The Associated Press is reporting that a Wall Street Journal editor has been ruled in contempt and fined a small amount for for two editorials and a letter to the editor published last year about Singapore’s judiciary system.
The AP reports, “High Court Justice Tay Yong Kwang also fined Melanie Kirkpatrick, deputy editor of the Journal’s editorial page, 10,000 Singapore dollars ($6,549) and said she must pay the same amount in legal costs, the attorney general said in a statement.
“‘With the conviction of Ms. Kirkpatrick for contempt of court, the public interest in protecting the Singapore judiciary from unwarranted attacks has been adequately served,’ the statement said.
“Journalist rights groups claim the government uses lawsuits to quash dissent. Singapore’s leaders have sued journalists and political opponents several times in recent years for alleged defamation, winning damages against Bloomberg, The Economist and the International Herald Tribune.
“Tay found the Journal in contempt of court in November and fined it SG$25,000 ($16,400) for publishing the same two editorials and letter to the editor which the government claimed questioned the judiciary’s independence from Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and the ruling People’s Action Party.”
Read more here.
