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ZUL OTHMANzul@mediacorp.com.sg

SINGAPORE — An Estonian ship engineer w ho punched an air steward, damaged an LCD monitor and tried to kiss and bite his fellow passengers onboard a Singapore Air lines f l ight , w as yesterday f ined $15,000 for being drunk and endangering the flight.

So violent was Vadim Bel-janin, 41, during that journe y from Frankfurt to Singapore on Dec 29 last year, that i t took three stew ards to re-strain him. The plane also had to make an unplanne d land-ing in Dubai t o offload him .

W hat t he unruly pas-senger cost t he ai r l i ne in damages, extra fuel and the unscheduled stop: Near ly $50,000, according to Deputy Public Prosecutor (DPP) Gay Hui Yi y esterday.

The Estonian had board-ed the flight with a bottle of whisk ey, whic h he was seen t aking sw igs f rom . A few hours later, he was drunk and was annoying passengers. He tried to kiss the person seated beside him and pushed the seat in fr ont of him.

When ai r stew ard Sim Yew Tiong, 47, advised Bel-janin to behave, the lat ter began punching t he LCD moni tor of the infl ight en-tertainment system in front of him until his f ists bled.

Mr Sim later took him to the toilet to clean his wounds. But despite repeated warn-ings, Beljanin continued kick-ing and screaming.

The cabi n cr ew w as forced to put him in a re-straining kit, and in the proc-ess, he punched Mr Sim in the face. Beljanin refused to calm dow n and t r ied to bite pas-sengers seated nearby.

When the crew informed the captain of what was going on, he decided to divert the plane to nearby Dubai Airport

Unruly air passenger fined $15,000

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only if governments time stimulus withdrawal properly: GIC deputy chairman Tony Tan

TAIPEI — The global economy could continue to rebound str ongly in the coming quarters but the recovery risks being scutt led if governments w ith-draw their stimulus policies prematur ely, deputy chairman of Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC) Tony Tan said yesterday.

“A key challeng e for policymak ers is how to properly t ime the w ithdrawal of unprecedented monetary and fiscal policies. The recovery could be derailed if withdr awal is too early or t oo sharp.

“However, policymak ers run the risk of creat-ing excessive inflation over the medium term, if emergency levels of policy st imulus are left un-changed for too long,” Dr Tan said at an economic forum in Taipei.

His remarks w ere echoed by Internat ional Monetary Fund managing di rector Dominique Strauss-Kahn at a press conference yesterday in Tokyo, w here the lat ter caut ioned governments against exiting stimulus measures too quickly as this could trigg er another do wnturn.

GIC is one of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds w ith investments in over 40 countries across a w ide spectrum of industries, and w ith assets esti-mated at between $200 billion and $300 billion.

Noting that the global economy had rebounded after hitting a tr ough in the first half of last year, Dr Tan said the recovery had been “st ronger in economies that are not over-leveraged and have room for huge fiscal st imulus such as those in Asia, led by China and India, Brazil”.

UNEVEN RECOVERY AND BUBBLESGlobal grow th could hit between 3 and 4 per cent this year after contr acting close to 2 per cent last year, he said. He added the recovery would be uneven, with the str ongest perf ormanc e coming from the emerging market economies, especiall y those in Asia. These w ill “benefit from an expected pick-up in global t rade and manufacturing” and “str ong balance sheet fundame nt als”, he said.

But Dr Tan w arned that pol icymakers in emerging economies would lik ely be challeng ed with managing inflation an d asset price bubbles.

“Cont inued low interest rates could push prices higher and eventuall y lead to bubbles. Like in the early 1990s, managing large capit al inflo ws and prospective bubbles will be a major task for policymak ers,” he said.

But with crisis comes oppor tunity . The global financial crisis of the last tw o years has lef t West-ern banks st ruggling, leaving “ the playing field unusually open for Asian financial inst itut ions and markets”, Dr Tan said.

GLOBAL ECONOMY

Strong rebound but ...

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in the news3Malaysian minister says

Christians in Borneo are allowed to use the word ‘Allah’.

4Visitors to Resorts World Sentosa will enjoy free entry

tomorrow, as the integrated resort opens its first retail belt.

12A diplomatic row has erupted after United

States military aircraft were given priority at Port-au-Prince’s congested airport.

16Britain’s Prince William charms New Zealanders

during his first official trip overseas on behalf of his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II.

30The hits and misses on the red carpet at the 67th

annual Golden Globe Awards.

35French football club Etoile and China’s Beijing

Guo’an were officially confirmed yesterday as the 11th and 12th teams in the S-League.

37Maria Sharapova, the ‘08champion, crashes out of

the Australian Open in the tour-nament’s first major upset.

B1Property giant CapitaLand acquires

the real estate business of Hong Kong’s Orient Overseas International for $3.1 billion.

TALIBAN ATTACKS

Police, militants clash in the heart of Afghan capital. Page 3

AFP