{"id":2505,"date":"2024-05-24T19:15:01","date_gmt":"2024-05-24T13:30:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/?p=2505"},"modified":"2024-05-24T19:15:01","modified_gmt":"2024-05-24T13:30:01","slug":"former-singapore-pms-brother-fined-296000-for-libel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/former-singapore-pms-brother-fined-296000-for-libel\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Singapore PM&#8217;s brother fined $296,000 for libel"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p>A Singapore court ordered former prime minister Lee Hsien Loong&#8217;s brother on Friday to pay $296,000 in damages to two top ministers after his libellous accusations caused a scandal in the city-state.<\/p>\n<p>Lee Hsien Yang&#8217;s defamatory Facebook post related to a controversy over the rental of sprawling colonial bungalows by the foreign affairs and law ministers, who have both been cleared of any wrongdoing following two investigations.<br \/>\nLee, 66, is living overseas after fleeing Singapore two years ago, claiming political persecution by the government of then-prime minister Lee Hsien Loong, his older brother.<\/p>\n<p>The allegations he made about the prime properties located in leafy suburbs sparked an outcry in the city-state, where most of the population live in government-built high-rise apartments.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I find that the defendant knew that the offending words were false, that he published them recklessly, and\/or without considering or caring whether they are true or not,&#8221; High Court Judge Goh Yihan said Friday in announcing the amount of damages.<\/p>\n<p>Goh ordered Lee to pay Sg$200,000 ($148,000) in damages to each of the two politicians &#8212; Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan and Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam.<\/p>\n<p>The ministers sued him separately for defamation and a court notice about the lawsuits was served through Facebook Messenger because Lee was not in Singapore.<\/p>\n<p>The judge ordered Lee in November to pay the ministers damages but did not immediately specify the amount.<br \/>\nLee has joined an opposition party but it remains unclear whether he wants to run for parliament.<br \/>\nThe Lee siblings have been at odds following the death in 2015 of their father, modern Singapore&#8217;s founding leader Lee Kuan Yew, over what to do with a historic family house after his passing.<br \/>\nLee Hsien Loong, 72, handed power to his deputy Lawrence Wong on May 15 after 20 years in office.<br \/>\n&#8211; &#8211; &#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Singapore court ordered former prime minister Lee Hsien Loong&#8217;s brother on Friday to pay $296,000 in damages to two top ministers after his libellous accusations caused a scandal in the city-state. Lee Hsien Yang&#8217;s defamatory Facebook post related to a controversy over the rental of sprawling colonial bungalows by the foreign affairs and law [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2506,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2505"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2507,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505\/revisions\/2507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nepalsamaj.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}