December 10, 2013 Edition

The Philippines told its nationals in Yemen to come home after raising crisis alert level 3 over the Middle Eastern Country. Philippine foreign affairs spokesman Raul Hernandez said the Philippines will shoulder the repatriation costs of Filipinos who want to come home. The Philippines raised the alert level after 7 Filipinos died in an attack on Yemen’s defense ministry last week. Latest government estimates put the number of Filipinos in Yemen at 2,190. The Philippines placed Yemen under crisis alert level 1 since 2012. Last week’s attack on the complex followed a series of strikes on military personnel and officials. The Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claims responsibility for the attacks.

Read the full story on Rappler.

President Benigno Aquino is leaving for Japan for the ASEAN-Japan commemorative summit, where the two countries will discuss a possible defense treaty. Aquino said he is open to a possible pact with Japan in the wake of growing tension in the West Philippines Sea better know as the South China Sea. Japanese defense minister Itsunori Onodera said they are looking at a “framework agreement” to be able to deploy troops faster in situations like in typhoon Yolanda. In his visit to Manila, Onodera highlighted the need for a peaceful resolution of the regional conflict with various countries concerned about China’s Air Defense Identification Zone which it established over disputed islands in the East China Sea. Japan also promised to help the Philippines defend its territory.

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US Secretary of State John Kerry will make his first trip to the Philippines, where he will visit the storm-hit city of Tacloban. The US diplomat will go first to Vietnam before heading to the Philippines. Kerry planned to visit the Philippines back in October, but the trip had to be cancelled because of a storm. The upcoming trip will be Kerry’s fourth visit to Asia while in office. The country’s central region is still struggling to recover after Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) hit a month ago. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Kerry will tour Tacloban to “witness first-hand the recovery efforts that are taking place there and discuss how the United States to continue to contribute to the relief and reconstruction work.”

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As the world celebrates human rights day and a month after a super typhoon hit, bodies still lie along the coastline of Timex compound in Village 88 of San Jose, Tacloban City.  At least 1,000 died in a population of 11,000.  Many corpses remained impaled on trees or caught under fishing cages.  This documentary by Pat Evangelista and her team tells the story of intertwining narratives of 3 fathers: Ramil Navarro, Edwardo Aboganda and William Cabuquin.  They tell us the horror of daily life – of living with decisions that can’t be unmade, of bodies of friends and ghosts of families, of the gruelling struggle to survive.  

Read the full story on Rappler.

The National Statistical Coordination Board or NSCB said poverty incidence among Filipino families fell only slightly in 2012 despite the Philippines’ high economic growth. NSCB Secretary General Jose Ramon Albert said the percentage of poor families is at 19.7% in 2012. It’s almost unchanged compared to the 2009 figure of 20.5% and 2006 figure of 21%.  Albert added the number of poor Filipino families rise to 4.2 million in 2012 from 3.8 million in 2006 because of the country’s growing population. The government considers a family poor if its monthly earnings are less than the poverty threshold. The poverty threshold for 2012 is P5,513 per month — the amount required for a family to meet basic food needs. JC Punongbayan, a young economist who works with the World Bank said Typhoon Yolanda single-handedly reversed years of progress in the war against poverty.

Read the full story here and here.

US and British intelligence spied on the global online gaming world because of fears terrorists could use the hugely popular platform to plot attacks. Citing classified documents from US fugitive Edward Snowden, The New York Times said the spies created characters in the fantasy worlds of Second Life and World of Warcraft to carry out surveillance, recruit informers and collect data. The Times said, “Fearing that terrorist or criminal networks could use the games to communicate secretly, move money or plot attacks, the documents show, intelligence operatives have entered terrain populated by digital avatars that include elves, gnomes and supermodels.”

Read the full story on Rappler.

The wife of revered democracy leader Nelson Mandela, Graca Machel has barely been seen in public in the wake of the icon’s death. Friends of the family say she is holding up, “Graca is very strong. She is a polished woman, I didn’t see her break down.” Machel was Mandela’s third wife, and he was her second presidential husband. She was the widow of Mozambican president Samora Machel who died in a plane crash in 1986. She was 27 years younger than Mandela when they married on his 80th birthday in 1998. A formidable political operator in her own right and a renowned rights campaigner, Machel took time to win over South Africans. A UN expert on children in armed conflict, she is also leading a global campaign against child brides. In 2010 Time magazine named her among the world’s 100 most influential people. Mandela’s fellow Nobel peace laureate, archbishop Desmond Tutu said South Africans owed Machel a “tremendous debt of gratitude” for the joy she brought Mandela in the latter stages of his life. Her initial relations with Mandela’s ex-wife were extremely frosty, with Winnie mocking her as the president’s “concubine.” Mandela’s illness helped forge a bond between the two women.

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A woman who said she was raped and the two journalists who reported her story are sentenced to jail for defamation in Somalia. A Somali court hands a suspended six-month sentence to the 19-year-old woman for “defamation and lying,” while the two journalists are sentenced for defamation and insulting state institutions. The alleged victim said she was raped at gunpoint by two fellow journalists. The accused reporters were not arrested. Al Jazeera reports it is the second time this year that Somalia jailed a woman for reporting rape. It is one of the most sensitive topics in the country.

Read the full story on Aljazeera.

What do you give your techie loved ones this Christmas? A new smartphone or tablet, a new computer, or maybe a cool new accessory for one of their existing devices? The possibilities are endless, but it can be tough to make these decisions when gadgets aren’t your thing. To make it easier for you, Rappler hung out with a bunch of tech aficionados to help you pick out the perfect Christmas gift for the techie in your life.

TechRap anchor Michael Josh Villanueva spoke to guests from the geek world to find the ideal geek gift list. Find out here.

More high-tech gifts coming your way this Christmas means more e-waste – waste that comes from discarded devices like dead computers, broken gadgets, or spent batteries. The toxic substances in these devices can harm the environment. This Christmas, you can reduce your e-waste footprint by keeping these guidelines in mind: have broken electronics repaired or outdated components upgraded; pass unwanted electronics to friends for reuse; collect spent batteries and label them properly; and donate usable electronics to charities.

Read the full story on Rappler.