There is no doubt that Van Nguyen’s death will add to the impetus for a campaign against the death penalty, no matter what the crimes or disposition of the victims of state-sanctioned murder. The comments of the Amnesty representative on Lateline tonight are worth pondering in this context.
There has been much discussion of Van Nguyen’s disposition in the lead up to his death. There is also no doubt of his courage and the exemplary manner in which he went to his grave as a victim of state sanctioned murder. The horrendous logic of equivalence where a life is taken for a life ought to be held in absolute contempt and is an evil calculus, and the lives of dead heroin addicts (two of whom I number among my friends) are cheapened and insulted by those who seek any shred of justification to indulge their barbaric death instinct. Every human life is precious, and should be valued equally and cherished, regardless of what any of us have done to hurt others. The sadness that accompanies Van Nguyen’s death is heightened by the possibility he displayed in his final weeks of redemption, and the true sorrow he felt for his straying off the paths of righteousness. Who of us cannot empathise? It’s clear that what has been taken from all of us, and most importantly from those who loved him deeply, is the fruits of his change of heart. Human lives, no matter what terrible deeds we do at times, always contain possibilities of growth, redemption and love. What gives the state the right to snuff these possibilities out?
Let he who is without sin, cast the first stone.
Vale, Van Nguyen.
Memorare, O piissima Virgo Maria, non esse auditum a saeculo, quemquam ad tua currentem praesidia, tua implorantem auxilia, tua petentem suffragia, esse derelictum. Ego tali animatus confidentia, ad te, Virgo Virginum, Mater, curro, ad te venio, coram te gemens peccator assisto. Noli, Mater Verbi, verba mea despicere; sed audi propitia et exaudi. Amen.
Amen.
Amen here too.
What a sick, wicked crime.
Boycott Singapore, forever.
Its boring as batshit anyway; full of late capitalist automatons. Whole so-called “country” is a total waste of time, if you ask me. You wouldnt miss it much if , say, Malaysian irrendentist invaded. A shitehole Rogue Chinese port, where the locals are so banjo-pluckingly primtive, even oral sex is illegal. Half-arsed, backward pack of dipshits.
Fuck ‘em.
Amen, indeed.
Lefty Elitist:
Sheesh, pal, sorry you couldn’t get your next hit from Nguyen’s stuff. You must be right mad, so why not branidsh your switchblade and try scoring some crack money from the next immigrant down the street?
Jeez, you’re a fuckin facist, aren’t you? I wouldn’t miss you much either if you throw your-motherfuckin-self off a building.
And oh, rake in the Hitlers and war-whores in your own backyard before you start unleashing your spit on others.
The really exciting thing about “eye-for-eye” justice comes when the body charged with dispensing justice takes an innocent life.
Somehow that’s okay though. In fact taking thousands of lives, even millions, is okay, as long as you hide within a group to do it.
Jg apparently has no logic or reason to use, and resorts to schoolyard insults. The level of mentality that accompanies those tin pot despots who want to inflict punishments out of all proportion to the crime. Fascism, indeed.
firstly the title is absurd.
He is dead so any prayers are irrelevant.
Thanks for linking my comments.
You have not made a defence of your moral equivalence ie a person who murders another human being in cold blood compared to a person facing punishment , capital, because of that deed.
Not even latin makes it sensible
I’ve always found Singaporeans to be warm, generous people. Their streets are safe to walk down, even at night. LE’s attack is unfounded and filled with unnecessary spite.
No society is perfect, and this law is difficult for us to comprehend, but it is well promoted, and no one who attempts to move illicit drugs in or out off the country can be in any doubt that there are severe penalties involved. Van Nuygen must have known the risks.
At the same time I was appalled at the lack of mercy shown to the family of Van Nguyen, which didn’t seem characteristic of the people. In the end his mother was allowed some form of contact, but it seemed inadequate in the circumstances.
I agree with yoou, Mark, that people who show genuine remorse should be given another chance, and legal systems should allow for this. The death penalty is tragically final, and leaves no way out for the penitent. Justice with mercy.
This is an appropriate launching pad for a discussion of Singapore and the coming ‘clash of civilisations’ (which need not necessarily be martial, I think it will be mostly in the use of soft power).
I am no great fan of Singapore (as someone born in Malaysia, its relatively poorer cousin that Singaporeans regard as ‘anarchic’ compared to its own Truman Show environs) but I agree that LE’s comments are filled with unnecessary bile against its inhabitants. You might as well blame North Koreans for being sheeple too.
True, they are better educated and wealthier than North Koreans but this only gives the lie to the argument that economic growth by itself can inexorably lead towards liberalism – in most cases yes, but not with a resourceful government like Singapore’s which relies on very subtle and insidious means of cracking down on dissent (libel suits for instance and targeted public housing not to mention using the media as its PR arm) while presenting a facade of superficial Westernisation and frivolities to distract its citizens or at least keep them sufficiently comfortable that they won’t kick up too much of a fuss. Notwithstanding that there is a not insubstantial network of civil libertarians in the island whose efforts should be encouraged, something which can’t be done by demonising the entire community.
And let’s not forget a not insubstantial percentage of the Australian population supported the execution of Van Nguyen and that Harry Lee has his admirers in the West – among those who wrote paeans of praise on the jacket covers of his autobiographies have been luminaries such as Lady Thatcher, Henry Kissinger, and many former members of the Reagan Administration. I believe Sir Joh also forms a mutual admiration society with the Senior Lee.
Singapore has been created in the image of ‘Harry’ Lee and his personal ideology is essentially a throwback to the days of Confucian Legalism which strangled the ancient civilisation of China and led to its slow but inevitable decline that killed its initial dynamism. But people never learn and apparently China is now looking to Singapore as its model. But make no mistake that this Sino-fascism which combines a sort of State directed capitalism, and excellent rule of law in the *commercial* sphere with a contempt for ‘frivolous’ civil liberties and ‘licentious’ sexual freedoms does not have its adherents in the West today as well among the talkback callers and poplist conservatives. Though I believe this philosophy is inevitably self-undermining it can last a lot longer than Communism not least because it is utterly pragmatic in its ability to draw on the fruits of modernism such as physical and biological scientific research (which as the USSR demonstrated, can flourish to some degree even absent individual freedom), and hence the stage is set for the future clash of civilisations through the exercise of soft power. In a way because this ideology is so much more appealing than Islamo-fascism, it is a more serious antagonist.
sorry, Mark, went off on a bit of a tangent there once I got started. Feel free to move this to Saturday Salon if you think it better belongs there.
Alright!
And stay tuned for next week, when I get shitfaced and vilify another small country.
Im thinking Belgium.
jg should remember not to insult other commenters.
Mark, even though I can’t interpret the latin, I believe you have made the only response a true Christian could make. It moved this old atheist. Thank you.
LE I think your reaction was, if rough, in some ways understandable under the circumstamces. I must admit I felt as if something was missing when I heard Van Nguyen has been hanged, and I wouldn’t know him from a bar of soap, nor do I think he was doing anyone any favours by trying to bring herion into the country. It felt like a family member had been rashly taken away. How do you explain this?
There’s something about the national psyche which creates an empathy with others when they’re in trouble under another regime, even when they mess up big time. Anyway, LE, I think your reaction echoed this point in another way.
Thanks Facelift…. and sorry Singaporeans, cant really blame you for your government, since its only nominally democratic.
I know what you mean FL. I didnt sleep well Thursday night, couldnt stop thinking about Nguyen. And his Mum and brother. What a hellish fate to endure, for all three. And for what? So little fish like Nguyen pay the price for the big dealers – who are in fact in bed with key elements of the Burma-backing Singaporean elite.
Anyway – made me angry & sad.
Amen Mark. Let’s hope some good comes out of all this barbaric madness in relation to people’s tolerance of capital punishment in Singapore.
I woke up early on the morning he was executed thinking of him and then again this morning. It’s a shocking and horrible thing, to which piquancy was added by the deceased convict.
One quibble though Mark. I’m passionately against the death penalty, but I hope not self righteously. I didn’t like this sentence in your post
If the death penalty did save lives (and I’m not saying it does, but I suspect it might) then I wouldn’t be so self-righteous. I’d just stick to my gut revulsion towards the death penalty, my intuition that it demeans and cheapens all of us, and (probably) stay opposed to the death penalty on those grounds. But I wouldn’t accuse those who disagreed with me of “indulging their barbaric death instincts”.
Further, judging by the success of people like Martin Luther King, Ghandi and Nelson Mandela, I wonder if hate-speech on something like this is all that helpful.
What Jason said, a good tangent to take…….and what Zoot sais as well.
Guy, that could well be the case, now that Singapore has really shown a lack of class and contempt for Australia by parading Nguyen’s body through the streets.
I might add by implication Mark and other likeminded people does not put a very high value on a human life.
“A shitehole Rogue Chinese port, where the locals are so banjo-pluckingly primtive”. Right. Because we disagree with the death penalty, which is in operation in at least 75 countries, that means all Singaporeans are “primtive” rogues. Pray tell, do you actually know any Singaporeans?
Read the thread Steve.
And yes, Ive spent time there. Oral sex is illegal, pot runners are murdered with a rope, and 5 people cant meet in public without a permit.
Lets not get too sentimental about the place.
As if any decent right-winger would want to have oral sex … [sarcasm]
Oral sex banned in Singapore???
But you can still put the old fella in the tradesmans entrance surely?
Ok so let’s just say there shouldn’t be any exceptions to the gravity of the crimes – be it for drugs traffickers, murderers, perpetuators of terrorism, and yes, even for Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein – if you are really against capital punishments. But Aussies themselves have not been the most consistent advocates in applying this, have they, if it didn’t concerned an Australian’s fate?
Read and weep:
http://www.nswccl.org.au/issues/death_penalty/aust_policy.php
http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/12/02/news/singapore.php
I don’t oppose the death penalty for some crimes but I do agree that the mandatory death penalty for drugs trafficking should have taken into account extenuating circumstances like Van Guyen’s although the Singapore gov’t may also argue that every drug trafficker out there probably have a sob story to tell, which I wouldn’t deny and, tell me, where would it end.
Saying a drug mule shouldn’t have been punished because he is a small fry is also akin to saying the Bali terrorists shouldn’t be punished because they’re small fries in the distorted world of Islamofacism and not quite Bin Laden or Hambali himself. But weren’t Aussies baying for blood after the Bali 2002 attacks?
And would any Aussies here have disagreed with the Singapore gov’t if, say, they’d caught a terrorist en route in transit to Melbourne strapped with bags of bombs, and say, “he was only in transit” and shouldn’t have been hanged because he was going to hurt Melbourne and not Singapore?
No. And that’s how we conclude that most Aussies are simply flippin’ hypocrites.
“And yes, Ive spent time there. Oral sex is illegal, pot runners are murdered with a rope, and 5 people cant meet in public without a permit.”
Of course, LE, they don’t allow that when you’re spending time behind bars.
“Singapore has ordered a theatre director to remove all references to the death penalty in a play to be staged on Saturday – a day after the execution of Australian drug smuggler Nguyen Tuong Van, a Singapore newspaper said.” link
jg
1) Van Nguyen was an Australian citizens and therefore a special interest was taken in his case. His relatives live here
2) The Van Nguyen sympathisers are a broad church. Some are consistent anti-capital punishment activists, some were taken by his plight because of (1) above, but more importantly you don’t have to consistently oppose capital punishment to find his execution barbaric. Many of us here don’t equate drug running with terrorism. It takes 2 parties to make a drug transaction – a buyer and a seller. It is a problematic transaction and consumption may have social costs but it is ultimately a consensual one. Even those who don’t take the anti-prohibitionist line would argue that the response was not proportionate to the crime. So no hypocrisy involved.
That news item is so frigging typical and is exactly how the government keeps its populace anaesthetised and infantilised.
“Saying a drug mule shouldnÄôt have been punished because he is a small fry…”
Nobody said that jg. We’re saying they shouldnt be murdered.
As for the rest of your post, it show the tolerance of dissenting views Singapore is so famous for.
The level of discussion from some commenters belongs in Andrew Bolt’s forum. On LProdeo, I expected the emotional maturity to distinguish between the Singapore government’s policies and the country as a whole.
LE’s reaction is not ‘understandable under the circumstances’. Let’s call a spade a spade: labelling Singapore a “shithole rogue Chinese port” and its inhabitants “primitive, banjo-plucking locals” is racism, unadulterated and venomous. It plays to the Singaporean press line about Australia being a bastion of neocolonialist Anglo hypocrites.
A lot of people think Australia is a pipsqueak country full of Asian-baiting rednecks – maybe even a ‘shithole’ -but that doesn’t make it true. So let’s hold the bile on countries whose laws or political system we have issues with.
1) Van Nguyen was an Australian citizens and therefore a special interest was taken in his case. His relatives live here
Which is to say were Van Nguyen a Chinese national or, a Malaysian or, a Burmese, Australia wouldn’t have “a special interest.” That just corroborate conclusions of hypocrisy.
Many of us here donÄôt equate drug running with terrorism.
Well you should, it IS a valid analogy.
Even those who donÄôt take the anti-prohibitionist line would argue that the response was not proportionate to the crime. So no hypocrisy involved.
Aw.. come on Jason, who you kidding – you’re Malaysian -! if Van Nguyen transited in Malaysia instead of Singapore, he’d be executed too.
But of course if that’d happened, Jason, your moral highground would likely sinked faster than the reputation of Malaysian police.
So no hypocrisy involved? You’re wearing the one with the biggest badge, pal.
I’d like to clarify that the execution of Van was most unfortunate and I’d have preferred if he wasn’t even caught in the first place, but as stated in numerous news articles, he knew the risks, he knew the penalty – which is death by hanging – and yet he chose to walk down that path.
But why should anyone be so desperate as to risk death and traffick in drugs in the first place? Weren’t there anyone he could turn to for help? Where was his church? Where were the authorities? Where were his fellow Aussies who could have help him and his family? (Don’t even get me started on how Australia treat immigrants and refugees) It’s interesting how not a single caucasian – save for the lawyers – came for his vigil. Did Van even had a single white friend in pre-dominantly White Australia? Or did he and his family – being immigrants – felt like outcasts in Australian society?
So who failed him? Australia or Singapore?
Because – trust me – Van Nguyen would still be alive today if his mother had chosen to come to Singapore instead.
“Aw.. come on Jason, who you kidding – youÄôre Malaysian -! if Van Nguyen transited in Malaysia instead of Singapore, heÄôd be executed too. ”
And why is that, jg? I was born in Malaysia. I’m an Australian citizen now. So what? Does that mean I wouldn’t criticise my country of birth? Why the f*** wouldn’t I? People do it all the time, except perhaps for Singaporeans. Is this more an indication of how typically parochial you are and how you are brought up to love your government?
oh and another thing, jg, note that in my previous comments I carefully distinguished between criticising the Singaporean government and its people. Stick to the arguments rather than rampantly casting aspersions as you have been.
“DonÄôt even get me started on how Australia treat immigrants and refugees)…
Because – trust me – Van Nguyen would still be alive today if his mother had chosen to come to Singapore instead.
”
Don’t make me laugh, jg. Singapore wouldn’t take a single Vietnamese refugee during the Boat People rush (and to be fair since jg perceives that I am mystically bound to Malaysia and must answer to its government, neither did Malaysia).
Good to see my drunken outburst riled up a few. I hope you’re Singaporeans: I urge you get right up your government over this backward, barbaric policy. Its an embarrassment to the fine, upstanding (etc) citzens of your city-state.
And yeah, Australia’s crap and hypocritical for all sorts of reasons. Im afraid the tu quoque argument wont get this commentator too interested; I’m not remotely nationalist by nature. But Ill give Oz one thing: we’ve abolished the death penalty. That puts us light years ahead of the 75 lesser civilisations that havent.
LE, what makes you assume your critics on this thread are Singaporeans? Maybe they’re Australians who think you’re giving ammunition to the Andrew Bolts and Janet Albrechtsens out there, who want to paint the Left as *elitist* hypocrites with the same small-minded prejudices as everyone else.
I hope you have the moral guts to admit that the term “lesser civilisation” is 19thC lingo that conjures images of the White Man’s Burden. It belongs on Stormfront.org rather than a blog with intellectual pretentions like this one.
Learn to debate without bellitling those who don’t conform to your moral standards. You can stand against the death penalty without blanket smearing of countries which still apply it.
For what it’s worth, I didn’t read LE’s comments as racist. Singapore is predominantly Chinese and it is a port, hence factually it is a Chinese port. LE also thought it was a shithole (rightly or wrongly) so he appended that descriptor to it, much like one might describe Apartheid-South Africa as a ‘shithole Dutch trash swamp’. And he was outraged over the execution of a Vietnamese Australian citizen.
The adjective ‘Chinese’ doesn’t add anything except perjorative racial connotations. By the same logic you could call Australia an ‘Anglo-celtic penal colony,’ but most Aussies would rightly find that offensive and unconstructive.
Recall that the ‘Chinese rogue port city’ comment first came from Gough Whitlam, the PM who opened relations with China during the Cultural Revolution. For us to run with that comment implies that we consider Singapore, which has gone in four decades from a resourceless colony to one of the richest nations in the world, more deserving of censure than Mao’s PRC. Think for a moment how that plays with non-Australians.
No objective observer denies that Singapore is a tightly-run oligarchy which smothers political dissent and civil society. But being upset over Nguyen’s execution doesn’t entitle one to throw racist slurs or vilify/misrepresent the country as a whole.
And btw, calling Apartheid South Africa a ‘shithole Dutch trash swamp’ was no more acceptable than LE’s comments about contemporary Singapore. Do you think Nelson Mandela would have endorsed that description of his country, even when he was being tortured in prison?
A lot of people think Australia is a pipsqueak country full of Asian-baiting rednecks …
A few Australians would agree with them.
Hey John Lee, you need to quote people in context and flow with the thread a little better. I see LE said ‘sorry Singaporeans’ somewhere along the line. I note that a few of us got into him as well. The point is that many people from different sides of the ideological spectrum showed support for Van Nguyen, were disappointed at the outcome and expressed themselves in different ways.
By the way, saying, ‘LetÄôs call a spade a spade’ can also be mistaken as racist in certain contexts. I know that’s probably not what you meant, but…
Australia, awake from your slumber!
Awake from your slumber, Australia!
Awake before it is too late!
Today a son of yours has been killed.
DonÄôt you care? DonÄôt you care, Australia?
Certainly, it is your prodigal son.
Certainly, he has wandered away from home.
Today, your son has been killed.
DonÄôt you care? DonÄôt you care, Australia?
Where is your fatherhood?
Where is your motherhood?
In your warm bed how could you sleep?
O Australia, donÄôt you care of your wandering children?
How many more of them will be killed?
Will you leave them to their fate?
Will you say it was their fault?
Australia, where is your parenthood?
You do not kill your children if they commit fault.
How could you let your neighbors kill them?
True, you have warned them of the danger.
Is that the reason for you to ignore their death?
How could you shake hands of the killers?
Was your face veiled by money?
Is the business deal with your neighbors more important?
Or are you careless about your childrenÄôs lives?
How could you keep a big smile with your neighbors?
How could you claim your successful reign,
When your children are being slaughtered in your sight?
Australia, arise from your sleep before it is too late!
Australia, where is your fatherhood?
Where is your motherhood?
How many more of your children will be killed?
Will you leave them to their fate?
Awake, Australia! Awake, before it is too late!
What can you tell God about your parenthood?
What will you leave in the memory of your children
From generation to generation and for ever?
Minh Bui
In memory of Van Nguyen
A drug trafficker killed by the Singapore Government
2nd December 2005
As is well known, the lesser civilisations who have the death penalty include all but 12 states of the USA. So much for John Lee’s silly defensiveness.
Incidentally, what is your view on the death penalty? You’ve neglected to mention it. Instead, youve run the same tired old, intellectually dishonest “Western critics of the Singaporean state must be racist” line that comes two for a buck in any SE Asian authoritarian state.
And well said Minh.
And Eric on the other thread (Can I book an irredental appointment, Dr Mahathir?).
Interesting that Mark points out (rightly) that not all deaths are equivalent, yet links to an interview on Lateline where the Fallacy of Moral Equivalence (http://humbugonline.blogspot.com/2005/12/all-morals-are-not-made-equal.html) is argued?
Interesting that Mark points out (rightly) that not all deaths are equivalent, yet links to an interview on Lateline where the Fallacy of Moral Equivalence (http://humbugonline.blogspot.com/2005/12/all-morals-are-not-made-equal.html) is argued?
LE, I haven’t run any ‘line’. I’ve pointed out your own remarks that show contempt for others, lack of objectivity and an inability to separate issues. Your first post clearly shows bigotry towards Singaporeans as individuals, and your use of the word ‘Chinese’ can’t be read as anything but a racial slur. A throwaway “sorry Singaporeans” further down doesn’t erase that, especially when you refer to them as a “lesser civilisation” in a later post.
If you’d bothered to read my posts (or my blog), you’d see I’m no apologist for Singapore’s political order. I recently had a nasty personal experience in Singapore, in which a well-connected local threatened to assault me and boasted of his immunity from the courts. So I’m well aware of the ugly side behind the gleaming skyscrapers and per capita GDP figures. But I don’t judge the whole society on the basis of that one experience, and neither should you based on Nguyen’s execution.
And yes, I oppose the death penalty. As it happens one of Nguyen’s friends is a former classmate of mine, so I have a personal connection to this tragedy.
Well JL, we could continue this argument, but I think you need to reread the whole thread first, since you really arent getting it.
Jason and Facelift have been following it from the start, why dont you read their recent posts.
Incidentally, before you assail me with more tendentious distractions (we are talking about the death penalty here, you know) here’s a heads-up: “Rogue Chinese port” is a quote – EG Whitlam.
You’ve been chasing a mirage for two days now.
If you’d read the thread LE, you’d see I referenced Whitlam in my third post. Quoting someone doesn’t exonerate you of the quote’s connotations.
As for mirages and tendentious distractions, I’ve addressed your arguments in each of my posts, whereas I’ve yet to see you do me the same courtesy.
Why don’t we call this off before it gets more unpleasant. We agree on the core issue – the death penalty shouldn’t apply for drug trafficking – so let’s avoid a tit-for-tat scrap over Nguyen’s dead body. I don’t think he’d want that…
Actually it is surprising how many Australians were happy to see Van Nguyen hang, despite the enormous and sympathetic coverage that he and his mother received. In a recent Roy Morgan poll about half the population though VN should swing for the crime, the other half thought he should just do time.
Popular support for the death penalty is one area where the generally more conservative cultural trend has not continued over the nineties/naugties. Australians do seem to be softening their attitude towards it:
Do you support it, Jack?
Zoot, there’s a translation of the Latin prayer here.
How does one square the 57/36% split on the abstract death penalty question with the 47/46% split over Nguyen?
Q3 didn’t specify quantity of drugs or mitigating circumstances, so it left room to support the DP for trafficking in principle while opposing it in this particular case. Still, the result makes you wonder how much people think when they do these polls….
I have to say van death is a real shame. The seller and the receiver of the parcel are not punished. Van paid his life to help his brother.
As a child abuse I know for a fact that most of them, to ease their pain use drugs to lessen it. No I do not use it but I could have.
Van was only a courrier and if you want to did in the wealth of Singapore, you may find that it has a lot to do with heroin.
Leave this country alone, I mean by that do not go near it, in transit or any other way, I had I bad feeling when I went there.
Van is a victim nothing more nothing less and wanted to help his family quickly, bad mistake but he did not deserve death.
On the other hand, child abuse as far as I am concerned can have it with my consent.
who in their right mind would want to go to a sterile police-state like singapore full of money-hungry, snotty and uninteresting people anyways? Ive been there for a friends wedding and couldnt wait to get the hell out of their..boring, boring, boring….Van, may you rest in peace forever.
I was a friend of van, i was also with him the day he left. He did not say anything to me, something was on his mind… but he didnt want to talk about it….
He gave the girls a rose each and said cheerish this forever….
I think van felt his debts were to big to repay… and if he didnt… his life and brothers life would be at stake,,,,
HE DID THIS WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE….. so what u hear in the papers is true… his brother did not know… being the oldest in his family he took all resposiblity..
Van once said to me ” i hate drugs, and how it kills innocent people, i hate how gangs make there brothers sell drugs… i would never make any of my brothers sell drugs cause i care for them too much”…..
When i heard the news i did no believe it…. it was a total shock to me..
Van was a normal kid but only troubled… no police record… his was more like a brother to his friends.. every one respected his words..
So being hanged on your first conviction,,,, fuck u singapore, who the still hangs people in this day and age…
Though i agree Van is Guilty of his crime.. a longer jail sentance would have been more suitable.
so, Van was 22 years old when he commited a crime..he was just a kid.God knows how many mistakes i made when i was that age but the journey of growing up is all about learning from our mistakes. Singapore, you murdered a young man who was on this journey of redemption..you denied him any chance of becoming a better person and i truly beleive that in one way or another, god will punish you.
People fuck up but they certainly do not deserved to be hanged/murdered for their mistakes no matter what century we live in…….shame on you singapore, you are an embarrassment to humankind.
what Van did was wrong, but i will NEVER forgive singapore for what they did to him….NEVER.
let go of your pride singapore and get off your high horse.
You have just embarrassed yourself infront of the world and ought to be ashamed of yourselves for the brutality you showed on the 2nd dec and every other murder that took place and will take place in the future…God will forver be with you Van.