Editor
says banned, sued magazine ready to fight in
Singapore
HONG KONG (AP) -- The editor of the
Far Eastern Economic Review magazine on Friday called a defamation
lawsuit filed by Singapore's prime minister and a government ban on
the magazine a coordinated attack.
Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his father, the
city-state's founding former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, filed a
lawsuit on Aug. 22 against Hong Kong-based Review Publishing
Company Ltd. and the magazine's editor, Hugo Restall, over an
article it published in July about Singapore opposition activist
Chee Soon Juan.
Singapore's government later banned the Review because it didn't
appoint a legal representative and pay a 200,000 Singapore dollar
(US$126,150; 99,430) security bond - new requirements that are
unrelated to the lawsuit, but that the Review has called
unjustified.
The two requirements are among tighter restrictions Singapore
imposed in August on five foreign publications: the Review,
Newsweek, Time, the Financial Times and the International Herald
Tribune.
Restall attacked the Review ban in an editor's note in the latest
issue, published Friday.
"The timing and substance of this move (the new requirements) were
in our view no coincidence," he wrote. "It followed hard upon our
refusal to apologize and pay damages."
"With Singaporean efficiency, the government bureaucracy leaped
into action on the Lees' behalf, imposing conditions with
retroactive effect in order to force the magazine to put its head
on the block for the Lees to chop off," Restall wrote.
The Lees' press secretaries and Singapore's Ministry of
Information, Communications and the Arts did not immediately
respond to e-mails seeking comment.
Speaking at a Review news conference in Hong Kong to launch a new
economic index, Restall said the magazine plans "to defend the
defamation lawsuit vigorously, and we look forward to having our
day in court in Singapore."
The Review on Friday launched a new "Barometer of Asian
Development" covering the past five years.
Thailand and China scored highest in the debut survey.
Asked why Singapore earned a top score of 5 in the survey's
"openness and tolerance" category, Restall said the indicator
doesn't measure freedom of speech but rather "openness to
creativity" - or how suitable a country is for academic or
scientific research.
Meanwhile, Paul Gigot, editorial page editor of The Wall Street
Journal and Restall's superior, said the Review has arranged for
its more than 1,000 Singapore subscribers to pick up the magazine
outside the country or read it online.
The Review and Wall Street Journal are both published by Dow Jones
& Co. Inc.
Singapore's ruling party leaders have successfully sued several
opposition politicians and journalists for defamation over the
years, saying they were protecting their reputations.
Domestic and international critics, including the U.S. State
Department and London-based Amnesty International, have accused
Singapore leaders of using such suits to stifle dissent.
Restall said the review, which switched from a weekly news magazine
to a monthly opinion journal in December 2004 due to declining
advertising revenue, is now profitable, but its circulation is
smaller at about 16,000.
Feer ready to fight in Singapore
