Singapore: Singapore will give police more power to maintain public order in the city’s Little India district where the country’s first riot in more than four decades took place last month.

“Officers will have more authority to enforce restrictions on the consumption or sale of alcohol, and regulate movements of people in the area," deputy prime minister Teo Chee Hean said in Parliament on Monday. “The law will be valid for a year," he said.

The riot involving about 400 people broke out the night of 8 December 2013 following a fatal traffic accident, and police vehicles, an ambulance and private cars were set ablaze, toppled or damaged. After the incident, the government banned the sale and consumption of alcohol on weekends in the area, which attracts thousands of foreign workers on their Sundays off.

“Law enforcement officers will be given enhanced powers to deal pre-emptively and decisively with potential public order threats in the special zone," the ministry of home affairs said in a statement on Monday. Officers will also have powers to exclude or ban persons from entering the special zone for specified durations if his presence or actions are likely to threaten public order. Bloomberg

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