ukrainian armored vehicles on the battlefield.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has renewed his appeals for more Patriot systems since 20 people were killed a week ago, including nine children, when a Russian missile tore through apartment buildings and blasted a playground in his home town.

Zelenskyy joined Friday’s meeting by video link.

Russia holds off agreeing to ceasefire

The Russian delay in accepting Washington’s proposal has frustrated Trump and fueled doubts about whether Putin really wants to stop the fighting while his bigger army has momentum on the battlefield.

“Russia continues to use bilateral talks with the United States to delay negotiations about the war in Ukraine, suggesting that the Kremlin remains uninterested in serious peace negotiations to end the war,” the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank, said in an assessment late Thursday.

Washington remains committed to securing a peace deal, even though four weeks have passed since it made its ceasefire proposals, State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce said.

Flags of the Alliance members flap in the wind prior to a coalition of the willing defence ministers meeting at NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, Thursday, April 10, 2025. PHOTO: AP

Observers expect a new Russian offensive

Ukrainian officials and military analysts believe Russia is preparing to launch a fresh military offensive in coming weeks to ramp up pressure and strengthen the Kremlin’s hand in the negotiations.

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said that his country would provide Ukraine with four IRIS-T short- to medium-range systems with missiles, as well as 30 missiles for use on Patriot batteries. The Netherlands plans to supply a Hawkeye air defense system, an airborne early warning aircraft.

Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said that his country is monitoring the world armaments market and sees opportunities for Ukraine’s backers to buy more weapons and ammunition.

Pevkur said he believes Putin might try to reach some kind of settlement with Ukraine by May 9 — the day that Russia marks victory during World War II — making it even more vital to strengthen Kyiv’s position now.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was absent from the forum that the United States created and led for several years, although he spoke via video.

At the last contact group meeting in February, Hegseth warned Ukraine’s European backers that the U.S. now has priorities elsewhere — in Asia and on America’s own borders — and that they would have to take care of their own security, and that of Ukraine, in future.

Scientists map mouse’s brain’s ‘galaxy like’ region

Features

April 12, 2025

WASHINGTON (AP) – Thanks to a mouse watching clips from The Matrix, scientists have created the largest functional map of a brain to date – a diagram of the wiring connecting 84,000 neurons as they fire off messages.

Using a piece of that mouse’s brain about the size of a poppy seed, the researchers identified those neurons and traced how they communicated via branch-like fibres through a surprising 500 million junctions called synapses.

The massive dataset, published by the journal Nature, marks a step toward unravelling the mystery of how our brains work.

The data, assembled in a 3D reconstruction coloured to delineate different brain circuitry, is open to scientists worldwide for additional research – and for the simply curious to take a peek.

“It definitely inspires a sense of awe, just like looking at pictures of the galaxies,” said one of the project’s leading researchers at the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle Forrest Collman. “You get a sense of how complicated you are. We’re looking at one tiny part… of a mouse’s brain and the beauty and complexity that you can see in these actual neurons and the hundreds of millions of connections between them.”

Associate Director of Informatics Forrest Collman, Data Analyst Leila Elabbady and Senior Investigator Clay Reid reviewing neuron reconstructions. PHOTO: AP

A digital representation of neurons in a section of a mouse’s brain. PHOTO: AP

How we think, feel, see, talk and move are due to neurons, or nerve cells, in the brain – how they’re activated and send messages to each other. Scientists have long known those signals move from one neuron along fibres called axons and dendrites, using synapses to jump to the next neuron. But there’s less known about the networks of neurons that perform certain tasks and how disruptions of that wiring could play a role in Alzheimer’s, autism or other disorders.

“You can make a thousand hypotheses about how brain cells might do their job but you can’t test those hypotheses unless you know perhaps the most fundamental thing – how are those cells wired together,” said Allen Institute scientist Clay Reid, who helped pioneer electron microscopy to study neural connections.

With the new project, a global team of more than 150 researchers mapped neural connections that Collman compares to tangled pieces of spaghetti winding through part of the mouse brain responsible for vision.

The first step: Show a mouse video snippets of sci-fi movies, sports, animation and nature.
A team at Baylor College of Medicine did just that, using a mouse engineered with a gene that makes its neurons glow when they’re active. The researchers used a laser-powered microscope to record how individual cells in the animal’s visual cortex lit up as they processed the images flashing by.

Next, scientists at the Allen Institute analysed that small piece of brain tissue, using a special tool to shave it into more than 25,000 layers, each far thinner than a human hair.

With electron microscopes, they took nearly 100 million high-resolution images of those sections, illuminating those spaghetti-like fibres and painstakingly reassembling the data in 3D.

Finally, Princeton University scientists used artificial intelligence to trace all that wiring and “paint each of the individual wires a different colour so that we can identify them individually”, Collman explained.

They estimated that microscopic wiring, if laid out, would measure more than five kilometres. Importantly, matching up all that anatomy with the activity in the mouse’s brain as it watched movies allowed researchers to trace how the circuitry worked. The Princeton researchers also created digital 3D copies of the data that other scientists can use in developing new studies.

Could this kind of mapping help scientists eventually find treatments for brain diseases?

The researchers call it a foundational step, like how the Human Genome Project that provided the first gene mapping eventually led to gene-based treatments. Mapping a full mouse brain is one next goal.

“The technologies developed by this project will give us our first chance to really identify some kind of abnormal pattern of connectivity that gives rise to a disorder,” another of the project’s leading researchers Princeton neuroscientist and computer scientist Sebastian Seung said in a statement.

The work “marks a major leap forwards and offers an invaluable community resource for future discoveries”, wrote Harvard neuroscientists Mariela Petkova and Gregor Schuhknecht, who weren’t involved in the project.

The huge and publicly shared data “will help to unravel the complex neural networks underlying cognition and behaviour”, they added.

Flood worsens situation of Putra Heights fire victims

Southeast Asia

April 12, 2025

KUALA LUMPUR (BERNAMA) – The residents of Kampung Kuala Sungai Baru and Kampung Tengah, Malaysia still reeling from the aftermath of the gas pipeline fire in Putra Heights, Subang Jaya, Selangor on April 1, have been by another catastrophe after being struck by floods yesterday morning.

Heavy rain since early this morning forced residents in both villages to be re-evacuated to the temporary relief centre at Masjid Putra Heights.

Mohd Kamalzaman Pauzi, 39, said his house, located less than 100 metres (m) away from the river at Kampung Kuala Sungai Baru, began to be inundated at about 6am, forcing him, his wife and their three children, aged six to eight, to evacuate to the relief centre as instructed by the Malaysian Fire and Rescue Department (JBPM).

“The river water began to rise at about 4.20am but we only evacuated when the situation worsened.

“Within a week, we have moved here (to the relief centre) twice. I haven’t even had time to get over the fire and now we have been hit by floods,” he told Bernama when met at the relief centre.

Mohd Kamalzaman said that since it has stopped raining, there is a possibility that they may be allowed to go back home today and clean their house of all the mud due to the flood. He added that since they rented a house in the village five years ago, they have been hit by floods three times, with the worst ones being in December 2022 and March 2023.

“During the first two times, we were forced to move to higher grounds near the tahfiz centre and we had to use ropes to get across due to the river’s strong currents,” he said.

He also said that he could only stand and watch helplessly this time as rainwater poured into his house because the roof, which was affected by the gas pipeline fire, had yet to be repaired.

“The roof over our kitchen area was affected by the fire, so all the utensils and things kept there get wet whenever it rains,” said the burger seller.

A vehicle drives through a flooded area in Malaysia. PHOTO: BERNAMA

Pilgrimages and tourism

Features

April 12, 2025

HO CHI MINH CITY (AP) – Hamburger Hill, Hue, the Ia Drang Valley, Khe Sanh: Some remember the Vietnam War battles from the headlines of the 1960s and 1970s, others from movies and history books. And thousands of Americans and Vietnamese know them as the graveyards of loved ones who died fighting more than a half-century ago.

Today the battlefields of Vietnam are sites of pilgrimage for veterans from both sides who fought there, and tourists wanting to see firsthand where the war was waged.

“It was a war zone when I was here before,” reflected United States (US) Army veteran Paul Hazelton as he walked with his wife through the grounds of the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City, which was known as Saigon when he served there.

Hazelton’s tour just shy of his 80th birthday took him back for the first time to places he served as a young draftee, including Hue, the former Phu Bai Combat Base on the city’s outskirts, and Da Nang, which was a major base for both American and South Vietnamese forces.

“Everywhere you went, you know, it was occupied territory with our military, now you just see the hustle and bustle and the industry, and it’s remarkable,” he said.

“I’m just glad that we’re now trading and friendly with Vietnam. And I think both sides are benefiting from it.”

The history and the museum recounting it Vietnam’s war with the US lasted for nearly 20 years from 1955 to 1975, with more than 58,000 Americans killed and many times that number of Vietnamese.

ABOVE & BELOW: Vietnamese flags fly on the Hien Luong Bridge with a memorial in the distance at the former border between North and South Vietnam, Quang Tri province; and tourists pose for photos in front of Independence Palace in Ho Chi Minh City. PHOTO: AP

A tourist moves in a narrow tunnel passage in the relic site of Cu Chi tunnels in Ho Chi Minh City. PHOTO: AP

A gardener waters flowers outside the rebuilt Kien Trung Palace in the Imperial City within the Citadel of Hue. PHOTO: AP

For Vietnam, it started almost immediately after the nearly decade-long fight to expel the colonial French, who were supported by Washington, which culminated with the decisive defeat of French forces at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.

The end of French Indochina meant major changes in the region, including the partitioning of Vietnam into Communist North Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh, and US-aligned South Vietnam. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the fall of Saigon to North Vietnamese and Viet Cong guerrilla troops, and the 30th anniversary of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between the US and Vietnam.

Tourism has rebounded rapidly since the COVID-19 pandemic and is now a critical driver of Vietnam’s growth, the fastest in the region, accounting for roughly one in nine jobs in the country. Vietnam had more than 17.5 million foreign visitors in 2024, close to the record 18 million set in 2019 before the pandemic.

The War Remnants Museum attracts some 500,000 visitors a year, about two-thirds of whom are foreigners. Its exhibits focus on American war crimes and atrocities like the My Lai massacre and the devastating effects of Agent Orange, a defoliant widely used during the war.

The US was to open the first exhibit of its own at the museum this year, detailing Washington’s extensive efforts to remediate wartime damage, but it is indefinitely on hold after the Trump administration slashed foreign aid.

Other wartime sites in Saigon, which was the capital of South Vietnam, include the South Vietnamese president’s Independence Palace where North Vietnamese tanks famously crashed through the gates as they took the city and the Rex Hotel where the US held press briefings derisively dubbed the Five O’clock Follies for their paucity of credible information.

On the northern outskirts of the city are the Cu Chi tunnels, an underground warren used by Viet Cong guerrillas to avoid detection from American planes and patrols, which attracts some 1.5 million people annually.

Today visitors can climb and crawl through some of the narrow passages and take a turn at a firing range shooting targets with war-era weapons like the AK-47, M-16 and the M-60 machine gun.

“I can understand a bit better now how the war took place, how the Vietnamese people managed to fight and protect themselves,” said Italian tourist Theo Buono after visiting the site while waiting for others in his tour group to finish at the firing range.

Former North Vietnamese Army artilleryman Luu Van Duc remembers the fighting firsthand, but his visit to the Cu Chi tunnels with a group of other veterans provided an opportunity to see how their allies with the Viet Cong lived and fought.

“I’m so moved visiting the old battlefields – it was my last dying wish to be able to relive those hard but glorious days together with my comrades,” the 78-year-old said.

“Relics like this must be preserved so the next generations will know about their history, about the victories over much stronger enemies.”

The former Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) where the country was split between North and South in Quang Tri province saw the heaviest fighting during the war, and drew more than three million visitors in 2024.

On the north side of the DMZ, visitors can walk through the labyrinthine Vinh Moc tunnel complex, where civilians took shelter from bombs that the US dropped in an effort to disrupt supplies to the North Vietnamese.

The tunnels, along with a memorial and small museum at the border, can be reached on a day trip from Hue, which typically also includes a stop at the former Khe Sanh combat base, the site of a fierce battle in 1968 in which both sides claimed victory.

Today, Khe Sanh boasts a small museum and some of the original fortifications, along with tanks, helicopters and other equipment left by US forces after their withdrawal.

Hue itself was the scene of a major battle during the Tet Offensive in 1968, one of the longest and most intense of the war.

Today the city’s ancient Citadel and Imperial City, a UNESCO site on the north bank of the Perfume River, still bears signs of the fierce fighting but has largely been rebuilt. West of Hue, a little off the beaten path near the border with Laos, is Hamburger Hill, the scene of a major battle in 1969.

About 500 kilometres to the southwest near the Cambodian border is the Ia Drang valley, where the first major engagement between American and North Vietnamese forces was fought in 1965.

Fighting in North Vietnam was primarily an air war, and today the Hoa Lo Prison museum tells that story from the Vietnamese perspective.

Sardonically dubbed the “Hanoi Hilton” by inmates, the former French prison in Hanoi was used to hold American prisoners of war, primarily pilots shot down during bombing raids.

Its most famous resident was the late Senator John McCain after he was shot down in 1967.

“It was kind of eerie but fascinating at the same time,” said Olivia Wilson, a 28-year-old from New York, after a recent visit.

“It’s an alternative perspective on the war.” – David Rising & Hau Dinh

Single mother charged with abusing daughter

Southeast Asia

April 12, 2025

KANGAR (BERNAMA) – A single mother pleaded not guilty in the Malaysian Sessions Court yesterday to a charge of abusing her 11-year-old daughter.

Ong Yiing Jy, 33, who is a convert, made the plea before Judge Sharifah Norazlita Syed Salim Idid.

The self-employed woman was charged with abusing her biological daughter in a room in Taman Kangar, at about 6am on April 6.

She was charged under Section 31(1)(a) of the Child Act 2001 (Amendment) 2006 and faced imprisonment for up to 20 years or a fine of up to MYR50,000 or both if convicted.

The court allowed her bail of MYR10,000 with one Malaysian surety. She was also ordered to report herself at a police station on the first day of every month and not to intimidate the victim.

Judge Sharifah Norazlita set May 16 for mention for the submission of documents and appointment of counsel.

The prosecution was conducted by Deputy Public Prosecutor Nabilah Ahmad Poad.

Police officers escort Ong Yiing Jy at the Malaysian Sessions Court. PHOTO: BERNAMA

Stronger than ever

Advertorial

April 12, 2025

Baiduri Bank celebrates record profits and excellent performance

Delivering strong financial performance

2024 has proven to be yet another milestone year for Baiduri Bank. Celebrating our 30th anniversary, the Baiduri Bank Group achieved its highest-ever net profit, surpassing BND 100 million for the first time.

At Baiduri Bank specifically, our net profit reached BND 95.1 million in 2024, up from BND 90 million in 2023 —marking another historic record. This remarkable achievement reflects our sustained growth, disciplined cost management, and diversified income streams, consistently strengthening our market leadership and credibility.

Our growth in profitability was achieved alongside continued financial stability, demonstrated by a strong Return on Equity (ROE) of 14.93%, significantly above the industry average of 11.8%.

These results clearly illustrate our effective use of resources and ongoing commitment to delivering value to our stakeholders.

Baiduri Bank’s sound financial health was also internationally recognised through Standard & Poor’s reaffirmation of our A-/A-2 rating with a stable outlook for the third consecutive year in 2024—validating our prominent role within Brunei’s banking sector as a reliable financial partner.

In recognition of our strong performance across the board, Baiduri Bank also achieved a clean sweep of six major industry awards in 2024, including Best Bank in Brunei by Euromoney and Bank of the Year by The Banker, reflecting regional and international confidence in our strategy and results.

Solid performance across all business areas

These record financial results in 2024 were driven by strong contributions from every division of the Bank, including Corporate Banking, Retail Banking, Treasury and our subsidiaries.

In Corporate Banking, we significantly enhanced our capabilities through participation in major syndicated loan arrangements. A notable highlight was our involvement in Atome Financial’s USD 200 million syndicated credit facility, led by global financial institutions including HSBC. This strategic partnership strengthened our regional presence and enhanced our expertise in managing cross-border financial services and complex financing transactions.

In Retail Banking, Baiduri Bank introduced key innovations such as the Home Loan Centre, providing simplified and personalised mortgage advisory services, particularly catering to young professionals and first-time homebuyers. Additionally, we launched Tap2Pay—Brunei’s pioneering mobile-based contactless payment solution—making digital transactions simpler and more affordable for SMEs.

In Treasury, we successfully managed high-interest-rate environments, notably in international markets such as Singapore, generating robust returns while meticulously managing risk exposure.

In 2024, Institutional Banking was restructured as a separate business unit from Treasury to focus on developing commercial activities with counterparty banks worldwide, particularly those based in Singapore. This expansion has strengthened our ability to serve the evolving needs of institutional and large corporate clients, reinforcing our market position and supporting sustainable growth.

Baiduri Capital also marked a key milestone in 2024 with the launch of Baiduri Invest, a digital investment platform providing local investors with seamless and secure access to diversified investment opportunities, reinforcing our commitment to wealth management solutions.

Investing in digital transformation

Digital transformation continued to be a key strategic priority for Baiduri Bank in 2024. We made significant progress in modernising our core banking systems, particularly through the ongoing development and implementation of the Temenos Core Banking System—a state-of-the-art, cloud-based Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform. This new infrastructure will greatly enhance our digital capabilities by providing increased scalability, connectivity, and operational efficiency through advanced Application Programming Interface (API) integrations.

In 2024, Baiduri Bank expanded our Robotic Process Automation (RPA) initiatives, deploying 37 automated processes across various departments and significantly reducing operational times. Additionally, 29 employees were trained as certified citizen developers, further enhancing productivity and customer service standards.

Commitment to sustainability

In 2024, sustainability continued to be central to our strategy, shaping the way we operate and deliver value. Baiduri Bank undertook a comprehensive materiality assessment, engaging key stakeholders to identify and prioritise the sustainability issues most relevant to our operations and community. This assessment guided the development of a structured Baiduri Greenprint built around three strategic pillars: People, Process, and Planet.

Further affirming our global commitment, Baiduri Bank became a member of the United Nations Global Compact, aligning our sustainability efforts with international standards and demonstrating our aspiration to drive meaningful change. Additionally, we appointed our first Head of Sustainability to oversee and accelerate these initiatives, reinforcing sustainability as an integral aspect of our corporate culture and strategic direction.

Strengthening community bonds through CSR

Our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) efforts play an essential role in supporting and enabling the Bank’s broader sustainability framework. Structured around three core pillars—Social, Economic, and Environmental—our CSR programmes deliver tangible impact closely aligned with our Sustainability strategy.

These strategic initiatives focus on environmental conservation, promoting social welfare, and fostering economic empowerment within our communities. By actively engaging in these areas, our CSR programmes reinforce our commitment to sustainable growth and responsible banking practices.

Developing our greatest asset—our people

At Baiduri Bank, we firmly believe that our greatest asset is our people. In 2024, we achieved record levels of employee engagement, with a 73% engagement score in our annual survey—well above regional benchmarks.

We continued to prioritise talent development, filling 108 roles internally and reducing staff turnover to just 1.7%. Our training programmes focused on future-facing skills such as generative AI, sustainability, digital process innovation, and business analytics, while our leadership development initiatives strengthened succession planning across the organisation.

A key highlight was Baiduri Bank being recognised on the regional stage as ‘Brunei Employee Engagement of the Year’ at the 2025 Asian Management Excellence Awards—affirming our commitment to building a capable, engaged, and future-ready workforce.

Looking ahead with optimism

Aligned with our long-term strategic vision, Baiduri Bank is laying the groundwork to support future opportunities beyond our domestic market—scaling up capabilities, strengthening governance and risk management, and enhancing the infrastructure required to meet the demands of a more interconnected financial landscape.

2024 has been exceptional, defined by outstanding financial results, resilience, and sustained innovation.

We proudly celebrate these achievements, deeply grateful for the continued trust and support of our customers, employees, partners, and stakeholders. As we move into 2025, Baiduri Bank remains committed to co-creating a future defined by shared progress and lasting impact—driving sustainable growth, innovation, and excellence, and reinforcing our role as a trusted financial partner well into the future.

Boris Johnson gets surprise peck from ostrich in Texas

World

April 12, 2025

AP – Former British prime minister Boris Johnson received a memorable welcome from an ostrich at a state park in Texas when the towering two-legged bird gave him a peck, according to a video.

In the video, posted by his wife Carrie Johnson, an ostrich slowly walks toward a car before poking its head through the driver’s seat window where Johnson is sitting with his son on his lap. Once in front of Johnson, the bird quickly pecks its beak toward his hand as he yelled, before driving off in the video.

“Too funny not to share,” Carrie Johnson said in the caption on Instagram.

It is not clear which wildlife park they were visiting, but other posts on the same account show the family visiting Dinosaur Valley Park, about 128 kilometres southwest of Dallas.

Boris Johnson, who served as prime minister from 2019 to 2022, was also spotted with his wife at a local restaurant in Lake Granbury, Texas, last Sunday, according to the restaurant’s Facebook page.

File photo shows former prime minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, delivering a speech at a Conservative Party campaign event at the National Army Museum in London. PHOTO: AP

Australian woman unknowingly gives birth to stranger’s baby after IVF clinic error

World

April 12, 2025

WELLINGTON (AP) – A woman in Australia unknowingly gave birth to a stranger’s baby after she received another patient’s embryo from her in vitro fertilisation clinic due to “human error,” the clinic said.

The mix-up was discovered in February when the clinic in the city of Brisbane found that the birth parents had one too many embryos in storage, said the provider, Monash IVF, in a statement supplied yesterday. Staff discovered an embryo from another patient had been mistakenly thawed and transferred to the birth mother, a spokesperson said.

Australia news outlets reported the baby was born in 2024. Monash IVF didn’t confirm how old the child was. The company, one of Australia’s biggest IVF providers, said an initial investigation had not uncovered any other such errors. Its statement didn’t identify the patients involved or divulge details about the child’s custody.

“All of us at Monash IVF are devastated and we apologise to everyone involved,” said CEO Michael Knaap. “We will continue to support the patients through this extremely distressing time.”

The “human error” was made “despite strict laboratory safety protocols being in place,” the statement said. The company said it had reported the episode to the relevant regulator in the state of Queensland.

Monash IVF opened in 1971 and sees patients in dozens of locations throughout Australia. Last year, the firm settled a class-action lawsuit from more than 700 patients, making no admission of liability, after claims its clinics destroyed potentially viable embryos.

The clinic paid a settlement of AUD56 million (USD35 million).

Rare cases of embryo mix-ups have been reported before, including in the United States (US), Britain, Israel and Europe. A woman in the US state of Georgia in February filed a lawsuit against a fertility clinic after she gave birth to a stranger’s baby.

Krystena Murray realised the error after the baby’s birth because she and her sperm donor were both white and the child was Black. Murray said she wanted to raise the baby but voluntarily gave the five-month-old to his biological parents after she was told she would not win a legal fight for his custody.

In Australia, each state makes its own laws and rules governing the use of IVF, which advocates say puts patients at risk of error or oversight failings. Queensland’s Parliament passed its first laws regulating the sector in 2024.

The measures will establish a registry for all people conceived at a clinic and made the destruction of donors’ medical histories illegal.

This image from video shows an exterior view of the Monash IVF clinic in Brisbane, Australia. PHOTO: AP

Two trapped in metro construction site collapse near Seoul

World

April 12, 2025

SEOUL (AFP) – At least two people were trapped yesterday when a construction site for a new metro line collapsed near the South Korean capital Seoul, the National Fire Agency said.

The site was part of an underground transit project connecting Seoul’s Yeouido district to Ansan and Siheung in Gyeonggi province, the country’s most populous region. The National Fire Agency said the collapse occurred during “tunnel reinforcement work”.

Two people have been confirmed trapped, but further details are still being verified, the agency said in a statement.

One of the two has been located and was being rescued, but the other – an excavator operator – remains missing.

The National Fire Agency added that 55 firefighters had been deployed for the rescue operation.

The site had already been evacuated due to safety concerns early yesterday morning, before the collapse, and police had closed off a one-kilometre stretch of road around the construction area. A police official told local media that a site supervisor had reported cracks in an underground support column, which led to a joint response with city authorities.

“There were concerns over possible ground subsidence, so we blocked the road as a precaution,” the official told reporters.

Police said they would keep the road closed until the reinforcement work is finished and the site is deemed to be safe. The incident comes just weeks after one person was killed when a massive sinkhole opened up in Seoul. The sinkhole accident took place at a site where extension work for a different metro line was underway.

Borneo Bulletin OnlineThe Independent Newspaper in Brunei Darussalam, Sabah and Sarawak

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