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Bilingual Education Was Wrong, Lee Kuan Yew Says Former Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew on Tuesday admitted that Singapore's insistence on bilingual education has been wrong. The father of current Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Lee now holds the honorary title of minister mentor and was prime minister from 1959 to 1990, and senior minister from 1990 to 2004. When Singapore separated from Malaysia in 1965, Lee made the country strictly English-speaking for the subsequent 19 years. But with the rise of China as a powerhouse in the global community, Lee hoped to make the country bilingual, having...

Sitting here in Singapore as President Obama went through China and flew home from his 8-day trip to Asia, it is perhaps easier to see the true truth of his trip—it’s deep failure....

In 1965 the two nations were equal in wealth. Four decades later, their standing was dramatically different. What accounts for the difference? Silicon Valley, Singapore, Tel Aviv—the global hubs of entrepreneurial activity all bear the marks of government investment. Yet, for every successful public intervention spurring entrepreneurial activity, there are many failed efforts, wasting untold billions in taxpayer dollars. When has governmental sponsorship succeeded in boosting growth, and when has it fallen terribly short? Should the government be involved in such undertakings at all? These issues are particularly timely, given the many billions of dollars governments spend worldwide to prop...

World leaders meeting in Singapore have decided to punt on reaching any firm agreement at next month's global warming conference in Copenhagen. The decision represents a huge setback to the Obama administration's goal of passing a cap and trade bill this year, which conversely is great news for virtually every company in America that has been worried about the higher cost of doing business that would come from the enactment of such legislation.

TOKYO – President Barack Obama says he wants to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki sometime during his presidency but won't have time during this week's trip to Japan to go to the cities devastated by U.S. atomic bombs at the end of World War II. No sitting U.S. president has visited the two cities largely because of the controversy it could raise at home. In an interview with Japanese broadcaster NHK that ran Tuesday, Obama said he would be unable to visit the cities on his trip to Japan this weekend due to time constraints but would be willing to do...

If all the adults worldwide who Gallup surveys show would like to migrate actually picked up and moved where they wanted, Gallup's Potential Net Migration Index (PNMI) suggests many developed countries could be overwhelmed and many developing countries could sit relatively empty. The Potential Net Migration Index is the estimated number of adults who would like to move permanently out of a country subtracted from the estimated number who would like to move into it, as a proportion of the total adult population. The results are based on nationally representative surveys of more than 260,000 adults worldwide. The higher the...

Critics of this island-nation often have fun referring to it as the “nanny state” for its laws against spitting, littering, or leaving behind an unflushed loo. When it comes to health care, however, Uncle Sam has better claim to the nanny title. From our federal price “negotiations” and state regulations to discrimination in the tax code, government distortions prop up a system that puts key health-care decisions in the hands of everyone but the patient. Each new government intrusion, moreover, begets only higher costs—and a call for more intervention to fix the problem. In Singapore, by contrast, they already have...

Critics of this island-nation often have fun referring to it as the "nanny state" for its laws against spitting, littering, or leaving behind an unflushed loo. When it comes to health care, however, Uncle Sam has better claim to the nanny title. From our federal price "negotiations" and state regulations to discrimination in the tax code, government distortions prop up a system that puts key health-care decisions in the hands of everyone but the patient. Each new government intrusion, moreover, begets only higher costs—and a call for more intervention to fix the problem. In Singapore, by contrast, they already have...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Beauty queen Miss Singapore World has given up her crown after it emerged that she had stolen credit cards to go on a shopping spree for lingerie. Ris Low had come under public pressure to be stripped of her 2009 title, after local media reported she stole seven credit cards last year while working at a medical clinic, buying goods worth about S$8,000 ($5,662) including gold anklets and phones. Organizers of the pageant ERM World Marketing said she had resigned Tuesday of her own accord. She will no longer represent Singapore at the Miss World finals to...

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The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. Never before photographed, it is bigger than the U.S. and British navies combined but has no crew, no cargo and no destination - and is why your Christmas stocking may be on the light side this year The tropical waters that lap the jungle shores of southern Malaysia could not be described as a paradisical shimmering turquoise. They are more of a dark, soupy green. They also carry a suspicious smell. Not that this is of any concern to the lone Indian face...

The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. Never before photographed, it is bigger than the U.S. and British navies combined but has no crew, no cargo and no destination> – and is why your Christmas stocking may be on the light side this year. >Fascinating article by Simon Parry in the Daily Mail this evening on the Ghost Fleet of Singapore — 100s of empty container ships sidelined by the recession.Excerpt: Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and...

The world's ship owners and government economists would prefer you not to see this symbol of the depths of the plague still crippling the world's economies The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. Never before photographed, it is bigger than the U.S. and British navies combined but has no crew, no cargo and no destination. Do not tell these men and women about green shoots of recovery. As Briton Tim Huxley, one of Asia's leading ship brokers, says, if the world is really pulling itself out of recession, then all...

Malaysia's prime minister has urged a Muslim woman sentenced to be caned for drinking beer, to appeal her sentence. Najib Razak said that a formal appeal against her sentence would probably get Kartika Dewi Shukarno a sympathetic hearing from Islamic authorities. "Kartika should appeal instead of being too quick in asking for punishment," Najib Razak told reporters in Putrajaya, Malaysia's administrative capital. He added that the authorities were "sensitive to the implication of the punishment". However, speaking by phone to Al Jazeera from her home in Malaysia's Pahang state, Kartika told Al Jazeera she had no intention of appealing because...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore has downplayed media reports of a plot to attack an Asia-Pacific summit in the city-state in November, the Straits Times newspaper reported on Monday. "The rumors are rumors. You check it, if it is unverifiable, you know you can't be chasing after every rumor,' Second Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam was quoted by the daily as saying during a mock terrorist attack exercise on Sunday. The Singapore Police Force and the Ministry of Home Affairs were not available for immediate comment. An intelligence analyst from the Center for Intelligence and National Security in Indonesia told Reuters...

Some time in the next few days, a Malaysian Muslim woman named Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno will be caned under Islamic laws for drinking glasses of beer in a hotel bar, and a number of political analysts say the country's increasingly fractious politics are partly to blame. The ruling National Front and the Islamist component of an opposition alliance are competing to place themselves as the guardians of a faith that has taken an increasingly political face in Malaysia over the last 20 years. The National Front accuses the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, or PAS, of giving up some of its...

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who assumed office in 2004, is warning that evangelization threatens the stability of his island nation. Citing “aggressive preaching” and criticizing the “wave of revival, megachurches, and tele-evangelism” he sees in the United States, the Buddhist prime minister-- and Catholic high school alumnus-- said that “the most dangerous fault line is race and religion.” An estimated 4% of the nation’s 4.6 million inhabitants are Catholic; 43% are Buddhist, and 15% are Muslim.

SNIPPET: "SINGAPORE — Nur Azlin Mohamed Yasin spends several hours a day trawling the Internet, but she is not your typical young surfer, descending into a world of bomb-making, militancy and extremism. From her computer, she enters a world where young Muslims openly volunteer to fight against US-led coalition troops in Afghanistan or learn how to make explosives out of everyday materials. The 24-year-old Singaporean research analyst is constantly on the lookout for attack manuals, video clips of Islamist militants in training and fiery extremist chatter that could hint at an imminent assault somewhere."

A Singapore boy survived a fall from an open window of the family flat on the ninth floor of an apartment building, escaping with cuts to his face and body as well as a fractured ankle, a media report said on Tuesday. Park Sihu, a three-year-old boy, landed in bushes in front of the building. He was found conscious and crying, but still able to respond to his mother, despite clearly being traumatized, the Straits Times newspaper reported. The little boy had been climbing on a bed beside an open window when he fell. His two elder sisters were in...

Bryan Caplan of EconLog has an interesting blog post on Singapore’s Health Care System. In the post, he reviews Ghesquiere’s “Singapore’s Success,” analyzing Singapore’s health care system. Harford finds that Singapore spends a third of what the U.S. does on health care (as a percentage of GDP) yet has better health indicators. Of course, much of this may be attributable to lifestyle differences rather than a superior health care system. Nevertheless, the Singapore system has some very interesting characteristics: * There are mandatory health savings accounts: “Individuals pre-save for medical expenses through mandatory deductions from their paychecks and employer contributions…...

Tributes are left for those killed in the hotel attacks Indonesian officials say there are "strong indications" a key wanted fugitive was behind Friday's deadly attacks on two hotels in Jakarta. Noordin Mohamed Top is wanted for plotting the Bali bombings of 2002 and 2005 and other Indonesian attacks. Nine people, including two suicide bombers, died in the attacks on the Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott. At least four of Friday's victims are said to be foreigners but have not all been formally identified. See map of area Police in the Indonesian capital are studying DNA and other evidence to...

The social and economic costs of lost productivity and wasted fuel from traffic-choked streets are estimated to be $87 billion a year, according to the Texas Transportation Institute’s 2009 Urban Mobility Report. So far, federal, state and local efforts — focused mostly on expanding road capacity — have been largely unsuccessful at slowing the growing congestion on U.S. roads. Transportation experts now advocate a different approach, changing the emphasis from increasing supply to reducing demand. To reinforce smart growth policies, plug mounting transportation funding gaps and achieve immediate traffic relief, London, Stockholm, Singapore, Milan and three cities in Norway have...

Singapore Navy Launches Its First Swedish Archer-Class Submarine 12:49 GMT, June 18, 2009 RSS Archer is one of two ex-Swedish Navy Vaastergotland-class submarines acquired by Singapore in 2005 and comprehensively upgraded, to include air-independent propulsion. (Singapore MoD photo) Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Teo Chee Hean officiated at the launch ceremony of the Republic of Singapore Navy's (RSN) first Archer-class submarine, RSS Archer, at the Kockums Shipyard in Karlskrona, Sweden, on 16 Jun 2009. The submarine was launched by Mrs Teo Chee Hean. Sweden's State Secretary for Defence, Håkan Jevrell, State Secretary for Trade and former Commander of...

SINGAPORE (AFP) — A Christian Singaporean couple were found guilty of sedition on Thursday for distributing evangelical publications that cast Islam in a negative light, court officials said. Ong Kian Cheong and his wife Dorothy Chan had been charged with distributing a seditious publication to two Muslims in October and March 2007 and sending a second such booklet to another Muslim in December that same year, a district court official told AFP. The publications were found to have promoted feelings of ill-will and hostility between Christians and Muslims, the Straits Times said on its website. A hearing was set for...

PARIS (AP) - French customs officers are inspecting a North Korean ship at an Indian Ocean island off the coast of Africa as part of U.N. sanctions prompted by the communist nation's nuclear test, but they found nothing illegal so far, officials said Thursday. It was the first time a country was known to have stopped a North Korean vessel under U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718 authorizing searches as part of the sanctions imposed on Pyongyang for its nuclear test. Since the resolution was passed Oct. 14, at least four other North Korean vessels have been stopped, but the countries...

ABOARD A MILITARY AIRCRAFT, May 13, 2009 – With piracy generating big news in the Gulf of Aden, a far-less-recognized multilateral partnership has brought pirates’ swashbuckling days to a virtual halt in the strategic Strait of Malacca. Navy Adm. Timothy J. Keating, commander of U.S. Pacific Command, praised a partnership among Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and, increasingly, Thailand and the Philippines, that has boosted maritime security dramatically. An estimated 40 percent of the world’s trade -- about 50,000 vessels each year -- transit the narrow passageway that links the Indian and Pacific oceans. Until three years ago, pirates trolling the strait...

FRANKFORT (Kentucky) - ANTI-tax protesters began gathering at state Capitols and in neighbourhoods across the United States on Wednesday to kick off a series of demonstrations. Organisers said they are angry about government spending since Mr Obama took office, most notably the US$787 billion (S$1.18 trillion) stimulus package Congress passed into law earlier this year with the idea of turning around the hard-hit economy. They say the movement has developed organically through online social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter and through exposure on the conservative Fox News channel. The protests, deemed 'tea parties,' are designed to echo the rebellion...

Singapore suffers record contraction By John Burton in Singapore Published: April 14 2009 02:43 | Last updated: April 14 2009 18:48 Singapore’s trade-dependent economy contracted by a record 11.5 per cent in the first three months of 2009 from a year ago as non-oil exports fell 17 per cent in March, the 11th consecutive monthly decline. The-sharper-than-expected deterioration in the economy’s performance forced the government to cut its full-year GDP forecast from minus 6 per cent to minus 9 per cent, which would make it Singapore’s worst postwar recession and Asia’s worst economic performer this year. The economy contracted 4.2...

Melanie Kirkpatrick ’73, a deputy editor of The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page and a member of its editorial board, was found in contempt of court by Singapore High Court Justice Tay Yong Kwang on March 19. Kirkpatrick was also fined 10,000 Singapore dollars, or roughly $6,550. “My first reaction [upon hearing of the ruling] was to roll my eyes and think, ‘Here we go again,’ ” Kirkpatrick said in an e-mail to The Daily Princetonian. “Whenever we publish anything on Singapore, we take a risk that we’ll be sued.” The repercussions could have proven to be even more serious,...

Singapore's Boomtown Dream Gets Hazy By TOM WRIGHT SINGAPORE -- On almost any major street of this affluent Southeast Asian city-state, cranes tower overhead -- a reminder of an incredible three-year building boom that now is turning into a bust. Residential property prices rose 60% between 2005 and the middle of 2008, fueled by a massive influx of U.S., European and Asian expatriates drawn by Singapore's goal of reinventing itself as a financial and entertainment hub like Dubai or Monte Carlo. [Singapore land photo] Associated Press A man puts on his safety helmet at the construction site of hotel towers...

Indonesia Update In a South Jakarta courtroom this week, a Singaporean terror suspect admitted that he was part of a plot to hijack an Aeroflot aircraft from Bangkok and crash it into Singapore’s Changi International Airport. Mohammad Hasan bin Sayanudin, alias Fajar Taslim, was testifying against two other terrorist suspects. All three are charged with killing a Christian high school teacher in South Sumatra province during 2007. They are also charged with plotting to kill two Catholic priests in 2005 and to carry out a bombing of a café in West Sumatra. According to Sayanudin, those who were part of...

AT SEA ABOARD USS VELLA GULF, Feb. 23, 2009 – Turkey and Singapore recently committed forces to join Combined Task Force 151, a naval coalition dedicated to conducting counter-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden. Turkey and Singapore will join other nations -- including the United States, the United Kingdom and Denmark -- that have conducted operations as part of the task force. "Coalition ships are a critical part of our mission," U.S. Navy Rear Adm. Terry McKnight, commander of CTF 151, said. "The very nature of some of our operations, as well as the success of those operations,...

S'pore ministers' pay may be cut 20 pct this year-media Reuters - Tuesday, January 20 SINGAPORE, Jan 20 - The annual salaries of Singapore's ministers and senior civil servants are expected to fall by 12 to 20 percent this year in line with the shrinking economy, local media reported on Tuesday. Defence Minister Teo Chee Hean, who is also minister in charge of the civil service, told Parliament on Monday that senior permanent secretaries and entry-grade ministers will likely receive S$1.54 million , which is a drop of 20 percent from last year. Younger officers in the elite Administrative Service...

Singapore will toughen its protest laws ahead of this year's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit to reduce the number of civil disobedience acts, state media reported on Saturday. Wong Kan Seng, Singapore's interior minister, told the pro-government Straits Times newspaper the city-state will look to enact regulations in the coming months giving police greater power to prevent protesters from gathering. Singapore will host an APEC ministerial meeting in July and the annual summit in mid-November. It hopes to avoid a controversy like the one in 2006 when an opposition politician was prevented from holding a march during the World Bank...

SINGAPORE, Jan. 10 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Singapore has decided to relax a ban on political films in yet another step to tone down its image as an authoritarian state to meet the demands of an increasingly Internet-savvy younger generation. "The government will amend the Films Act to allow for certain types of party political films," Singapore Minister for Information, Communications and the Arts Lee Boon Yang said in remarks at a news conference for local media on Friday, now posted on the ministry's website. "Films which are factual and objective, and do not dramatize....or present a distorted picture will be allowed,"...

It is Singapore’s secret Eden, a miniature village called Kampong Buangkok that is hidden in trees among the massed apartment blocks, where a fresh breeze rustles the coconut palms and tropical birds whoop and whistle. With just 28 houses in an area the size of three football fields, it is Singapore’s last rural hamlet, a forgotten straggler in the rush to modernize this high-rise, high-tech city-state. But apparently not for much longer. Kampong Buangkok is designated by the government for demolition and redevelopment, possibly in the near future. When it is gone, one of the world’s most extreme national makeovers...

A 20-year-old Ghanaian has been sentenced to death in Singapore for trafficking 2.6 kilograms (5.73 pounds) of cannabis, the Straits Times reported Saturday. The High Court convicted and sentenced Chijioke Stephen Obioha on Tuesday after a 21-day trial held last year, it said. Under Singapore's tough anti-drug laws, the death penalty is mandatory for anyone caught trafficking more than 15 grams of heroin, 30 grams of cocaine or 500 grams of cannabis. The death penalty is carried out by hanging. Narcotics officers arrested Obioha in April 2007 following a surveillance operation. He had come to Singapore in 2005 to try...

Three Singaporeans were jailed on Thursday after being charged with contempt of court for showing up at Singapore's Supreme Court wearing T-shirts depicting kangaroos in judges robes. Isrizal Bin Mohamed Isa and Muhammad Shafi'ie Syahmi Bin Sariman were sentenced to seven days' jail, while Tan Liang Joo John received 15 days imprisonment. They were each ordered to pay S$5,000 ($3,305) in costs. Tan is the Assistant Secretary-General of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party, led by Chee Soon Juan. The three had worn the T-shirts at a court hearing in May to determine the damages that Chee Soon Juan and his...

Singapore is to cut the salaries of Lee Hsien Loong, prime minister, and senior government officials next year by up to 19 per cent, writes John Burton . The city-state is one of the few countries where the salaries, among the highest in the world, are tied to economic performance. "Public sector salaries follow the market up and down. The mechanism allows salaries to respond more rapidly to market conditions," said Teo Chee Hean, the minister in charge of the civil service. Government salaries are pegged to top earners in six professions and Mr Loong's pay is more than six...

ANOTHER 20 products have been found to be contaminated with melamine, including well-known products such as Lotte Koala biscuits and Julie crackers. Three of them are from China while 17 others are from Malaysia. This marks the first time that non-China products available here have been found contaminated with melamine. The latest detection brings the total number of melamine-tainted products here to 33, said the Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority of Singapore in an update on Friday. The tainted China-made products are Lotte Koala's March Cocoa Chocolate Biscuit, Hello Kitty Strawberry Cream Filled Biscuit and unbranded non-dairy creamer in industrial pack....

Singapore on Friday joined other Asian nations in easing monetary policy as the economy slipped into recession for the first time since 2002. The economy contracted by 0.5 per cent in the third quarter from a year ago, based on preliminary data. The trade ministry cut its full-year growth forecast for 2008 to 3 per cent from a previous estimate of 4-5 per cent. On an annualised, seasonally adjusted rate, the economy shrank by 6.3 per cent from the previous quarter, after contracting by 5.7 per cent in April-June period, which meant that Singapore is in a technical recession defined...

KUCHING: A misunderstanding over a small pet dog saw three stallholders attacked by a group of youths, resulting in one of the victims losing a part of his finger and sustaining a broken arm on Friday night. Prior to the 9.30pm incident at a parking lot in Kota Sentosa, where a number of foodstalls operate, a young couple and a friend went to a stall selling fried kuey teow accompanied by their small pet dog. The stall was operated by a 35-year-old man and assisted by his ‘mentally-challenged’ younger brother who is also in his 30s. Although it was unclear...

The city-state’s Finance Minister argues that it is a barometer for all of Asia and will be uniquely tested by the credit crunch Lee Kuan Yew, the octogenarian statesman who looms over the Singaporean Government as its “Minister Mentor”, was opening an event at one of the city's swish hotels. If voters were ever gripped by the “sheer madness” of electing a member of the opposition, Mr Lee said, in a typical bit of carrot-and-stick politicking, it would take “only five years” to ruin Singapore completely. Singapore's affluent skyline bears every sign of the city-state's sustained economic vibrancy. Where there...

Excerpt - ABC South Asia correspondent Peter Lloyd has been arrested in Singapore and is likely to be charged with a number of drug-related offences later today. A statement from Singapore's Central Narcotics Bureau says the 41-year-old was arrested in the course of a follow-up search after the arrest of another man, a 31-year-old Singaporean. Singapore police say Lloyd was arrested for possessing a small quantity of the drug 'ice', one improvised smoking pipe, and six syringes. Police say his urine tested positive for amphetamines and he is being investigated for trafficking a controlled drug. If convicted, Lloyd faces imprisonment...

A Singapore man with a penchant for sniffing women's armpits was sentenced to 14 years in jail and 18 strokes of the cane for molesting his victims, a local newspaper reported Friday. The 36-year-old, who the Straits Times said was mentally unstable, had previous convictions for drug and sex-related offences. He molested 23 women over the course of 15 months, smelling their armpits and touching them in lifts, staircase landings and their homes, the paper said. He was caught after a housewife reported him to the police. The court meted out the jail term, normally reserved for hardcore criminals, saying...

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - A U.S. lawyer was charged in a Singapore court on Monday for allegedly insulting a judge in an email and on his website, court documents showed. Gopalan Nair, who runs a law firm in California and was previously a Singapore citizen, was arrested last Friday and charged on Monday for "threatening, abusing or insulting a public servant" in an email he circulated and posted on his blog, singaporedissident.blogspot.com, official documents showed. Nair was not sentenced and will be held in custody for 7 days pending further investigations, his lawyer Chia Ti Lik said. Under this charge, Nair...

THE SINGAPORE MODEL Healthcare reformers often look to Europe for models of change.  Rowan Callick investigates the city-state of Singapore and finds it may have a prescription for America. Singapore has eschewed the European government-payer-model of health care with a great deal of success.  The reason for Singapore's successful health care system is not government spending, says Callick.  Compared to the American system, Singapore keeps it citizens healthier for much less cost per person: Singapore residents are considerably healthier than Americans, yet pay, per person, about one-fifth of what Americans pay for their healthcare. In Singapore, the government funds only...

Arab Liberal Dr. Mamoun Fandy: The Palestinians Have Chosen the Model Of Tora Bora Over That of Singapore In an article published April 21, 2008 in the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, well-known researcher, writer, author, and columnist Dr. Mamoun Fandy wrote that the Palestinians must proceed from revolution to state-building, demonstrating that they are capable of building a prosperous state which will contribute to the stability of the region. [1] The following are excerpts from the article: "When Will the Palestinians Advance From the 'Adolescence' of Revolution to the 'Maturity' of Statehood?... [Will the] Palestinian State... Strengthen, Rather Than Weaken,...

Singapore: Singapore Says It Will Investigate Alleged North Korea Rocket Exports To Myanmar News 2008-04-04 10:33 SINGAPORE: The Singapore government said Thursday (3 Apr) it will look into allegations that a Singapore company was involved in the exports of rocket launchers by North Korea to Myanmar, following a media report. Japan's national broadcaster NHK reported Wednesday (2 Apr) that North Korea started full-scale exports of rocket launchers to Myanmar through a trading company based in Singapore. The report, however, did not identify the Singapore-based company, or give any other details. Singapore's Foreign Affairs Ministry said it took such allegations seriously...

Dorset man smuggling parts to Iran, says US By Patrick Sawer A British pensioner is at the centre of a worldwide police hunt after being accused by United States authorities of smuggling military parts to Iran. Brian Woodford, 77, who owns a 17th century manor house and 100-acre estate in Dorset, has been charged in his absence with selling millions of pounds worth of US military and civilian aircraft parts to the Islamic regime in Tehran. His wife Laura was arrested after arriving at San Francisco on a flight from Hong Kong with two catalogues from a Chinese company that...