PRESIDENT SR Nathan on Tuesday explained why he agreed to the Government's request to unlock the past reserves.

The process took 11 days and he gave the nod just a day before the Government presented its Budget to Parliament on Jan 22.

SINGAPORE Airlines on Tuesday unveiled more route cuts, a day after it said it would reduce capacity by 11 per cent and ground 17 jets in this financial year.

Faced with a rapidly-shrinking travel market, SIA, which had earlier announced route cuts to India, the United States and Vancouver, has added to the list Australia and Britain, as well as other points in Asia.

PHNOM PENH - 'I PRAYED for dawn as soon as possible so that I could see this trial start,' said Vann Nath, one of only a handful of people to have been spared by the Khmer Rouge regime's chief torturer.

He was one of hundreds of people, from saffron-robed Buddhist monks to families who lost loved ones, who on Tuesday attended the first day of the trial of Duch, who ran the notorious Tuol Sleng detention centre.

SINGAPORE'S exports plunged to a record low in January as shipments of manufactured goods to all markets continued to slow dramatically.

The fall of 34.8 per cent, was the lowest in 22 years since the Government started recording year-on-year figures, and was worse than the previous record fall of 30.7 per cent set in September 2001, International Enterprise Singapore reported on Tuesday.