Financial Times
8 September 2004
Does believing in George W. Bush’s convictions get you in trouble in Singapore? Chee Soon Juan, one of the city-state’s most outspoken opposition politicians, has been accused of being a tool of foreign interests that want to “attack Singapore” by a libel lawyer for former prime ministers Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong.
Chee “is acting in concert with foreign backers who will continue to fund him so long as he is prepared to be used by them to hurt Singapore,” said Davinder Singh, who is seeking $500,000 in damages for remarks Chee made in the 2001 election.
What are these foreign interests? Singh didn’t say, but it is no secret that Chee was recently a Reagan fellow at the Washington-based National Endowment for Democracy, one of Bush’s favourite foundations.
No word on where this leaves Singapore’s policy of promoting closer military and economic ties with the US, which Lee and Goh backed …