South-East Asia (Page 1,377)

The implementation of a mutual 30-day visa-free travel between China and Singapore brings “more good news”, said Mr Tan.
 
Under the agreement which started on Feb 9, Singaporeans and Chinese citizens holding ordinary passports can enter China or Singapore without a visa for no more than 30 days if they are travelling for business, sightseeing, visiting friends and family, or other private affairs.

Mr Tan said this has made it easier for Chinese visitors to travel to Singapore – a likely boost to arrivals and spending across tourism-related, retail and the food and beverage sectors. The longer visa exemption also makes it more convenient for Singaporeans to travel to China for leisure and business.

Beyond investments, the government is also working with the tourism sector to develop “a pipeline of high quality and first-of-its-kind experiences” that will be launched in the coming years.

These include expansions at the Resorts World Sentosa to develop a Minions-themed zone at Universal Studios Singapore and an oceanarium that is significantly larger than the existing SEA Aquarium.

Sentosa will also get a new attraction called the Sensoryscape. Connecting Resorts World Sentosa and Sentosa’s beaches, the pathway will feature “multi-sensorial gardens” with digital light art displays at night, said Mr Tan.
 
The 30,000 sqm pathway, first announced in 2019, is part of a master plan to transform Sentosa and nearby Pulau Brani into a game-changing leisure and tourism spot in the next two to three decades. The iconic Merlion statue on Sentosa island was closed that year to make way for the new development.

The Sensoryscape will be soft launched this month.
 
Altogether, these new experiences will help to strengthen Singapore’s appeal as a “compelling destination”, Mr Tan said.

Continue Reading

SINGAPORE: A Singaporean man sentenced to death for trafficking 34.9g of diamorphine or heroin has lost his appeals against his conviction and sentence.

Shen Hanjie, 33, argued in his appeal that he always believed the drugs in the bundles found in his Marsiling bedroom to be cannabis or “grass”.

He also argued that he did not have the intention to traffic the drugs and that he was a mere courier.

The Court of Appeal in a judgment released on Friday (Mar 1) found no error in the trial judge’s decision and dismissed Shen’s appeals.

According to court papers, a team of 13 Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB) officers went to the carpark of a block in Marsiling to look out for Shen on Nov 20, 2018.

When they got to his unit, the main door was open but his bedroom door was locked.

They broke into Shen’s bedroom and arrested him, seizing multiple packets of drugs found inside.

In several statements given to investigators after his arrest, Shen claimed that he was keeping the drugs for a man known as Alan.

He said he had known him for about six months before his arrest, through a mutual friend.

He claimed that he met Alan only once at a playground, where Alan said that if Shen needed anything, Alan would be able to find someone to deliver it over.

Shen said he understood “anything” to be a reference to illegal things such as drugs.

After the meeting, Alan called Shen to say there were “things” coming in from “JB” and asked Shen to receive them on his behalf.

Shen claimed to not know what these things were, and found out they were drugs only after opening them up.

After this, he began receiving drugs on Alan’s behalf. He claimed not to receive any fixed payment in return, but instead would ask Alan for about S$200 (US$148) to S$300 whenever he needed money.

Shen used various terms to describe the drugs in his notebooks seized from his bedroom.

These included “Hot” for “Hot one”, “Fish” for “cold one”, referring to ice, “wine”, “dance”, “KFC” and “Gu”, referring to grass or cannabis.

Shen said he smoked “ice” on a daily basis since early 2018.

He was jobless after he stopped helping out at his father’s coffee shop, and would receive allowances from his parents.

To get money, he would pawn various items including his parents’ belongings and said he wanted to use the money for daily expenses and online betting.

At trial, the defence argued that Shen did not know what diamorphine is, as he had only ever consumed other types of drugs such as ice or cannabis.

While the prosecution argued that “hot one” referred to diamorphine, the defence argued that Shen understood “hot one” to refer to “ganja” or cannabis.

But the trial judge rejected the defence’s explanation.

First, it was clear that Shen wrote down different entries for “hot” and “gu” in his notebooks. He could not have understood “hot” to be the same as “gu” or grass.

Second, Shen had omitted to mention in one of his statements that he knew “grass” to be the same as “hot one”.

COURT OF APPEAL FINDINGS

The Apex Court agreed with the trial judge that Alan did not lie to Shen that the drugs were cannabis instead of diamorphine.

Even if that were true, it was “unbelievable” that Shen would trust and believe Alan totally and accept his explanation at face value.

Justice Tay Yong Kwang, Justice Steven Chong and Justice Belinda Ang of the Court of Appeal said Shen was not “generally forthcoming and cooperative in the recording of investigation statements” as he claimed.

Instead, he was “far from being forthcoming” as he gave a blatantly false statement at one point that he did not know what grass was.

Later evidence would show that he was quite familiar with grass as he had helped Alan distribute this drug before, said the Court of Appeal.

“He even stated that he had smoked grass before but did not like the smell. Although he referred to it as ‘gu’ in his notebooks, in his evidence, he accepted that ‘gu’, ‘grass’ and ‘ganja’ all meant the same drug, cannabis,” the court said.

The court noted that Shen had admitted he would deliver drugs to other people as directed by Alan.

Shen had been out of work for about two years before his arrest and was being paid by Alan to distribute the drugs.

There was also DNA evidence showing that he had repacked some of the drug packets, and there were drug-related paraphernalia such as clear wrap, empty packets and black tape that pointed to the fact that he was involved in the drug distribution.

Continue Reading

SINGAPORE: A boy who had tried to rape his sister when she was 11 and he was 14 has been sentenced to 27 months’ probation.

The prosecution, who pushed for reformative training (RT) instead, has appealed against the sentence.

According to a judgment made available on Friday (Mar 1), the boy lived with his sister and their parents at the time of the offences in 2020.

On Apr 21, 2020, the boy saw that his sister appeared to be in deep sleep. He molested her before sexually assaulting her.

Sometime between April 2020 and May 2020, the boy approached his sister and attempted to rape her. The girl pushed him away and told him to stop.

The offences came to light only in October 2022, when the Ministry of Social and Family Development lodged a police report.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Gladys Lim objected to the calling of a probation report, as asked for by the defence.

She said the boy, now 18, had committed “egregious sexual offences against his biological sister” and that probation would be “entirely incommensurate to the severity of the offending” and the aggravating factors.

She sought instead a term of reformative training – where a young offender is detained in a reformative training centre in a structured setting and required to undergo rehabilitation programmes.

Assessments found the teenager suitable for both probation and reformative training, but District Judge Carol Ling imposed probation instead.

The prosecutor argued against it, highlighting the teen’s moderate risk of sexual reoffending and his continued viewing of pornographic materials even after being caught for the offences.

But defence lawyer Kalaithasan Karuppaya from Regent Law said his client’s character was “still developing” and that he was remorseful.

The boy had no prior history of conflict with the law.

Judge Ling said there was no doubt that the offences were very serious, but she was of the view that he “could be given a chance at a community-based rehabilitation in the form of probation”.

One of the most important considerations was the boy’s age at the time of the offences, she said.

“He was only 14 years old then. It was clear from the probation report and the RT report that the offences were committed in part due to his curiosity and early and frequent exposure to pornography,” she added.

PORNOGRAPHY EXPOSURE

Social investigations by the probation officer showed that the boy was first exposed to porn when he was only four years old.

This was when his maternal cousin, also four, showed him a porn website on a tablet.

From 2017 to 2020, the boy’s frequency of watching porn increased.

The lead psychologist wrote in the boy’s RT report that his “early sexualisation experiences had likely disrupted his normative and healthy process of psychosexual development”.

“The early onset and frequent exposure to pornographic content at six years old introduced him to sexually inappropriate situations and influenced his understanding about sexuality … the regular exposure to pornography contributed to the development of inappropriate sexualised behaviours and preferences,” wrote the psychologist.

The judge said it was important to consider the circumstances that led to the commission of the offences.

He was approaching or experiencing puberty at the age of 14 at the time, and all four offences were committed in April or May 2020, with no further incidents.

“The short period within which the offences occurred indicated that the accused was at that material time, seeking sexual gratification (replicating what he had watched on pornography) and was acting out of curiosity,” said Judge Ling.

Once the boy realised his sister was unresponsive or expressed discomfort or unwillingness, he stopped.

LACK OF ADULT GUIDANCE

Judge Ling said this premature and heightened exposure to inappropriate sexualised behaviour was not helped by the fact that he did not have the benefit of proper adult guidance to address this developing sexual curiosity as he was growing up.

His parents travelled overseas frequently for work. It was only in 2018, when the boy’s father became a real estate agent, that the man could spend more time at home.

Throughout the boy’s growing-up years, it was “apparent that the parents were unaware of the accused’s engagement in unhealthy and covert sexual behaviour”, and found out only when the probation officer told them, the judge said.

While the circumstances precipitating the offences did not justify his acts against his sister, they provide insight into his offending, said the judge.

“To my mind, there was some room for understanding and compassion for a very young offender who may not have been able to fully appreciate the gravity and/or the full consequences of his actions on himself and his sister at the material time,” said Judge Ling.

The boy was also observed to have displayed “significant behavioural shifts such as respectful and consensual interactions with opposite-sex peers” after realising the harm he had caused his sister, the court heard.

On top of this, the boy also showed personal insight into his own offending, conveying guilt and recognising how his actions had broken his sister’s trust in him and disappointed his parents.

He has also sought to educate himself through his parents, social media and other means, in building positive and healthy relationships.

The boy’s parents also implemented parental control applications in his phone and computer and are ready to continue monitoring his device use. 

The judge said the boy’s porn-watching habit could be “addressed through equipping him with appropriate sexual knowledge and strategies to cultivate healthier sexual habits”, with practical steps taking place “in a community under the guidance and supervision of the probation officer”.

On top of serving his probation period, the boy also has to serve 120 hours of community service, attend offence-specific treatment programmes and comply with the Child Protective Service’s safety plan.

However, since the prosecution has filed an application to appeal, the terms of probation have been stayed pending the outcome.

Continue Reading

TWO TIERS, TWO DIFFERENT PURPOSES 

The national SkillsFuture movement was launched in 2015. Since then, training participation rates have increased from 35 per cent to around 50 per cent in 2022.

Close to 40 per cent of Singaporeans in their 30s have used their base S$500 credits, compared with about 25 per cent of those aged 60 and above.

The purpose of the new SkillsFuture scheme announced in February is to enable mid-career transitions to in-demand industries, hence the targeted nature of the S$4,000 top-up in credits, said SIT’s Dr Ng. 

“For people who are not keen on these industries, they can still rely on the earlier SkillsFuture scheme to explore industries outside of the industry they are currently employed in,” he added. 

“Both types of schemes serve very different purposes and do not affect each other.” 

Dr Xu Le of the National University of Singapore’s business school noted that the new measure seeks to encourage people to upskill or reskill, to maintain the competitiveness of Singapore’s workforce.

On the other hand, one of the objectives of the S$500 in basic tier SkillsFuture credits is to incentivise individuals to pursue their genuine interests and cultivate lifelong learning habits, she added. 

“I believe it’s crucial to maintain the flexibility of the basic tier of credits and allow individuals to choose courses they desire, even if they aren’t directly related to their careers,” said Dr Xu. 

“As long as these courses bring happiness and contribute to overall well-being, they can indirectly benefit their careers by promoting a healthier and happier life.” 

Experts pointed to the example of Apple founder Steve Jobs, who took a calligraphy class at a time when it had no practical application in his life or career.

But when his team at Apple was coming up with the first Macintosh 10 years later, everything he learnt about typography and typefaces came back to him and was incorporated into the design of the computer. 

This is why SkillsFuture courses still need to cater to diverse needs that go beyond employment, said Mr Ho Seong Kim, CEO of the Singapore Institute of Management Academy.

“These learning opportunities may not directly support immediate employment outcomes,” he added. “But are nonetheless valuable for personal growth and self-discovery, which can lead to entrepreneurship.”

Continue Reading