Page two/Public.
wish to point out that this document which came to me. first
when I was working at the Sunday Times in December 1989, and
which was later handed to me at the European Parliament in either
March or April 1990, appears to have been in public circulation
between at least November 1989 and the date of the High Court
decison in June/November 1990, which accorded the documents PIIC
status.
I also wish to point out to you that the Divisional Sitting
of the High Court on that occassion and in the earlier Discovery
application ruled out consideration of this cable and other
documents over which Public Interest Immunity had been claimed
on the grounds that they were not relevant to the issues under
consideration in the third Habeus Corpus application by Lorrain
Esme Osman.
Lord Justice Mann in judgment of 14 Nov. 1990.
"For my part I would regard prior dissemination of a document
as being a matter to be taken into account in the balance. If, as
was put in the Australian case of Sankey v Whitlam (1978) 42
CLR 1 (Aus) 45 there has been publication to the whole world, then
that side of the balance concerned with the public
must collapse."
interest
The situation has changed since then, in that significant public
dissemination of the documents has occured.
In addition the initial prosecutor in the case, the former deputy
Director of Public Prosecutions in Hong Kong, is in jail himself
on corruption charges and documents have been referred to by
Counsel for the Hong Kong Government in the 4th Habeus Corpus
application which tend to show attempts at bribery by an accused
(George Tan) of the present Prime Minister of Malaysia and of
a former Finance Minister of Malaysia.
All these matters are very much in the public interest to be
disclosed.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.