MercuryNews.com
24 Jun 2008
In his blog, "Singapore Dissident," Gopalan Nair describes himself this way:
"Determined to find the Truth."
Those words may have come back to haunt the Fremont lawyer, now being held in his native Singapore for using his blog to criticize a judge. Nair, a longtime opposition activist before leaving Singapore for California in 1991, accused Judge Belinda Ang of "prostituting herself" during the defamation trial of another opposition activist. He said by telephone last week that he was merely expressing the free speech allowed under the city-state's constitution.
Singapore has been controlled for five decades by Lee Kuan Yew's People's Action Party, accused by human-rights groups of repressive laws and suppression of political dissent. Nair had gone there last month to blog and monitor the case of Dr. Chee Soon Juan, on trial for allegedly defaming Lee and his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
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