World

Mr Lee also said that sanctions mark a “big step” to take for a small country like Singapore, and the hurdle is even “higher” for the country to impose sanctions on its own. “But in this case because it is such an egregious, flagrant and major violation of the international norms and with such a major consequence for the global order, including in our region, we decided we had to act on sanctions because the UN could not act,” he said. “The UN obviously cannot act, because you need the Security Council. The Russians are there; they have a veto (and) it is not going to pass,” added the Prime Minister. “But we had to stand up and be counted and we did.” WHAT IT MEANS FOR SINGAPORE The war in Ukraine, which started on Feb 24, is "not over" and that both sides of the conflict are not close...

Patients undergo directly observed therapy, which involves them taking three to four types of medication under the observation of a trained healthcare worker. “The main challenge in the treatment of TB is the long duration of treatment beyond that of symptom resolution and the large number of tablets taken as part of the standard drug regimen,” Dr Tan said. For the first two months, the therapy is required daily, after which it is needed three times a week. Kelvin, who went for his therapy at a polyclinic near his home, completed his treatment in nine months and no longer has any symptoms, he said. Dr Tan said that those diagnosed with TB are not required to be isolated, unlike COVID-19 patients. They however have to wear a mask and are encouraged to go out only for healthcare visits a...

NEW YORK : Closing arguments are set to begin on Monday in the U.S. trial of a former Goldman Sachs banker accused of helping loot hundreds of millions of dollars from Malaysia's 1MDB development fund. Prosecutors say Roger Ng, Goldman's former top investment banker for Malaysia, helped his then-boss Tim Leissner embezzle money from the fund, launder the proceeds and bribe officials to win business for Goldman. Ng, 49, has pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiring to launder money and violate an anti-corruption law. His lawyer Marc Agnifilo acknowledged that he introduced Leissner to Jho Low - a Malaysian financier accused of being the scheme's mastermind - but said Ng had no role in looting 1MDB. The charges stem from one of the biggest financial scandals in history. U.S. prosecutors...

:A federal judge said on Wednesday Tesla Inc was liable to a Black elevator operator who said the electric car company ignored racial abuse at the factory where he worked, but reduced a nearly $137 million jury award to $15 million. U.S. District Judge William Orrick in San Francisco ruled after jurors last October found that Tesla subjected Owen Diaz to a hostile environment at Tesla's factory in Fremont, California by allowing and failing to stop the racism he faced. Diaz, who worked at the plant for nine months in 2015 and 2016, said other employees used racist slurs when speaking to him, and scrawled swastikas and slurs including the "N-word" on bathroom walls. He also said one supervisor drew a racist caricature near his workstation. In a 43-page decision, Orrick said the evidence ...

How high prices at the pump can go is hard to say, particularly in the peak summer driving season between Memorial Day and the Fourth of July. Analysts say that will depend on oil prices, which have been fluctuating as the world scrambles to replace Russian oil exports. Gasoline prices have fallen from a record $4.33 nationally per gallon of unleaded on March 11. Prices of gasoline declined as oil prices dipped, but crude has moved higher again and analysts say gasoline prices could too. Legislation has been proposed by Democrats in the U.S. Senate and House to temporarily lift an 18.4 cent per gallon federal gas tax. Those proposals have been referred to committees. Maryland last week suspended its 36 cents per gallon gasoline tax, and its average price for unleaded at the pump is now ...

Japan will raise its daily limit on arrivals from overseas to around 10,000 from April 10, up from the current 7,000, the top government spokesman said Friday, as the country gradually relaxes its coronavirus border controls. The easing of the nation’s strict border controls is in response to growing demand for entry among returning Japanese nationals, foreign residents and new nontourist arrivals, including foreign students, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said. Foreign tourists are still barred from entry. “Japan plans to increase international movements of people in stages by taking into account the infection situation at home and abroad and border control measures that other major nations have taken,” Matsuno said at a news conference. Japan effectively imposed an entry ban...

SINGAPORE: Singapore has reached “a major milestone” in the fight against COVID-19, with the country now able to “breathe easier”, said Health Minister Ong Ye Kung on Friday (Apr 22). With COVID-19 infection rates stabilising, Mr Ong added that the Disease Outbreak Response System Condition (DORSCON) level will be brought down from Orange to Yellow from Apr 26. The DORSCON framework, which gives an indication of the current disease situation, was raised to Orange more than two years ago. This move will be accompanied by the further easing of a number of measures across the community. Here's what you need to know: 1. No more limits on group sizes From Apr 26, there will no longer be a cap on group sizes. This means you will no longer need to keep to groups of 10 people for mask-off ac...

SINGAPORE: Taxi company ComfortDelGro is relaunching its mobile application under a new name on Wednesday (Apr 20), also introducing new services and making it easier for customers to access services through a single platform. The application, renamed CDG Zig, combines the ComfortDelGro taxi booking application and its now-decommissioned lifestyle application Zig, the company said in a news release on Tuesday. It will be available for download on the Apple App Store, the Google Play Store and the Huawei AppGallery. “It will offer users taxi and ride-railing booking features and lifestyle options like restaurant reservation, as well as new services like electric vehicle (EV) charging,” it said. “Over time, it will continue to grow with the addition of more ComfortDelGro services from its...

Climate change is near a tipping point – and time is running out. Last August, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that by the next decade, global surface temperatures will rise beyond the 2015 Paris Agreement’s 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold target, unless urgent action is taken. The same report estimates that approximately 3.3 to 3.6 billion people live in contexts that are highly vulnerable to climate change. Already, the world is seeing an increase in the number of extreme weather events driven by climate change, such as flooding, forest fires and droughts. According to a study of 1,500 companies in the MSCI World Index, without any concrete action to curb emissions, the international private sector would be responsible for raising global temperatures...

Educator Noriko Hazeki says the challenges non-Japanese children face in the Japanese school system begin even before they enroll. She says some parents have been told that it will “be hard for your child because their Japanese isn’t good,” and that, actually, “they don’t have to go to school, so why push them?” “Compulsory education in Japan is really only compulsory if your citizenship is Japanese,” she explains. “Otherwise, it’s up to the parents whether they want to put their children in school or not, and some schools even discourage them from doing so.” The picture that often comes to mind when imagining non-Japanese children going to school in Japan is often one of a multicultural student body attending elite, expensive international schools in the heart of Tokyo. As the number o...