Singapore court affirms ruling against soon-to-be-closed magazine

Oct 8, 2009, 0:48 GMT

Singapore - Singapore's highest court has affirmed a ruling that the magazine Far Eastern Economic Review, which is slated for closure, had defamed the city-state's founder Lee Kuan Yew and his son Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, media reports said Thursday.

The Court of Appeals agreed with a verdict from September 2008 that a story by the magazine about Singapore's opposition party leader Chee Soon Juan in 2006 improperly associated the father and son Lee with corruption.

The court dismissed the magazine's appeal and rejected its arguments that the article was justified and constituted fair comment, the Straits Times newspaper reported.

Damages to be awarded to the Lees would be assessed at a later date, said the report.

Arguing that they have to protect their reputations, Singapore's leaders have already sued several international publications for defamation and won hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages.

The Far Eastern Economic Review will be shut down in December, the publishing house Dow Jones and Co. announced last month, saying that its 'continued losses in advertising revenue and readers are now unsustainable.'