Conrad Black has been given clearance to sue six former colleagues for libel in Canada. The defendants, who include Hollinger International Inc directors and a vice-president, are based in the US. But the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled that the former press baron could sue them for libel in Ontario because he built his reputation there.
The Supreme Court ruled on Friday that journalists do not have the constitutional right to protect the identity of their sources. The judgment means the question of whether a reporter must reveal their sources should be decided on a case-by-case basis. At issue were a series of articles written in 2001 by Andrew McIntosh of the National Post newspaper. The pieces claimed that prime-minster, Jean Chrétien, had intervened on behalf of a constituent who was seeking a loan from a government-owned development bank. The bank claimed that documents which McIntosh used in support of his allegations were in fact forgeries, and a search warrant was issued to seize copies. The court found that the warrant was justified, because the accusations of forgery were “of sufficient seriousness to justify the decision of the police to investigate”.
The Canadian Supreme Court ruled on 23 December to strengthen the public interest defence in libel cases. The chief justice stated that the law as it stood did not “give adequate weight” to free expression. The court also moved to change the wording of the defence of “responsible journalism” to “responsible communication”, which potentially allows the law to cover new media such as blogs. The decision followed high profile libel cases involving two newspapers, the Star and the Ottawa Citizen.
Jagdish Grewal, founder and editor and editor of Brampton (Canada)-based newspaper “Punjabi Post” was attacked by three masked men armed with a baton and a gun outside the newspaper’s offices, on 23 October.
Mr. Grewal, who also hosts a daily Punjabi radio show, said it is highly probable that the attack was fuelled by his political views. He does not support the Khalistan movement — a separatist movement aimed at creating a Sikh homeland within India’s northern state of Punjab — and has received threats related to this and other political positions in the past.
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