Singapore (VNA) – The High Court of Singapore onOctober 6 started a hearing on Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong'sdefamation suit against blogger and financial adviser Leong Sze Hian.
Lee had sued Leong over a post the blogger shared on hisFacebook page on November 7, 2018, which contained a link to an article byMalaysian news site The Coverage.
The article contained allegations that former Malaysian PM NajibRazak had signed "secret deals" with PM Lee in exchange for Singaporebanks' help in laundering money from scandal-ridden Malaysian state fund1Malaysia Development Berhad, or 1MDB. The content of the article had beentaken from the States Times Review (STR) site, owned by Singaporean nationalAlex Tan Zhi Xiang, who lives in Australia.
Lee's lawyers said that the article contained "falseand baseless" allegations and charged that Leong shared the post"maliciously" to damage their client. Leong subsequently deleted thepost.
Leong has said he "merely shared" the articlewithout adding comments or changing the content and rejected allegations thathe maliciously posted the article./.
VNA