1. **Indonesia:** While Indonesia lacks national laws against adultery, some regions, like Aceh province, follow strict Sharia law. Adultery and being alone with someone of the opposite sex can lead to a nine-month jail sentence.
2. **Nigeria:** Northern states in Nigeria adhere to Sharia law, which criminalizes adultery. The Penal Code of Northern Nigeria prescribes imprisonment for up to two years and/or a fine for adultery.
3. **Taiwan:** Adultery is against the law in Taiwan, with third parties facing four months in jail, and cheating spouses potentially serving a year. Despite efforts to abolish the law, a 2013 survey showed majority support for keeping it in place.
4. **Philippines:** Engaging in sexual intercourse with someone other than one’s spouse is a criminal offense in the Philippines. Both cheaters can face jail time, with women potentially serving up to six years and men up to four and a half years. If a man cheats on his wife, the woman involved may be exiled for four years and one day.
5. **Somalia:** Somalia takes adultery seriously, imposing severe penalties. Anyone who has ever been married, even divorcees, can be found guilty of adultery, punishable by stoning to death. Unmarried individuals engaging in premarital sex may face 100 lashes. Note that enforcement and interpretations of these laws may vary, emphasizing the importance of understanding local customs when traveling.
Indonesia has formally apologised over the manhandling of a Nigerian diplomat in the South-East Asia country.
A viral of video of Mr. Mohammed Buba, an accredited Nigerian diplomat, being rough-handled by Indonesian immigration officials, had surfaced online earlier, prompting Nigeria to threaten to review its relationship with the country.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs regrets the incident on August 7th,” Indonesian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Teuku Faizasyah said, the Associated Press reported on Thursday.
“This is an isolated incident, and is in no way related to the commitment of the Indonesian government in carrying out its obligations as host country or in accordance with the Vienna convention on diplomatic relations.”
Faizasyah added that Indonesia has launched a formal investigation into the incident.
‘Unfortunate incident’ Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs had condemned the incident, which took place on Saturday.
The viral video of the event shows at least three men in a vehicle assaulting the Mr Buba, ignoring his screams of pain.
While two of the men held his hands and pinned him down in the backseat, another freely assaulted his unprotected head as he cried out in pain.
“The unfortunate incident is against international law and the Vienna Conventions governing Diplomatic and Consular Relations between states,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday.
In its drive to further curtail the menace of banditry occasioned by the marauding activities of unknown gunmen often speculatively associated with Fulani nomads, Sokoto state government is mulling the modernisation of animal health centers across the state.
Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal of Sokoto State made this known when he received the Indonesian Ambassador to Nigeria, AVM Usra Hendra Harahap and his team who are in the state for a working visit at Government House, Sokoto.
The release by the SA Media to Governor Tambuwal Muhammad Bello said the drive towards this initiative is geared towards addressing the challenges of cattle rearing, farmers-herdsmen clashes that has catalyzed security challenges in the country.
In order to achieve this feat, the governor stated that his administration is poised to partner the Indonesian government, the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) and the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing system for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL).
According to him, the target of this partnership is to avail farmers in the state and even neighbouring states as well as Niger Republic the opportunity of livestock rearing without the intermittent skirmishes that accompany it.
He also reiterated that the state government is giving attention to agricultural mechanization and plan to engage the private sector by giving them incentives to establish plants in the state.
Applauding the Indonesian embassy for its sustained interest and collaboration with the state in many sectors, Governor Tambuwal said the technical support that the state Zakkat and Waqf Commission (SOZECOM) have been enjoying from the Indonesian government is yielding the desired results.
He listed other areas of support from the Asian giant as: education, including theprovision scholarships to Sokoto State indigenes, health, agriculture and others.
He noted that were it not for the debilitating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic the state’s technical team would have gone far in its development of the required templates to fast track the realization of the thematic areas of cooperation.
He also appreciated the Indonesian embassy’s outreach to indigent areas of the state where both last year and the current one Ambassador Harahap and his wife have donated items to the less privileged.
Tambuwal said this gesture shows the personal attachment of the envoy a d his country to the development of the people of Sokoto in addition to the deeper collaboration and cooperation between the two entities.
Earlier in his remarks, AVM Harahap expressed satisfaction with the level of commitment between his country and Sokoto State, noting that the bilateral relationship, now slowed by the COVID-19 pandemic, has nonetheless reached advanced level.
Top of the list he said is his country’s consideration for the reformation of the Almajiri system of education, with a view to remodeling it by providing basic needs such as clothing, shelter, medical facilities and and empowerment to the students.
An Indonesian man collapsed as he was flogged nearly 150 times Thursday for raping a child in conservative Aceh province, where public whipping is a common punishment for violating Islamic law.
The 19-year-old grimaced and cried out as a masked sharia officer lashed his back with a rattan stick in the town of Idi. He pleaded for the punishment to stop and was briefly treated by doctors before the flogging restarted.
The man was arrested earlier this year on charges he molested and raped the victim, whose age was not revealed.
He was sentenced to 146 lashes, a particularly high number reserved for the most serious crimes.
“The maximum sentence is meant to be a deterrent,” Ivan Nanjjar Alavi, an official from the East Aceh prosecutor’s office, told reporters.
Aceh, on the western tip of Sumatra, is the only region in Muslim-majority Indonesia to impose Islamic law under an autonomy deal with the central government that ended a long-running separatist insurgency.
Also on Thursday, a 40-year-old and a 21-year-old man were whipped 100 times each for having sex with underage partners. Aceh’s public whippings — widely criticised by rights groups — can attract hundreds of spectators, but crowds have dwindled in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
The province allows whipping for a range of charges — including gambling, adultery, drinking alcohol, and having gay or pre-marital sex. It has wide support among Aceh’s mostly Muslim population.
Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo, on Tuesday, said he had signed a regulation to let the government significantly raise spending in its fight against the coronavirus and widen the 2020 budget deficit to 5.07 per cent of GDP.
Widodo also announced a national public health emergency and said the government would spend 405.1 trillion rupiahs ($24.85 billion) more on COVID-19 response, social welfare programmes and economic stimulus, including a three percentage point cut in corporate tax rates to 22 per cent.
The emergency regulation is effective immediately, but parliament must approve it to turn it into law in its current session. (Reuters)
The Indonesian Ministry of Health on Friday said the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Indonesia had surpassed 1,000 after 153 more people tested positive for the disease.
According to the ministry spokesperson, Achmad Yurianto, the number of cases as of Friday has risen to 1,046.
Yurianto said that the death toll from virus-related conditions rose to 87, after the death of nine more patients.
Meanwhile, 20 tons of medical equipment donated by China to support Indonesia’s fight against the coronavirus arrived in Jakarta on Friday.
An official at the Foreign Ministry, Santo Darmosumarto, said that the equipment donated by the Chinese Government include: test kits, masks, gloves, medical goggles and other personal protective equipment.
Darmosumarto added that another 20 tons were expected to arrive on Saturday.
Earlier, China sent 150,000 rapid test kits and other tools to Indonesia.
A public health professor at the University of Indonesia, Hasbullah Thabrany, said that the coronavirus outbreak in Indonesia was expected to reach its peak in about one month.
“It’s in early stages,” Thabrany said.
The Indonesian Government had so far ruled out a lockdown, but several provinces had already imposed travel restrictions and a ban on large gatherings. (dpa/NAN)
