Shangri-La Dialogue organisers committed to hosting summit in Singapore

The organizers of the Shangri-La Dialogue on Friday reiterated their commitment to hold the mega defense summit in Singapore next month even as the government announced tighter COVID-19 safety measures in the country. The defense summit, organized by the London-headquartered International Institute for Strategic Studies IISS, draws delegates from dozens of countries each year.

The organizers of the Shangri-La Dialogue on Friday reiterated their commitment to hold the mega defense summit in Singapore next month even as the government announced tighter COVID-19 safety measures in the country.

The defense summit, organized by the London-headquartered International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), draws delegates from dozens of countries each year. Since its launch in 2002, it has been held in Singapore annually except for last year when it was canceled due to global COVID-19 travel restrictions.

The event is scheduled for June 4 and 5 this year.

“We remain committed to holding the 19th Shangri-La Dialogue in person in early June,'' IISS told Channel News Asia.

Participants expected at the Shangri-La Dialogue include US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and keynote speaker Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.

The organizers said that they are aware of the announcement by Singapore's COVID-19 multi-ministry task force about the stricter COVID-19 measures in the country.

“We will review our safe management measures in light of today's news to ensure the highest safety levels for all our participants and the wider community in Singapore,” the Channel quoted an IISS spokesperson as saying.

The spokesperson added that IISS will continue to monitor the local and global COVID-19 situation closely.

Amid a rise in community cases, the multi-ministry task force on Friday announced tighter measures, including a cap of 100 people at conferences with pre-event testing and 50 without testing.

The authorities capped group gatherings to two from Sunday, down from the current five.

Other measures included suspension of dining-in at food outlets while working from home will again be the default at workplaces.

The new restrictions will be in place from Sunday until June 13.

On whether conferences such as the Shangri-La Dialogue and the World Economic Forum in August will go ahead, co-chair of the task force Lawrence Wong said that the organizers are monitoring the situation globally and in Singapore “very closely” and will provide updates in due course.

“As far as the Singapore side is concerned, we are in touch with them and we will provide them the latest information on our prevailing public health updates and cases, measures we are taking, so that they have the latest information to decide on the events,” he said.

Wong added that organizers will also consider the broader public health situation and whether potential attendees are prepared to travel.

Singapore authorities reported 24 community cases out of the 52 new COVID-19 infections as of noon on Friday.

This is the highest number of new daily COVID-19 cases since January 30, when 58 cases were reported.

Twenty of the new community cases are linked to previous clusters, of which 13 have been linked to the Changi Airport cluster.

Among them, 16 cases have already been placed in quarantine.

The remaining cases were imported and were placed on stay-home notice upon their arrival in Singapore.

Of these, 19 are returning Singaporeans or permanent residents said the Ministry of Health.

As of Friday, Singapore has reported a total of 61,505 COVID-19 cases. Thirty-one people have died related to COVID-19 complications.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)