Greetings: The Online Citizen wishes everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Koh Yi Na
Balldev Naidu (pictured on the left), a founding member of the Reform Party, has been extradited to the United States on charges of terrorism.
The 48-year-old businessman is believed to have been moved to the US sometime last Friday. There, he will face two charges of conspiring to provide arms and financial support to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in 2006, which were brought against him at an extradition hearing last month.
He is currently held at the Maryland Reception, Diagnostic and Classification Center in Baltimore, having previously been remanded at the CPL Building in Toa Payoh.
Balldev, who denies any involvement with the Tamil Tigers, will face a court hearing next Tuesday.
Until Wednesday night, Balldev’s wife had been unaware of his location in the US, as the Singapore police did not provide that information when they told her about her husband’s extradition last Friday.
The police had previously informed Mrs Balldev that her husband would be extradited between 16 and 18 December, but did not provide the exact date or any other details.
She last spoke to Balldev via video link on 17 December, during one of her regular visits. She had been refused a face-to-face visit that day, as the police claimed that he was being quarantined.
She was due to see him again at 1.05pm the next day. But less than an hour before their scheduled meeting, she received a call from the police informing her that he had already been sent to the US.
According to Mrs Balldev, requests for more information on Balldev’s extradition and exact location went unanswered by the police on Friday, and she was unable to contact them on Saturday as their office was closed.
On Sunday morning, she called the police’s main telephone line, and was directed to several different departments before being referred to the Criminal Investigation Department.
On Monday, she called the CID again, and received vastly differing reports from the various personnel she spoke to. Initially, she was told that her husband had been discharged and allowed to return home.
She was then referred to officer Kelvin Ang, who confirmed that her husband had been sent to the US. He also told her that he was not the officer in charge of Balldev’s case, and referred her to his superior, a woman named Neo Yin Shun.
There was no response when she attempted to call Ms Neo on Tuesday.
The Reform Party however managed to locate Balldev on Wednesday, and passed the information onto Mrs Balldev.
Mrs Balldev told TOC that the allegations against her husband were “not true at all”, and that he “had no dealings” with the Tamil Tigers. She added that he had no ties to Sri Lanka, other than some friends who were of Sri Lankan descent.
She also believes that her husband may have been set up by Haniffa bin Osman, a Singaporean who was convicted in 2007 in a Baltimore court for conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization and money laundering.
Osman is currently serving a 37-month prison sentence in the US.
In a statement released after Balldev’s extradition hearing in November, Kenneth Jeyaretnam, the Secretary-General of the Reform Party, said that he was “hopeful” that Balldev would be exonerated.
Founding member of Reform PARTY??? wow the MSM will go to town with this one…
Yup, I have just read the news, and I am surprised and shocked.
what does MSM stand for?
Hi S,
MSM = Mainstream Media e.g. State Times in Singapapore
If you want to consider tamil tigers as terrorist,then hamas,basque separatists,chechen rebels,taliban etc. should also be considered as terrorists. the term Terrorists is being misused by govts around the world to justify their own agenda.
Anyway,if this guy is framed,hope that justice will prevail.
MSM : MainStream Media (The Strait Times) not to be confused with MSMH…MeeSiam Mai Hum
MIW : Man In White
GLC : Government Linked Corporation
Some examples of Abbreviation in this blog…Please try mistake these or get them mix up with boybands like NKOTB…FOB…
What about those rich indo men who escpased taxes andhid in Singapore? Are they going to be extradited?
Is tamil tiger terrorist? For your information, it is generally accepted that the talibans, hamas, etc are terrorists. They employ terrorist methods, e.g. suicide bombings against civilians. I don’t think you are making a valid point. In fact you are undermining your own argument.
nowadays the dumb public only thinks that terrorists = muslims/arabs/oranyonewithabeardwholookslikearab
I hope he does not get involve in the coming election. PAP has no more triump card with Singaporeans other than this one. If KJ wants to win in the election, he better think of a better way now.
Thanks to the fact that the US is a benefitiary of INC’s investments, the extradition was so smoothly coordinated.
;)
The subject has been extradited and the US law will take it course. The thing that sickened me is the way our government handled the issue. What has it done to ensure that its citizen would have a fair trial. The Australian, British and US government stood up for their citizens when their citizens were involved in cases abroad. In the above case, it seem that the police here treated the subject as though he was already convicted. Keeping a subject locked up without trial for three months and not informing his family his extradition and his current whereabout is gross negligence on the part of the state to it citizen.
if he is being framed, i sincerely hope justice will prevail.
if he is a real terrorist, then kindly stay there and dun come back.
The way the police treat this case.
Trust Sing gahmen.
The man is already guilty in Sing.
The Yanks are paranoid.
The Afghans and Iraqis are fixing GI Joes there.
I am out of Sing and had lived outside Sing for seven years.
i suspect this case may drag on and on until…..u know right?
What a huge contrast when one compared members of the opposition parties with those in the PAP!
To be fair to the police whether informed of extradiction or not is not important because of the nature of the offence and keeping the wife informed may undermine the security effort..
I only hope that no one is frame and it is a fair trial.
[i] is tamil tigers terrorist? on December 25th, 2009 11.25 am If you want to consider tamil tigers as terrorist,then hamas,basque separatists,chechen rebels,taliban etc. should also be considered as terrorists.[/i]
hello friends singapoorium and county peasants…..
you all forgotton myamer general er si mi(you know we named our prize orchid under him)…….
his nephew whoever not residin in singapore mey?
Hifalutin! Just because Baldev joins the Reform Party and we must think that he must be got rid off! How naive? Is LTTE a terrorist group? Well ask the Sri Lankans! You all do not know the plight of the Tamils as well as the Sri Lankans.
The US has their own interpretation of their law. If Baldev is innocent then he should not be too concerned. Don’t think the Americans got nothing to do than to go catch a Reform Party man.
Mrs Baldev account trying to paint the police and Govt in a bad light cannot be believed in totality. If it is true also no big deal. The more important is hope husband is proven innocent, come home, give the PAP a hard time and get elected.
“She was due to see him again at 1.05pm the next day. But less than an hour before their scheduled meeting, she received a call from the police informing her that he had already been sent to the US.”
I smell a rat here! I don’t think he was even extradiated AT ALL!! Because, in the US, he would definitely have more rights that in a singapore prison. In the US, he should be able to engage an attorney and properly defend himself. And it will have ample press coverage. Until his wife actually meets him in a US prison, I dare say this saga is indeed a PAP sanctioned kidnapping under the guise of a joint anti-terror operation.
Why isn’t there much US media coverage such case? It definitely cannot be TOP SECRET, right?
Even the recent case of a US military computer hacker’s extradiation request was well covered.
“Why isn’t there much US media coverage such case? It definitely cannot be TOP SECRET, right?
Let’s see. An obscure South Asian man from a friendly but not well known nation is being extradited to the USA for possible connections to to a terror group that hasn’t been on the US radar for the past decade.
VS Tiger Woods mistresses, Christmas and the healthcare reform. I wonder why there’s been zero coverage.
By what international law has this person been extradited to the US? He has not committed an offence against the US government. He has been accused of working with the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka which in my opinion is a matter of concern of the Sri Lankan government alone. So why has the Sing government agreed to this extradition request by the US? Has the UN ruled that all those working with so-called terrorist organizations in any country should be tried in the US?
Can someone pleased explain !——– I was at the last days of the court hearing.
started @ 9.45am. Given a chance to explain & grace period to appeal. he has nothing to do for himself. Evidence was read throw in multiply sentences. RP Sg (KJ) did not appeal himself to the hearing in many occasion. Why is voice so louds that the Party will support and stand behind him. Good LIar.