Tag: singapore

After decades touting openness, Singapore sees foreign meddling threat | Politics

Singapore – For decades, Singapore marketed itself as one of the world’s most open and globalised economies to compensate for its diminutive territory and lack of natural resources.

Now the Southeast Asian city-state is confronting a new challenge: retaining the magic ingredients of its success while guarding against foreign interference that such openness could invite.

On Monday, Singapore invoked its foreign interference law for the first time by designating Chan Man Ping Philip, a 59-year-old naturalised citizen, as a “politically significant person”, weeks after authorities flagged their intention to designate the businessman.

Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs said that Chan, who was born in Hong Kong, had shown “susceptibility to be influenced by foreign actors, and willingness to advance their interests”.

Under the designation, Chan is required to disclose annually political donations of 10,000 Singapore dollars (around $7,400) or more that he receives, foreign affiliations and migration benefits.

While the government did not say which country’s interests Chan allegedly tried to advance in Singapore, the businessman and real estate developer is well-known for advocating China’s perspective.

“It is our duty as overseas Chinese to tell China’s story well, and to both spread and pass on the marvellous traditional Chinese culture while we are abroad,” Chan was quoted as saying by a Chinese media outlet last year while attending China’s Two Sessions parliamentary meetings.

Chan, who founded China Link Education Consultancy and headed the Hong Kong Singapore Business Association and the Kowloon Club, has also written prolifically for Chinese-language news outlet Lianhe Zaobao.

In 2019, he was issued a warning by police for facilitating a discussion on a controversial bill in Hong Kong without a permit in violation of Singapore’s strict curbs on public assemblies.

Chan told local media that he had no comment regarding the designation and a request for comment made by Al Jazeera through his former association went unanswered.

Singapore passed the Foreign Interference (Countermeasures) Act, or FICA, in 2021 amid heavy criticism from opposition politicians and activists who warned the legislation could be used to stifle legitimate dissent.

Other countries, such as Australia and the UK, have passed legislation aimed at preventing foreign interference.

But for Singapore, the task of balancing an open economy and national security is especially delicate.

A tiny island city-state with few natural resources, Singapore relies heavily on the free flow of goods and people.

Trade accounts for over 300 percent of gross domestic product(GDP) – the highest ratio of any country – and non-permanent immigrants make up about 30 percent of the country’s 5.92 million residents.

Singapore has the highest trade-to-GDP ratio of any country [File: Wong Maye-E/AP]

For authorities, there is a growing realisation that this openness can be a double-edged sword.

“For Singapore, there has always been a perennial concern of foreign influence and this is not specific to only China as we are an open economy and highly digitised as well,” Dylan Loh, an expert on Chinese foreign policy at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU), told Al Jazeera.

“We cannot afford to put up barriers to people, information, ideas, capital in the way that others have done.”

Loh said Singapore is especially concerned about “insidious forms of influence” that go beyond typical economic and cultural exchanges.

“As a Chinese-majority country, it is quite natural that we are seen as a fertile site for cultivation and influence,” Loh said.

“For Singapore, I think this means that we have had to update our tools including our regulations to better deter and also respond appropriately when we detect such activities and this incident is precisely why FICA was needed,” he added, referring to Chan’s case.

Local media have highlighted how ethnic Chinese Singaporeans, who make up about three-quarters of the population, are increasingly sympathetic to China.

In a Pew Research Center survey of residents in 19 countries carried out in 2022, Singapore was one of only two countries – along with Malaysia – where a majority of residents expressed a favourable view of China.

Chong Ja Ian, a political scientist at the National University of Singapore (NUS), said there is concern in Singapore about the Chinese Communist Party mobilising the Chinese diaspora and exploiting commercial relationships to further its interests.

“That Singapore has in the past skirted around more serious and substantive discussions about race, ethnicity, citizenship, and their meaning means that Singapore society is less equipped to deal with challenges that pull at, challenge and perhaps seek to redefine these concepts of identity,” Chong told Al Jazeera.

Like many Asian peers, Singapore has also been reluctant to be drawn into taking sides in the increasingly heated rivalry between the United States and China, instead adopting the mantra of being a “friend to all and an enemy to none”.

Singapore is in a challenging position because its foreign policy calls for building a network of partners based on the principles of mutual respect, sovereignty and the equality of states, regardless of size, said Ben Chester Cheong, a law lecturer at Singapore University of Social Sciences (SUSS).

“Everything that is happening around us must be understood considering Singapore’s foreign policy fundamentals. As a small and open economy, it is inevitable that Singapore needs to work closely with various countries across different sectors, including technology, society and academia,” Cheong told Al Jazeera.

Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has cited a number of instances of foreign entities allegedly mounting hostile influence campaigns as justification for FICA.

In one of the most high-profile cases of alleged foreign interference, authorities in 2017 expelled Chinese-American academic Huang Jing after deeming him to be an “agent of influence of a foreign country”.

Huang, a professor at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, had his permanent residency revoked for allegedly working with intelligence agencies to influence government policy and public opinion.

Huang denied being a foreign agent at the time, describing the claims as “nonsense”.

FICA, which passed parliament after a 10-hour debate, attracted controversy over its immunity from judicial review and the scope of its powers, including provisions allowing authorities to direct internet service providers and social media platforms to provide user information, block content and remove applications used to spread content they deem hostile.

In an open letter before the FICA’s passage, 11 rights organisations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, said the legislation’s provisions “contravene international legal and human rights principles” and would “further curtail civic space, both online and offline”.

Singapore
Singapore has one of the world’s most open economies [File: Edgar Su/Reuters]

Singapore’s business community has been muted on the legislation, both before and since its passage.

Several Singapore-China business associations declined to comment when approached by Al Jazeera.

SUSS’s Cheong said he did not believe the use of FICA against Chan would scare investors or businesses away, given that he had not been charged with a criminal offence and his case appeared to be isolated.

Investors and businesses are lured to Singapore because it has one of the world’s best business environments, which remains the main consideration, Cheong said.

“A good majority of investors and businesses are neither politically significant nor do they have any desire to be politically active,” he said.

“Hence, for most investors and businesses who are politically inert, the likelihood that FICA will ever apply to them is negligible.”

Althaf Marsoof, an assistant professor at Nanyang Business School at Nanyang Technological University, said the law may actually boost business confidence as national security and public order are “fundamental prerequisites for a stable and secure business environment”.

“FICA enhances Singapore’s reputation as a safe and reliable place for economic activities, fundamental to sustaining and attracting investment and fostering business growth,” Marsoof told Al Jazeera.

Marsoof said the law has so far been applied in a “targeted manner” and the government was keen to maintain a “stable and balanced international standing”.

“This measured approach ensures that legitimate business operations and investments are not adversely affected, reinforcing Singapore’s commitment to maintaining a secure and predictable operational environment vital for business confidence and investment decisions,” he said.

NUS’ Chong said that Singaporean society should have more open discussions about issues around identity and foreign meddling and not only rely on the law.

“Other actors will sometimes try to make use of Singapore and Singaporeans for their purposes,” he said.

“That cannot be helped. What can be helped is how Singapore and Singaporeans address these challenges. Having laws like FICA without broader discussions and without greater transparency may not be sufficient.”

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China’s C919 jetliner showcased at Singapore Airshow | Aviation

Biennial air show opens to the public for the first time since the onset of the COVID-pandemic in 2020.

China’s C919 jetliner is being showcased at Asia’s biggest airshow, as its Beijing-backed manufacturer seeks buyers for the country’s first homegrown passenger jet.

Chinese state-run aerospace firm COMAC has touted the C919 as a challenger to the A320 and the 737 MAX, manufactured, respectively, by long-standing industry leaders Airbus and Boeing.

The C919 made its inaugural flight outside China on Sunday at a media event ahead of the Singapore Airshow, which opened to the public for the first time since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

China’s Tibet Airlines said on the sidelines of the show on Tuesday that it had finalised an order for 40 of the narrow-body jets, which are designed to carry up to 192 passengers and travel up to 3,500 miles (5,644km).

The C919, which has been flying commercially in China since May, has so far only been authorised to fly in its home country.

The biennial air show, which has more than 1,000 companies from some 50 countries in attendance this year, comes as Asia’s aviation sector is bouncing back from several years of dire business conditions due to the pandemic.

International air traffic recovered to nearly 89 percent of pre-pandemic levels in 2023, with the remaining gap mostly the result of China’s slow exit from pandemic curbs, according to International Air Transport Association (IATA) data.

Asia-Pacific airlines saw the biggest rise among regions, posting a 126 percent rise in traffic compared to 2022, according to the IATA.

Other aircraft expected to be displayed in Singapore include Airbus’s A350-1000 and the US Air Force’s B-52 Stratofortress.

US-based Boeing is not presenting any commercial aircraft as it grapples with the fallout of January’s near-catastrophe in which a 737 MAX 9 Alaska Airlines jet lost a door-sized section of the fuselage in mid-flight.

Russian companies that attended previous shows, including Russian Helicopters and Irkut, are not participating this year amid the war in Ukraine.

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Lunar New Year 2024 explained in five emblematic dishes | Arts and Culture News

It’s the year of the dragon, and celebrations are about to begin.

Starting on Saturday, hundreds of millions of people around the globe will mark the Lunar New Year. Families will come together for celebrations that will extend over several days in multiple countries, including China, North and South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei and Vietnam as well as among diaspora communities in other nations.

Food is a central part of the Lunar New Year experience with signature dishes prepared specifically for the occasion.

Here is a look at some Lunar New Year dishes and what they symbolise:

Guests toss an 88kg (194lb) plate of yusheng, or raw fish, during a dinner ahead of the Lunar New Year in Singapore [File: Edgar Su/Reuters]

Yusheng

This colourful raw fish salad with fresh vegetables is popular in Malaysia and Singapore. It is believed to have been introduced by Cantonese and Teochew immigrants. In Cantonese, the word for fish sounds like the word for abundance.

Sliced raw fish is central to the dish, and bright salmon has long been the go-to option.

Meghan Poh, a Singapore-based designer and illustrator, told Al Jazeera that assembling yusheng can be an exciting communal ritual for families.

According to the 24-year-old, auspicious phrases are often chanted with the addition of every ingredient as yusheng is assembled. Most chants are wordplays on the ingredient names.

Shredded carrots and lime add a zesty earthiness while crushed golden crackers and peanuts add a nutty crunch. Spices are sprinkled, oil is drizzled and then comes the most exciting part: Family members and friends gather around the dish with large chopsticks to toss together the elements in a ritual that is also called the prosperity toss.

In fact, yusheng is also called lo hei, which is Cantonese for “tossing up”. “Apparently, the higher you toss, the wealthier or luckier you are in the New Year,” Poh said.

A resident drops banh chung, or rice cakes, into a pot to cook at Tranh Khuc village outside Hanoi [File: Kham/Reuters]

Banh chung

For the Lunar New Year, houses in Vietnam are decorated in red and yellow – “the colours of wealth and wellbeing in our culture”, Vietnamese student Thuc Ngo said.

Workplaces and schools take an eight- to 10-day break, also known as the Tet holiday in Vietnam. “We have big platters with different kinds of food,” she said, explaining that the items are also presented on the ancestral altar.

Banh chung is a signature Lunar New Year dish in Vietnam. It consists of square layers of aromatic glutinous rice, tender beans and pork.

A man wraps banh chung for sale ahead of Tet, the traditional Vietnamese Lunar New Year festival, in Tranh Khuc village outside Hanoi [File: Kham/Reuters]

Thuc, who is studying business in Qatar, said the layering of the assorted elements in banh chung symbolises natural elements such as animals and plants living in harmony with humans.

“You use the banana leaf to wrap them together with the string,” Thuc said. The banh chung are then placed in a large pot and steamed for up to 10 hours until they are cooked into glossy, green squares with a delicate flavour. The stickiness of the rice is a signature property of the rice cakes. They are also said to be symbolic of the earth or the land of Vietnam.

“It is a big tradition to gather around the big pot of banh chung on New Year’s Eve to watch it cook overnight, so that your whole family has banh chung to eat throughout the Tet holiday,” she said.

Tteokguk, or sliced rice cake soup, is a traditional Korean dish eaten during the celebration of the Korean New Year [Alleko/Stock image/Getty]

Tteokguk

This savoury rice cake and meat stock soup is a staple of Korean cuisine and a signature dish during the Lunar New Year. The broth is most commonly beef-based. Seaweed and green onion can be added to the dish.

Traditionally, rice cakes were not consumed every day because rice was a scarce, expensive commodity and was reserved for special occasions, such as the Lunar New Year, called Seollal in Korea.

Tteokguk is one of the foods presented to ancestors during a traditional ritual called charye.

The chewy rice cakes are small and circular. They are believed to resemble coins and symbolise wealth and prosperity. They are also white, symbolic for purity and cleanliness as Koreans mark the start of a New Year.

A worker pulls out a tray of pineapple tarts from an oven in the central kitchen of the traditional Peranakan confectionery HarriAnns in Singapore [File: Loriene Perera/Reuters]

Pineapple tarts

Particularly popular as a Lunar New Year sweet in Taiwan, pineapple tarts are now common in other parts of Asia – particularly Malaysia and Singapore – as well as other parts of the world.

Once again, the significance of the dish lies in words and sounds. The Chinese word for pineapple, “ong lai”, sounds similar to “incoming luck” in the Hokkein dialect. That’s what makes the buttery cookies a must–have for the celebrations, with families stocking up on supplies for festive visitors or to give as gifts to friends and business associates.

Pineapples have also become a political symbol of Taiwanese identity during the self-governing territory’s mounting tensions with China. In 2021, Beijing banned the import of the fruit from Taiwan.

(Al Jazeera)

Zhai choy

Poh, the designer in Singapore, prepares meals with her immediate family and uncle for a large family gathering every Lunar New Year. Her family sits around the house wrapping spiced meat rolls, following her aunt’s recipe.

Once the family gathers, they sit around, talk, eat and watch movies together.

“Before my grandma passed, she used to make this Cantonese dish called zhai,” she said.

Zhai is a vegetarian dish with components such as fermented tofu, mushrooms and cabbage. Poh explained that it also has fat choy, which looks like strands of hair when dry, and has the texture of vermicelli when wet. Poh said fat choy is also a homonym for gaining wealth.

Chewy glass noodles added to zhai represent longevity. Shredded carrots also represent good luck.

The dish also helps to balance out the heaviness of other food, often meat-based, that is consumed during the Lunar New Year, Poh said.

Growing up, food helped Poh get past awkward moments during Lunar New Year celebrations, which can otherwise be overwhelming because of large family gatherings, she said. “Especially when you don’t conform to typical, traditional standards,” she said, such as by pursuing “a different career than what is traditionally expected”.

“Now that I’m older, I appreciate the occasion more and find myself participating a bit more,” she remarked. She now hopes to learn how to make traditional Lunar New Year recipes.

“I think a lot of these recipes are getting lost, like my po po’s [grandmother’s] zhai recipe, after she passed, I never learnt it, and I don’t think any of my aunts know how to make it. You can find a recipe online, but it’s different.”

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Auspicious but unlucky: The perils of a lunar new year dragon baby boom | Arts and Culture News

Taipei, Taiwan – IHua Wu was born in 1976, the Year of the Dragon in the Chinese zodiac.

The only mythical animal in the zodiac, which includes a rabbit, a pig and a horse, the dragon is seen as particularly auspicious.

Wu is unsure whether his parents planned for him to be born that year – it was at least a pleasant surprise – but other Taiwanese parents certainly seem to have hoped for dragon children.

The year 1976 was a bumper year for babies in Taiwan – 425,125 births, up from the crude birth rate of 396,479 over the 1970s. It was a noticeable reversal from a birth rate that had been slowly on the decline.

“People in Taiwan kind of prefer to have kids who are dragons,” Wu said, because the dragon is known to be wise and charismatic in Chinese folklore.

The least popular sign is the tiger, by contrast, with those born in those years seen as potentially wild or stubborn by superstitious parents – or grandparents.

While Wu said he did not feel extra pressure at home to become a model “dragon”, his zodiac sign followed him throughout his education and into adulthood due to the sheer size of his school year.

“Because we have more dragon kids in this year, we could expect for university or high school exams … more competition,” he told Al Jazeera, “Even my compulsory military service, there were more opportunities to be unlucky.”

He ended up volunteering to become a paratrooper rather than risk two years stationed on one of Taiwan’s lonely outlying islands, thanks to the bumper crop of recruits in his year.

IHua Wu, born in a Year of the Dragon, stands next to a statue of his zodiac animal at a temple in Taipei, Taiwan [Erin Hale/Al Jazeera]

Dragon babies everywhere

Wu’s experience growing up in Taiwan is one that is not uncommon for ethnic Chinese across Asia born in the Year of the Dragon. While their parents may hope for an auspicious birth, the impact of a small population spike can follow dragon babies throughout their lives.

In 2017, researchers in Singapore studied the experience of ethnic Chinese “dragons” in the city-state and found that they struggled more than other zodiac signs – and that some of their bad luck spread to other minority groups.

“We find that larger dragon cohorts face weaker educational and economic prospects due to greater competition,” said Tan Poh Lin, one of the authors behind the study and a senior researcher at the National University of Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

In multiethnic Singapore, ethnic Indian and Malay Singaporeans also felt the knock-on effect of as many as 10 percent more births during dragon years, she said. Singaporean women born two years later also faced stiff competition from “dragon” men who entered the workforce at the same time, after taking time off to perform compulsory national service.

“These externalities spill over to non-Chinese born in the dragon year, and since men enter the labour market two years later than women do due to National Service requirements, we also see depressed earnings among women born in the year of the horse, their labour market co-entrants,” she said by email.

Tan and her team specifically studied Singapore, but similar patterns can be seen across ethnic Chinese communities and clustered around the dragon years of 1988, 2000 and 2012. Another bump is expected to start this week with the start of the new lunar new year on February 10 when the next dragon year officially starts.

A not-so-ancient tradition 

The Chinese zodiac dates back at least 2,000 years, but the dragon baby boom is a distinctively modern phenomenon, according to researchers.

The year of the first dragon boom – 1976 – also coincided with an overall upswing in East Asia and some parts of Southeast Asia as countries finally felt the positive benefit of widespread post-war industrialisation. Economists even had a name for four of its biggest stars, the “Asian tigers” of Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea.

“These zodiac swings… started really in the 1970s in Chinese societies,” said expert demographer Daniel Goodkind, who has studied Chinese zodiac birth patterns.

“This is the fifth cycle where we’re starting to see this pattern, and it’s not just the dragon where you see these zodiac fluctuations. In Chinese societies, you also tend to see a drop in the tiger year two years before,” he said.

Those born in the Year of the Dragon often face stiffer competition for places in school, even as toddlers [File: Bobby Yip/Reuters]

While conducting fieldwork in Asia in 1990 on the issue – shortly after the “second dragon cycle” of 1988 – Goodkind said he struggled to find an exact answer. He recalled even asking fortune-tellers at the time if they encouraged parents to have a “dragon” baby, they would look at him confused and respond” “Why are you asking me that?”

The preference “doesn’t really come from formal principles or collective wisdom”, he said. “That’s not what parents are relying on. It’s more like a folk belief based on the animals themselves.”

The contemporary drive for dragon babies has resulted in some of the greatest fluctuations in Malaysia and Singapore, he said, although they are felt to varying degrees in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Brunei, the Philippines and Thailand, where at least 10 percent of the population is ethnic Chinese.

China proper has been the latest entrant thanks to the impacts of the one-child policy and the Cultural Revolution, which temporarily suspended many folk practices, but parents there are now also seeking dragon babies.

Indeed, rather than disappear with other superstitions, astrology has only become more popular with the passing decades – both in Asia and beyond, according to Singapore’s Tan.

“Among affluent and well-educated populations from East to West, astrological services have become heavily commercialised as a form of entertainment, social activity and belief system parallel to organised religion,” Tan said. “In Singapore, for example, it is easy to find online daily horoscope and almanac apps or walk-in feng shui consultancies for advice on matters such as couple compatibility, auspicious dates for major events and baby name selection.”

In Asia, these practices even extend to modern buildings and skyscrapers, incorporating traditional Chinese beliefs around feng shui, or the practice of creating harmony in the environment. In ultramodern Hong Kong, many buildings famously have “dragon holes” allowing the mythical beast passage to nearby mountains.

Other buildings, like Hong Kong’s HSBC headquarters and Taiwan’s tallest building, Taipei 101, were built with multiple references to feng shui and traditional Chinese symbolism.

Dragons continue to reign

Despite the notable increase in competition in some countries, it is not all doom and gloom for every dragon baby.

Herman Wu, who was also born in 1976, told Al Jazeera that while his school year was significantly larger and more competitive, there were also some benefits.

“Some traditional rituals require the zodiac sign to be the auspicious dragon. For example, during the wedding ceremony, when the bride arrives at the groom’s home, children with the zodiac sign of the dragon are needed to greet the bride,” he said.

For this service, he would receive a “red envelope” with some cash inside, earning him pocket money throughout his childhood. Red is considered a lucky colour among Chinese and red envelopes are also given to younger people by their elders during the Lunar New Year festivities.

Even less traditional Taiwanese are thrilled about the possibility of a dragon baby.

Cici Jiang, a 34-year-old expectant mother, told Al Jazeera she was excited that her baby boy would be born in March – well into the year of the dragon.

While Jiang said she had not planned for a dragon baby, many of the other women in her pregnancy chat group had.

“All the others used IVF to get pregnant, they were all excited to have a dragon baby, but they ended up having their babies before the lunar new year, so the babies’ zodiac signs were still considered rabbits,” she said.

People born in rabbit years are said to be gentle and creative. While it is also an auspicious sign, it does not quite meet the prestige of being a dragon.

“I’m the only person who’s going to have a dragon baby boy. People have been telling me how lucky I am. I feel very blessed,” Jiang said.

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Singapore’s Turf Club faces closure after failure to keep the pace | Politics News

Singapore – On a sunny Saturday afternoon in the far north of Singapore, a weekend ritual is in full swing.

Racegoers at the Singapore Turf Club are crowded around banks of screens, studying the odds for the afternoon’s upcoming horse races.

Many are clutching newspapers, scrutinising the form guide in the hope of picking out a winner. The crowd is largely made up of older Singaporean men, affectionately known as “uncles”.

Soon, they will need to find something else to fill their weekends. The curtain is about to come down on more than 180 years of horse racing history in Singapore, with the final race scheduled for October.

The Southeast Asian nation’s sole horse racing track has fallen victim to the tiny island’s need for land, with its entire 120 hectares (297 acres) to be handed back to the government in 2027 for redevelopment into public and private housing.

British Queen Elizabeth II (centre), who loved horse racing, visited the Turf Club on several occasions [File: Nash/AP]

When the announcement was made last June, Singapore Turf Club’s chairman,  Niam Chiang Meng, said he was “saddened by the decision” but “understands the land needs of Singapore”.

More than six months later, Singapore’s horse racing community remains shocked, confused and frustrated.

“We had no indication [prior to June] or any information that this place is closing”, said Jason Ong, the president of the Association of Racehorse Trainers Singapore.

“To close down the whole industry in one and a half years, I think that’s something that every participant in horse racing feels is very sudden and hard to come to terms with,” Ong added.

Horses have been raced in the city-state since 1843, with the inaugural Singapore cup race held in front of more than 300 spectators.

As the popularity of the sport grew, racing moved to a 98-hectare site (242 acres) in the centrally located Bukit Timah area in 1933. Queen Elizabeth II was a notable visitor to the course in 1972, with 26,000 fans flocking to see her and other members of the British Royal Family.

Then, on the eve of the Millennium, the turf club was moved so the site could be returned to the government for housing and other uses.

At a recent meeting, there were plenty of seats available for spectators [Adam Hancock/Al Jazeera]

The 500 million Singapore dollar ($295m) Kranji Racecourse was opened in 1999 and included a five-storey grandstand with a capacity for 30,000 fans.

This new venue was supposed to signal more opportunities for the growth of horse racing in Singapore, even allowing for atmospheric night races under floodlights.

But today, it is a very different feeling at a racecourse that is soon to be demolished.

The grandstands are far from full, with most people huddled together in the shade of the concourses watching the races on monitors.

‘It’s a hobby’

Food and drink options are limited, with one food court sitting empty. Just a few shops remain, selling cheap cans of Tiger beer and plastic containers of noodle and rice dishes.

But the enthusiasm for racing and gambling remains strong among the loyal patrons.

“It’s a hobby, my hobby. I’ve been betting for more than 30 years”, said racegoer Frankie Koay.

“I’m very sad – it shouldn’t have had to be closed. Once it goes down we have to concentrate on other racing, like Hong Kong and Malaysia,” Frankie added.

Racegoers queue up to place their bets at the Singapore Turf Club [Adam Hancock/Al Jazeera]

In the lull between races, action from other tracks in South Korea and Australia is broadcast on TV screens. Occasional roars can be heard from different crowds, presumably cheering a winner in the 3:40 at Seoul.

While far from full, there is a real sense of community at the course, with the largely working-class crowd enjoying the chance to pocket some winnings.

“I’ve come here for around 30 years”, said Mr Tay, who preferred not to share his full name.

When asked why he keeps coming back, he says: “Just nothing to do. No place to go. I just come for fun”.

With horse racing soon to bow out in Singapore, one sport retains a stronghold on the tiny island.

As of 2023, there were 16 golf courses on the island, according to local media, although one public course closed at the end of the year.

On top of this, the 712 sq km (275 sq mile) city-state retains several country and social clubs.

The government says golf courses are being targeted too, with the centrally-located Marina Bay course to close later this year when its lease comes to an end.

When announcing the closure of the Kranji Racecourse, Singapore Turf Club blamed dwindling attendance over the past decade. And on this Saturday afternoon, it was not difficult to find a seat to watch the action.

“Closing down is OK for me because there’s no new generation to do horse betting,” said racing fan Roger Chuay.

Some members of Singapore’s racing community are placing the blame for the ageing fan base firmly at the door of the Turf Club’s management.

Fans check out the horses in the paddock. Trainers are concerned about the future of some 500 horses [Adam Hancock/Al Jazeera]

“Horse racing here has gone backwards a bit. But it was only going backwards because of the way they manage it and they never kept up with the times,” said one leading trainer who wished to remain anonymous.

“If you put the right people in to run racing and get it right, it could be a massive asset to Singapore and to tourism and to jobs,” the trainer added.

500 horses to consider

Eyebrows have also been raised at how long it took to begin the redevelopment of the Turf Club’s previous site in Bukit Timah.

Since it closed in 1999, the racecourse has been host to several businesses, including restaurants and children’s play facilities.

It was only at the end of 2023 that it was finally cleared for work to begin on a new housing neighbourhood.

“The old turf club is only just now closed up and they are going to start doing something to it. That’s 24 years”, said the trainer.

“This place [Kranji Racecourse], nothing will happen to it for 10-15 years. It will just rot.”

For those still involved in horse racing in Singapore, there is now the considerable challenge of winding down their operations and finding new homes for hundreds of horses in a relatively short period of time.

“The important part now is thinking about what the exit strategy is,” said Ong.

“It’s the welfare of the horses as well, even if you want to export the horses out, will there be anyone taking them in? If you say we can send 500 horses to Malaysia, I don’t think Malaysia will be able to take in so many horses,” explained Ong.

In a statement, the Singapore government said: “Racehorse trainers and owners will receive support for horse maintenance and exportation.”

The Turf Club tends to attract older working-class men. Many are upset at the course’s impending closure  [Adam Hancock/Al Jazeera]

The Singapore Turf Club declined an interview request from Al Jazeera. In a statement released last year, they said they “will work with the government to ensure a well-managed exit for local horse racing.”

Racing at Kranji will draw to a close with the running of the 100th Grand Singapore Gold Cup.

It will be a day that will bring immense sadness for the Singaporeans for whom racing is the highlight of their weekends.

“A lot of people have no place to go for amusement. We are not going to go drinking or out to night life, this place [the races] is for old men to go”, said Paul as he studied horses in the parade ring.

“If they want to build commercial buildings or houses, I think a golf club is better. One golf club cleared away means you can build a lot.”

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Batang Kali: A British massacre in colonial Malaya and a fight for justice | Human Rights News

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – In the smart offices of a law firm located among the skyscrapers of the Malaysian capital, 85-year-old Lim Kok’s thoughts turn back to a crime perpetrated by British forces three-quarters of a century ago.

The decades in between have not faded Lim’s memories of the period when then-Malaya was a colony in the waning days of the British Empire.

Attempting to slow the sun setting on its colony in Southeast Asia, London sent thousands of British and Commonwealth troops to suppress a local movement fighting for independence in the aftermath of World War II.

Lim was just nine years old when his father, a hardworking ethnic Chinese supervisor at a rubber plantation, was gunned down in a hail of bullets along with 23 other innocent workers in what is still known to this day as the Batang Kali massacre.

He lost more than his father that day, Lim said.

He lost a family.

With her husband and the family’s breadwinner dead, Lim’s mother was left alone to raise six children – an impossible task for a poor rural household in the late 1940s.

Lim’s mother was forced to give her youngest child, a newly-born baby girl, up for adoption. Lim was later sent to live with a granduncle in Kuala Lumpur.

Not only was Lim’s family torn apart, but the British troops who carried out the massacre tried to cover up the atrocity by accusing their victims of being involved with the Communists fighting for independence.

The truth would surface years later as journalists, researchers and court hearings attested to the innocence of those killed by British soldiers in Batang Kali.

To this day, however, there has been no redress or official apology from British authorities, who have resisted calls to open an enquiry into the massacre that took place 75 years ago this week.

An ethnic Chinese protester leaving a white flower at the main entrance of the British High Commission building in Kuala Lumpur during a commemoration in 2008 for those massacred by British soldiers in Batang Kali in 1948. Britain has refused requests to hold an inquiry into the massacre by 14 members of the Scots Guards [File: Saeed Khan/AFP]

“I knew my dad was a genuine rubber tapper,” Lim told Al Jazeera, when asked about the colonial state’s attempt to frame the victims of the massacre as rebels.

The false accusations never made him “feel bad” as he was growing up, he said.

“The only thing bad is that they were massacred by the British soldiers.”

Though he is in his mid-80s, Lim is spry and energetic and has not given up the fight to hold the British government to account for “the suffering which we and the other relatives of the murdered persons experienced”.

“Being the offspring, we suffered a lot. Even my brothers and sisters… They have to go out in search of work at a very early age just to earn a living,” he said in an interview earlier this year. “They suffered a lot.”

The most recent fight to hold British authorities to account began in 2008 when the father of Kuala Lumpur-based lawyer Quek Ngee Meng launched a campaign for justice after researching the incident in his retirement.

When his father passed away in 2010, Quek took up the torch for the victims of Batang Kali.

The campaign for an official inquiry has taken advocates from London’s High Court to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court, and onto the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

Quek said the massacre has had a multigenerational impact on the families of the slain men, who were consigned to economic hardship and poverty on top of suffering the trauma of the violent deaths of their loved ones.

Many families of the victims could not afford to educate their children well. Some gave up children for adoption. Others married young or agreed to arranged marriages just to keep their families afloat following the loss of their breadwinner.

“The families were actually broken down,” Quek told Al Jazeera, explaining that it took generations for the families of victims to improve their economic and social circumstances.

“It actually wasn’t just the 24 or whoever who were killed. Many, many people are victims of this,” he said.

Quek recalls that legal action was not their first choice. An apology and a settlement would have sufficed for relatives, but a letter sent to British authorities seeking to negotiate was ignored.

“There was no middle ground that we can reach…. No offer for any talks. We just have to go on this legal journey and, yes, we lost on technical grounds,” he said.

Quek Ngee Meng, centre, presents a memorandum condemning the massacre of 24 civilians at Batang Kali to British High Commissioner to Malaysia Boyd McCleary outside the British High Commission building in Kuala Lumpur on December 12, 2008 [File: Saeed Khan/AFP]

“I felt sorry for Lim Kok and all those I couldn’t get compensation for,” said Quek, who has worked for years on the campaign on a pro bono basis.

“But, what I can get is this: All judges all agree that an atrocity at that time was committed by the British soldiers. And, the fact, the true fact, is these villagers, they were not guilty of any crime.”

“They were not Communists. There is no proof that they were sympathisers,” he said.

The details of the Batang Kali massacre are chilling.

According to court documents, in the early evening of December 11, 1948, a patrol of Scots Guards numbering 14 soldiers entered the remote settlement in Batang Kali, located among heavily jungled hills some 60km (around 40 miles) north of Kuala Lumpur. The settlement was inhabited by around 50 adults and some children who worked on the surrounding rubber plantation, which was owned by a Scottish man.

The British soldiers separated the men from the women and children and confined them overnight in a wooden long hut where they were interrogated. The soldiers carried out mock executions to terrify the unarmed male villagers in the hope of obtaining information about rebels that might have been nearby.

Troops of ‘G’ Company, Second Battalion The Scots Guards, wade through a swamp during an operation in Pahang, Malaya, in 1950 [File: AP Photo]

That night, the first victim was shot.

The following morning, the women and children, and one traumatised man, were put on a truck and driven away from the plantation. The hut in which the 23 men had been detained was opened and, in the next few minutes, all were shot dead.

With bodies strewn all around, the soldiers torched the workers’ huts and the patrol moved on, returning to their base later.

The first newspaper report in the days following the massacre described the slain men as “bandits” who were shot while trying to escape and claimed that a quantity of ammunition had been uncovered.

Shortly after, Britain’s War Office officially declared the killings as a “very successful action”.

As the truth began to emerge of what actually took place, a rudimentary enquiry headed by British legal officials in the colony was conducted and concluded within a matter of days.

Based on statements from the soldiers, and not the villagers, the conclusion was that nothing had occurred in Batang Kali that “justified criminal proceeding”.

A protester representing a British soldier portrays the Batang Kali massacre scene during a protest in front of the British High Commission building in Kuala Lumpur in December 2008. British troops during the ‘Malayan Emergency’ said they severed the heads of suspected rebels for identification purposes [Saeed Khan/AFP]

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Singapore’s Stablecoin Regulatory Framework Announced: All Details

Singapore has announced a framework for stablecoins, as the overall global crypto sector faces increased rules and regulations in different parts of the world. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced these rules on August 15, which now allow for stablecoins to become part of the country’s existing financial system. The government of Singapore had begun deliberations on stablecoin rules last year in October. In the ten months since, authorities invited and reviewed feedback from the public, especially since stablecoins fall under the crypto category.

Stablecoins are essentially cryptocurrencies that are pegged against reserve assets like gold or fiat currencies. Unlike regular cryptocurrencies, that are impacted by market volatility, stablecoins pose a lesser risk for investors as their underlaying assets make them less susceptible to major dips. Tether, USD Coin, and Binance USD are some examples of popular stablecoins.

The MAS’ stablecoin regulatory framework has been designed for single-currency stablecoins (SCS). Only stablecoins pegged to the Singapore dollar or other G10 currencies like Australian dollar, US dollar, and British Pound among others, will be eligible for receiving the MAS certification, the official statement from Singapore’s authorities said.

“SCS reserve assets will be subject to requirements relating to their composition, valuation, custody, and audit to give a high degree of assurance of value stability,” the MAS said.

Web3 firms that wish to issue stablecoins in Singapore will have to ensure that they maintain minimum base capital and liquid assets. The country aims to avoid companies being exposed to the risks of collapse and insolvency.

The MAS has directed stablecoin issuers to return the value of stablecoins to holders within five business days from them submitting redemption requests.

“Issuers must provide appropriate disclosures to users, including information on the SCS’ value stabilising mechanism, rights of SCS holders, as well as the audit results of reserve assets. Only stablecoin issuers that fulfil all requirements under the framework can apply to MAS for their stablecoins to be recognised and labelled as ‘MAS-regulated stablecoins’,” the official document said.

Not all stablecoins will be regulated by MAS and if any issuer is found guilty of promoting a non-MAS certified stablecoin as one, they would be subject to penalties. The MAS will also list defaulted stablecoins on the Investor Alert List to warn potential investors.

“MAS’ stablecoin regulatory framework aims to facilitate the use of stablecoins as a credible digital medium of exchange, and as a bridge between the fiat and digital asset ecosystems,” said Ho Hern Shin, Deputy Managing Director (Financial Supervision), MAS.

In its exploration of the digital assets sector, Singapore is taking a gradual and calculated approach. Crypto and Web3 advocacy groups from India and Singapore signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) last month. The groups, Bharat Web3 Association (BWA) and the Blockchain Association Singapore (BAS), have decided to join forces on nurturing and fostering the Web3 sector.

This MoU entails that both India and Singapore will collaborate with their expertise and resources on the growth of the blockchain sector.

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Hodlnaut Crypto Lender Under Scanner in Singapore, Being Probed for Fraud

Singapore has launched a probe into the Hodlnaut crypto lender to investigate its operations. The Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) from Singapore is now probing if Hodlnaut has been indulging in cheating and fraudulent activities. As per the law enforcement authorities, between August and November, several reports had claimed that Hodlnaut and its directors had made ‘false representations’ about the lender’s exposure to a particular digital token. The CAD is Singapore’s white-collar crime investigation unit.

The token in question remains unnamed. It reportedly refers to the USTC crypto token that was developed by Terra which collapsed quite dramatically earlier this year in May.

Following Terra’s collapse, Holdnaut had lost nearly $190 million (roughly Rs. 1,550 crore) that left its accounts high and dry.

In August, Hodlnaut had to freeze withdrawals from its platform to save its business from shutting down.

Holdnaut, as of now, has not reacted to the development.

The collapse of the Terra ecosystem — both algorithmic stablecoin UST and sister token LUNA — triggered a massive crypto sell-off leading to a crypto winter.

Terra’s collapse also prompted the high-profile meltdowns of crypto lenders Celsius and Voyager, as well as hedge fund Three Arrows Capital, and ushered even more scrutiny on crypto investing and stablecoins from regulators.

Shaktikanta Das, the governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), had issued warnings against the experimenting in the crypto sector soon after Terra’s collapse.

“This [crypto] is something whose underlying [value] is nothing. There are big questions on how do you regulate it. Our position remains very clear, it will seriously undermine the monetary, financial, and macroeconomic stability of India,” the governor had said at the time.

In the market movements that followed the collapse of Terra and then FTX crypto exchange this month, over $200 billion (roughly Rs. 16,30,000 crore) were wiped off from the market, leaving the global crypto valuation currently at $828 billion (roughly Rs. 67,48,800 crore).

Several crypto companies including Lemon Cash, Genesis and Vauld had to lay off their employees to sustain their respective businesses.

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Singapore Partners HSBC, Standard Chartered to Explore Token Use in Trade, Wealth Management

Singapore is exploring the use cases of blockchain technology to get its fintech sector ready for a futuristic revamp. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has partnered with multinational banks Standard Chartered and HSBC to dive deeper into the use-cases of tokens in trade finance and wealth management. Two pilot projects are being launched in Singapore for experimentation. The United Overseas Bank (UOB) is also part of this initiative and is working with Marketnode, a digital asset platform built by the Singapore Exchange (SGX).

As part of the first pilot project lead by Standard Chartered, the involved parties will explore digital tokens that could be used to simplify and expand tools for trade finance.

The second pilot will focus on identifying the tokenisation of wealth management products. This will be headed by HSBC.

The move is aimed at transforming trade assets into transferable instruments.

“We aim to improve the accessibility to an asset class – which has largely been the domain of banks – with participation from a broader range of investors. Not only can we potentially narrow the $1.7 trillion (roughly Rs. 1,40,73,033 crore) global trade finance gap, this also offers investors the option to balance their portfolio with a digital token that has traceable intrinsic value,” a Coindesk report quoted Kai Fehr, global head of trade and working capital at Standard Chartered as saying.

Asset tokenisation is the process of creating digital units of a physical or virtual property that is held on blockchain networks. Each of the tokens of an individual property, amount for some percentage of the entity.

Tokenising an asset can increase the liquidity of the assets. The property owner could sell 50,000 tokens, instead of selling the entire property and losing its utility as a whole.

The news about these new pilot projects come after Singapore’s central bank announced that the first trades using tokenised version of the yen and the Singapore dollar completed successfully.

“Under the first industry pilot, DBS Bank, JP Morgan and SBI Digital Asset Holdings conducted foreign exchange and government bond transactions against liquidity pools comprising of tokenised Singapore Government Securities Bonds, Japanese Government Bonds, Japanese Yen (JPY) and Singapore Dollar (SGD),” the MAS said in an official post.

Investment in Singapore’s crypto and blockchain companies surged to $1.48 billion (roughly Rs. 11,800 crore) in 2021, ten times the previous year and nearly half the Asia Pacific total for 2021, according to KPMG.

Over 150 crypto companies applied for a new crypto payments licence from the MAS in 2020, although so far only a handful have received one.

On Tuesday, November 2, Stablecoin issuers Circle and Paxos have received operational approvals in Singapore. While Circle is the issuer of USD Coin (UDSC), Paxos is behind the Pax Dollar (USDP).

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Finance Authorities of Singapore Call for Stringent Licencing Process for Digital Asset Businesses

Singapore wishes to establish itself as a ‘responsible’ hub for crypto activities. In a bid to achieve this goal, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has called for very strict verification and licencing processes for entities dealing with virtual digital assets wishing to set up shop in the southeast Asian sovereign island city-state. Singapore’s central bank has also joined MAS in suggesting a tough screening process for the businesses that expose people to high-risk assets and could potentially cause major financial damage if left unsupervised.

“The licensing process is stringent. And it needs to be because we want to be a responsible global crypto hub with innovative players, but also with strong risk management capabilities,” said Ravi Menon, the managing director of the MAS, while addressing the subject.

The statements were made by Menon during the Financial Times Crypto and Digital Asset Summit on April 27, Bitcoin.com reported.

The MAS chief noted that cryptocurrencies and other virtual assets do pose the threat of being misused for illicit activities such as terror financing and money laundering among others.

“I think many global regulators share similar concerns about retail exposure to cryptocurrencies,” he added.

In Singapore, Menon said, the track record of licence applicants is thoroughly analysed to see if strong corporate governance structures are in place or not.

Singapore also takes a tough approach on retail investors pouring money on cryptocurrencies in order to curb the risk of big losses.

A recent report has revealed that the total crypto-related crime in 2020 has amounted to around $10.52 billion (roughly Rs. 79,194 crore).

The same report also highlighted that scams and frauds are a major problem, which made for 67.8 percent of the total cryptocurrency crime in 2020.

In January this year, the MAS had published its “Guidelines to Discourage Cryptocurrency Trading by General Public”. The document warns innocent investors against making ignorant decisions.

As of January, over 100 companies applying for licences to operate in Singapore’s virtual assets industry were denied permits. Over 170 firms had reportedly applied at the time.

The island authorities, however, do not wish to ban the crypto sector.

In fact, in March, the Singaporean regulators had advised other nations also to enter the cryptocurrency space.

As per a report by research firm TripleA, over 550,000 Singaporeans — making up 9.4 percent of the country’s total population — are crypto-owners.

The country’s biggest bank DBS Group has also created a platform to facilitate digital token transactions.

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