KUALA LUMPUR - MALAYSIA'S new Prime Minister Najib Razak announced the release of 13 people held under tough security laws and revoked a ban on two newspapers in his first act after taking office on Friday.

Mr Najib, who was sworn in as the country's sixth prime minister, pledged in his first televised broadcast as PM that he would also review the tough Internal Security Act (ISA) which allows for indefinite detention without trial.

WASHINGTON - US EMPLOYERS slashed 663,000 jobs in March, lifting the unemployment rate to 8.5 per cent, the highest since 1983, official data showed on Friday in a report underscoring the growing distress in the labour market.

The Labor Department also revised January data to show job losses of 741,000 that month, the biggest decline since October 1949, as the economy battles a recession that has entered its 16th month.

ECONOMICS graduates from the Singapore Management University emerged the top earners last year in the latest graduate employment survey.

Their average monthly salary of $4,164 was a notch higher than the $3,971 earned by business graduates from the National University of Singapore.

STARHUB has won the four-horse race in the bid to install the networking equipment that will direct data traffic across Singapore's upcoming broadband network.

Technology sector regulator Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) on Friday announced that StarHub has been appointed the operating company (OpCo), the final missing piece in the drive to build a faster and more competitive broadband market beyond the ability of any single party.