SINGAPORE, March 1 (NNN-Bernama) — Singapore has agreed to declassify and release documents in the famous “Albatross File”, a file that Dr Goh Keng Swee kept in the run-up to Singapore’s separation from Malaysia, said Senior Minister of State for Communications and Information Dr Janil Puthucheary.
Dr Goh served as Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore between 1973 and 1985 and is widely recognised as one of the founding fathers of Singapore.
“The process of declassification began some time ago, and took some time given the complexity of the material, and a subset of the material was part of a public exhibition,” said Puthucheary at a committee of supply debate for his ministry in Parliament.
“A larger set of declassified Albatross documents will be released in a book on separation to be published later this year. This will include cabinet papers and Dr Goh’s notes of his conversations with Malaysian leaders,” said Puthucheary.
The minister also informed the Parliament that since 2016, government agencies have reviewed more than 7,000 government records that were not yet declassified.
“This was in response to 2,130 requests by members of the public. In all, 83 per cent of these records have been approved for access. In total, some 68,000 file records have been declassified and made accessible to the public,” he said.
— NNN-BERNAMA
