Singapore - The Singapore Exchange Limited (SGX) Tuesday said its derivatives and Exchange Traded Funds (ETF) markets set new trading records last year with volume surging to 62 million contracts, up by 38 per cent from 2007.

By September 2008, turnover in the total futures and options market had already surpassed that for the whole of 2007. This was followed by a record month in October, when 6,863,420 contracts were traded, said SGX.

Total trading value of SGX-listed ETFs in 2008 was 2.94 billion Singapore dollars (1.995 billion US dollars), a 155 per cent increase over 1.15 billion Singapore dollars registered in 2007.

Singapore - Governments should not abandon women and children who need their help most, even as tax revenues shrink because of the global financial crisis, the UN warned Tuesday.

Anupama Rao Singh, UNICEF director for East Asia and the Pacific, urged governments not to forget those dependent on public aid.

"The UN Convention on Children's Rights, which has been ratified by all nations, is clear: children should get help first, especially in economically difficult times," Singh told a Singapore conference.

Singapore  - A Singaporean man was jailed for 16 years and to be beat with 18 strokes of the rattan cane for raping his mildly retarded 11-year old daughter, the Straits Times reported Tuesday.

The 40-year old father, who is also mildly retarded, sobbed as he pleaded guilty to the December 2006 rape following months of denial.

The case came to light last April after his two other daughters reported having been molested by their uncle, their late mother's bother, who faces a separate charge next month.

Singapore  - A Singapore mother faces a four-year jail term and a fine for having her 10-year-old son caned about 100 times during a marathon beating in 2007, the Straits Times reported Tuesday.

The woman, 39, had handed two rattan canes to her husband, the boy's stepfather, which he used to hit the boy on the buttocks, arms and back for two hours on September
15, 2007, in the family's apartment located in the northern Singapore public housing estate.

The boy was hospitalized for eight days after the lashing, a punishment for lying to his school teacher.

Singapore - Singapore shares rose by 5.2 per cent Monday but traders were wary of corporate performances with some listed companies having issued profit warnings and others reviewing investments in

Singapore - Foreign workers in Singapore are complaining of salary arrears, with an increasing numbers of them out of work under the impact of economic downturn, according to a news report Monday.

Workers from China and Bangladesh used the Manpower Ministry to intervene and negotiate their salary disputes with employers, the Straits Times reported.

It said 171 of the Chinese had decided to go back to work, 53 were going back to China and two others were taking their claims to the Labour Court.

Some volunteers helping foreign workers said they were seeing more of them coming to seek help.