How to Censor with the use of Libel
Reposted from Padraig Reidy’s Index on Censorship blog:
Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz has made an academic publisher withdraw a controversial book. But it is the UK libel system that allows the rich and powerful to stifle investigation, writes Padraig Reidy
Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz, a Saudi-born Irish passport holder, and one of the richest men in the world, is no stranger to the UK libel courts.
Since 2002, banker bin Mahfouz has used his considerable financial clout to garner apologies and damages through the courts from a variety of organisations, from tiny leftist political publisher Pluto to the Mail on Sunday, one of the UK’s biggest newspapers.
Recently, bin Mahfouz’s attention has been turned to respected academic publisher Cambridge University Press.
Bin Mahfouz’s wrath was provoked by the CUP book Alms for Jihad by Robert O Collins and J Millard Burr, a wide-ranging study of the use of Islamic charities in siphoning funding to al-Qaeda.
Bin Mahfouz alleged that the book linked him, financially and through family, to Osama bin Laden, a claim which he has previously forced others to retract in the UK courts.
September 16th, 2007 at 7:17 pm
I read in Wikipedia that this gentleman does not contest aiding the US-sponsored forces in Afghanistan against the soviets. And ofcourse that means that well known cave dweller Bin Laden. And the $225m settlement re BCCI is also worth noting. A dodgy Irishman if ever there was one.
September 21st, 2007 at 1:09 pm
[…] Here’s another example of British libel laws used by wealthy foreign plaintifs to silence comment in Britian. Craig Murray and Tim Ireland’s blogs have been pulled as a result of libel pressure by the UK lawyers of Alisher Usmanov following articles published by Murray on his blog. On 2 September 2007, Craig Murray, the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, referred to Alisher Usmanov’s conviction for various crimes in the former USSR, for which he had been jailed for six years during the 1980s, as well as making further allegations of criminal activity. Usmanov’s lawyers claim he was a political prisoner pardoned under Mikhail Gorbachev’s administration, though Murray claims the pardon was actually the work of Uzbek President Islom Karimov. The article was subsequently removed by Murray’s web host under pressure from Usmanov’s legal team, who also contacted independent Arsenal blogs and websites warning them to remove any references to Murray’s allegations, and any reproduction of Craig Murray’s weblog posting. […]
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