SINGAPORE: The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has filed a police report over an online article that it said was false, defamatory and "impugned its integrity".
The report was filed against the author of an article published on Monday (Nov 5) on the States Times Review, an alternative news website, the central bank said in a statement on Friday.
The Singapore Police Force confirmed that a report was lodged in case of alleged criminal defamation. Investigations are ongoing.
The article, titled "Lee Hsien Loong becomes 1MDB’s key investigation target", alleged that Malaysia had signed several unfair agreements with Singapore in exchange for Singapore banks’ assistance in laundering the funds of Malaysian state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).
The central bank called the article "baseless and defamatory", and said it "made statements that were false and malicious and impugned the integrity of MAS as a financial regulator".
"The article ignores the unprecedented and robust actions taken by MAS over the last two years against Singapore-based banks and bankers in relation to their roles in 1MDB related transactions, in most instances ahead of enforcement actions by foreign jurisdictions," it said.
"It also makes false allegations that Singapore was forced to reopen its investigations into 1MDB only after the change in political leadership in Malaysia."
Investigations into the state fund had never been closed, said the central bank.
More at https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/1mdb-mas-files-police-report-article-states-times-review-10911664
Golden Monkey Seng.....hur hur hur.
Golden Monkey Seng asks why Dishonourable chief Monkey In White not defending himself after publication of STR article
Alex Tan will be forgotten soon enough, why even bother to fix him?
Alex Tan's parting words to PAP:
Take by siao lang M Ravi on suing the pants off STR:
Though the case against STR concerns criminal defamation, this article that appeared in ST last year contains some relevant discussions on the common law principle that government cannot sue on defamation.If this principle were to be true, it is certainly arguable that it should apply to s499 of the Penal Code (criminal defamation) as well when reading it with Article 14 of the Singapore constitution that guarantees freedom of expression. The article deals with the case of blogger Han Hui Hui whom I represented when she was sued by a government body:
In Goh Chok Tong v Jeyaretnam , the Singapore High Court referred in its ruling to “the question whether Singapore law, being premised on English common law, should follow suit” to adopt the Derbyshire principle. But since the case involved a politician and not a public body suing an individual, the High Court left it to the Court of Appeal to deal with the issue if and when a public body should ever sue a citizen.
As Mr M.Ravi, the blogger’s lawyer noted, the Derbyshire principle is accepted in other common law nations like Canada, Australia, India and Malaysia.
In a clutch of cases, local courts have also cited the principle in passing, with seeming approval, albeit only to contrast it with the individual public servant’s right to sue for defamation.
Still, these cases suggested to Prof Chen that local courts may rule that the principle does apply in Singapore. One example is Tang Liang Hong v Lee Kuan Yew in which the Court of Appeal rejected the argument that Derbyshire implied individual public officers may not sue for defamation, noting it only restricted the right of public bodies to do so.”
http://www.asiaone.com/can-public-body-sue-defamation
LMFAO what a joker.
Alex Tan and FB both flipping the bird at the SG government is a double whammy of major embarrassment; in the little red dot PAP can play god and bully little folks into acquiescing at the snap of a finger, beyond our shores it appears them threats hardly make anyone shit in his/her pants.
Since you are always so darn trigger happy when it comes to initiating lawsuits, why don't you go sue FB dear PAP? Sue Zuckerberg and company till their pants drop? Show 'em who's boss, shut 'em down good and tight. Give us a good show, after all we ordinary Singaporeans are paying your ministers millions year after year after year.......
And if you lose, we have swords for you to commit hara-kiri standing nearby. REMEMBER: Singapore's reputation is at stake.
Singapore Assails Facebook for Refusal to Remove Post on Premier
Singapore lashed out at Facebook Inc., calling the social media giant unreliable after it declined a request to remove a post that linked Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and the city state with 1MDB allegations.
Facebook’s decision to not remove malicious information on Singapore shows the need for legislation, the Ministry of Law said in a statement. The government is protesting a post by the States Times Review, an alternative news website, which connected the country and its leader to probes on the embattled Malaysian state fund.
“Facebook has declined to take down a post that is clearly false, defamatory and attacks Singapore, using falsehoods," the Ministry of Law said. Facebook "cannot be relied upon to filter falsehoods or protect Singapore from a false information campaign.”
A Facebook spokeswoman in Singapore declined to comment on the government’s statement.
The States Times Review cited the Sarawak Report, a Malaysian website focusing on subjects such as politics and human rights, as saying Singapore is a target in 1MDB investigations. The Sarawak Report said in Facebook posts that it made no such comments.
The State Times Review has since said it will stop publishing new articles after being blocked by Singapore authorities, and denied charges of it being defamatory.
More at https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-10/singapore-assails-facebook-for-refusal-to-remove-post-on-premier
SINGAPORE: Facebook has declined to take down a post by the States Times Review linking Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong with the 1MDB investigations, said the Ministry of Law on Friday (Nov 9) night.
Their stance shows that the social media platform"cannot be relied upon to filter falsehoods or protect Singapore from a false information campaign", the ministry added.
"Facebook has declined to take down a post that is clearly false, defamatory and attacks Singapore, using falsehoods.
"This shows why we need legislation to protect us from deliberate online falsehoods," said the ministry in a press statement.
Can still be accessed via proxy server.......
IMDA orders States Times Review to take down 'objectionable' article
SINGAPORE: The Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) has ordered the States Times Review to take down an article which the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has said is baseless and defamatory.
If the alternative news website fails to do so by 5pm on Friday (Nov 9), IMDA will direct Internet Service Providers to restrict access to the site, it said in a statement.
The article in question, titled Lee Hsien Loong Becomes 1MDB’s Key Investigation Target, was posted on Monday on the website.
It alleged that Malaysia had signed several unfair agreements with Singapore in exchange for Singapore banks’ assistance in laundering the funds of Malaysian state fund 1MDB.
The States Times Review refused to take down the article, it said in a Facebook post at about 6pm on Friday.
The States Times Review website was inaccessible at about 9pm, checks by Channel NewsAsia showed, although the Facebook post on the article in question was still accessible.
Read more at https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/imda-orders-states-times-review-take-down-pm-lee-1mdb-10912554
https://www.facebook.com/STReview/posts/2155706664647513
Yeppers, website has been blocked.
More 1MDB secrets to emerge from Hong Kong, Singapore, says journalist Rewcastle Brown
The investigative journalist, whose blog The Sarawak Report fuelled corruption allegations against Malaysia’s disgraced prime minister Najib Razak, has just released a book on the 1MDB saga
Details of the millions that former prime minister Najib Razak and his wife allegedly took from the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) sovereign wealth fund and hid in Hong Kong and Singapore will soon emerge in the widening investigations on how billions were looted from Malaysia’s national coffers, said investigative journalist Clare Rewcastle Brown.
Rewcastle, whose blog The Sarawak Report fuelled corruption allegations against Najib and his associates – leading to his electoral defeat in May this year – was in Hong Kong on Wednesday to publicise her new book.
“1MDB is going to rear its head in Hong Kong quite soon. A lot of the money stolen by the former ruling couple of Malaysia ended up here in Hong Kong. I cannot see how the lid is going to be kept on that much longer,” Rewcastle told a lunchtime crowd at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club.
“I think there are still secrets to come out of Singapore on 1MDB, and probably Malaysians will want to prise them out,” she said.
In September, Rewcastle, 58, published her book The Sarawak Report, named after her eponymous blog. It details the nine years the investigative journalist spent exposing corruption in politics – first by targeting the shady dealings of Sarawak’s former chief minister Abdul Taib Mahmud, who was loosely aligned with Najib’s government.
The 82-year-old Taib, who is now Sarawak’s governor, a largely ceremonial role, has been repeatedly accused by activists of favouring his family in awarding infrastructure contracts and being complicit in timber sector corruption that resulted in massive losses of virgin forest throughout the state.
While previous investigations into Taib were closed by Malaysia’s Anti-Corruption Commission several years ago, parliamentarians have recently pushed for these to be reopened.
Rewcastle’s biggest bombshell was in 2015, when she revealed on her blog that nearly US$700 million was funnelled into Najib’s bank account.
In her 528-page book, she described the surreal experience of attending her son’s school leaving ceremony the same day she met a source who provided leaked documents detailing the massive payment to Najib’s account.
In the aftermath of the allegations, she wrote, The Wall Street Journal went on to publish documents from the same source, even though they had originally agreed not to as the source was afraid for their life.
Since coming to power, the new government led by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed has aggressively launched investigations into the 1MDB saga. Najib and his wife Rosmah Mansor have since been charged in court with dozens of 1MDB-related offences but both have maintained their innocence.
The United States’ Department of Justice alleges that the 1MDB scandal involved misappropriation of an estimated US$4.5 billion. Last week, the Justice Department indicted Malaysian businessman Jho Low and two former Goldman Sachs bankers for money laundering and violation of anti-bribery laws. One of the former Goldman bankers, Tim Leissner, has pleaded guilty and will forfeit US$43 million for conspiring to launder cash and violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, while the other, Roger Ng Chong Hwa, has been arrested in Malaysia and is expected to be extradited to the US.
Low remains at large, maintaining that he is innocent while refusing to return to his birth country to face the music, citing a lack of faith in the judicial system under Mahathir’s administration.
Asked if she thought Low was the mastermind of the heist – as portrayed by another recent book on the scandal, Billion Dollar Whale, by The Wall Street Journal reporters who had followed the saga– Rewcastle said if it had not been Low, it would have been someone else. She added that for Low’s part, she believed it was “a family business”.
“Jho’s father was a businessman with a chequered career and probably … spent many decades developing an understanding of how to manage the offshore system … and little scams of that nature. I’m sure he was advising Jho.”
Low’s sister based in Singapore was an expert in setting up offshore corporations, Rewcastle added, while Low’s brother was also involved in the family business. According to her sources, Low and his family were in China at the moment, she said.
China has not commented publicly on claims Low is in the country, though the Chinese ambassador in Kuala Lumpur, Bai Tian, was quoted by the Malaysian Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng last week as saying immigration records showed Low was not in the country.
However, Mahathir has implied he believes Low is in China, saying that as Malaysia and China have no extradition treaty, it would be tricky to ask for China to send him back.
More at https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2172351/more-1mdb-secrets-emerge-hong-kong-singapore-says-journalist
PINKY MUST SUE THE PANTS OFF ALEX TAN ASAP!!!!!!!!!
WTF..........Alex Tan still want to play punk sia
STR welcomes a libel lawsuit from Lee Hsien Loong
http://statestimesreview.com/2018/11/08/str-welcomes-a-libel-lawsuit-from-lee-hsien-loong/
In response to the official fake news from the corrupted Prime Minister, STR fully welcomes a libel suit from the corrupted Singapore Prime Minister in an Australian court.
PAP should just put a bounty on faggot Alex Tan Zhixiang's head; soon enough he will be nabbed and brought back to face the music.