London Calling

Our Correspondent - Asia Sentinel
22 January 2007
In a stern reversal on a controversial legal case, Singapore’s ruling family finds that its writ does not extend past its borders

With a British court’s vindication of a prominent English neurologist and expert on epilepsy, Singapore’s ruling Lee family has discovered that other countries don’t share the island republic’s – or the Lee family’s – idea of what is legal and proper.

In a written decision adjudicated in December and handed down on January 12, the British High Court effectively ended Singapore’s pursuit of Simon Shorvon, the former principal investigator of a medical research project in Singapore, after a protracted international dispute in which the Singapore Medical Council alleged Shorvon was guilty of professional misconduct. Shorvon is now a professor at the University College, London.

The charges were brought against Shorvon by Lee Wei Ling, a physician, who happens also to be the daughter of patriarch Lee Kuan Yew and the sister of Lee Hsien Loong, the current prime minister. Over the past two to three decades, the Lee family and other Singaporean officials have filed a plethora of writs and lawsuits on various charges of libel and other misconduct against almost anyone who has had the nerve to stand up against them – but almost always in Singapore courts, where they have a 100 percent winning record, particularly against journalists and opposition politicians.

to continue reading...

Singapore