Singapore

Singapore, Sep 9 (PTI) More and more Indian workers are returning home as Singapore businesses cut down on workforce following the severe impact of the novel coronavirus pandemic, an official said.

"On an average, about 100 Indian nationals in Singapore continue to register daily with the High Commission here for flights back home, with over 11,000 having registered so far," Indian High Commissioner P Kumaran said on Wednesday.

SINGAPORE, Aug 27 (NNN-BERNAMA) – Singapore is raising salary criteria for the Employment Pass (EP) and S Pass while setting for the first time, higher salary requirements in the financial services sector.

 For EP, it will be raised further to S$4,500 for all new applicants from Sept 1, 2020, according to the republic’s Ministry of Manpower (MOM) on its website.

The minimum qualifying salary for EP which allows foreign professionals, managers and executives to work in Singapore, was raised to S$3,900 from May 1, 2020.

SINGAPORE, Aug 25 (NNN-CNA) – Singapore President, Halimah Yacob, said that, providing job security will be a priority for the country, in the coming years.

Halimah made the remarks, at the 14th parliament sitting which opened on Monday (yesterday). She said, the COVID-19 pandemic added to the employment pressure in Singapore.

To sustain job creation, Singapore urgently needs to transform its economy and find new ways to earn a living, she noted.

SINGAPORE, Aug 14 (NNN-BERNAMA) — Two Malaysian inmates on death row failed in their appeals for a stay of execution pending a probe on allegations that “brutal and unlawful methods” used in judicial executions in the republic.

“We dismiss the appeals,” according to judges of Singapore’s Apex Court, Andrew Phang, Judith Prakash, and  Woo Bih Li in their written judgment released in the Supreme Court’s website.

A. Gobi and K. Datchinamurthy were convicted for drug-related offences and sentenced to the death penalty.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Chinese tech giant ByteDance censored content it perceived as critical of the Chinese government on its news aggregator app in Indonesia from 2018 to mid-2020, six people with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

The sources said that local moderators were instructed by a team from ByteDance’s Beijing headquarters to delete articles seen as “negative” about Chinese authorities on the Baca Berita (BaBe) app.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Top oil exporter Saudi Arabia may cut its September official selling price (OSP) for crude sold in Asia, tracking falling Middle East benchmarks and weak refining margins, according to industry sources.

Five sources from Asian refineries on average expect the September OSP for flagship Arab Light crude to fall by 61 cents a barrel, though forecasts range from a cut of $1 to 20-30 cents, a Reuters survey showed.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The case of a Singaporean caught spying for China in the United States has reawakened fears over China recruiting intelligence assets on an island state which has won trust among Western governments while keeping on good terms with Beijing.

Jun Wei Yeo, a 39-year-old academic who also goes by the name Dickson Yeo, pleaded guilty in a U.S. court on Friday to acting as an illegal agent of Chinese intelligence. He will be sentenced in October and faces up to 10 years in prison.

SINGAPORE (AP) — Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s long-governing party comfortably won Friday’s general elections as expected amid the coronavirus pandemic, but faced a setback as the opposition made minor gains.

Lee said his People’s Action Party secured 83 parliamentary seats, retaining its overwhelming majority with 89% of the total seats, but its popular vote dipped to 61%. The Workers’ Party, the only opposition with a presence in Parliament, increased its seats from six to 10 — the biggest victory for the opposition since independence.

SINGAPORE, July 1 (NNN-BERNAMA) —  Mediacorp will broadcast ‘live’ two General Election 2020 political debates in English and Mandarin on Channel 5 and Channel 8 respectively this evening.

Mediacorp has invited the four political parties fielding the most number of candidates in the General Election – the People’s Action Party (PAP), Progress Singapore Party (PSP), Worker’s Party (WP) and Singapore Democratic Party (SDP) – to send a candidate to each of the debates.

SINGAPORE, June 29 (NNN-CNA) – The Singapore Tourism Board (STB), said on Sunday that, tourism businesses in Singapore will be permitted to resume operations, at stages, from July 1, beginning with 13 attractions.

The authority said, this is part of the resumption of activities in Phase 2, after the Circuit Breaker, which was imposed by the government from Apr 7 to June 1, to reduce COVID-19 transmission.