BRITISH LAW MAY BE CHANGED TO PREVENT LIBEL TOURISM

Amiel Ungar reports that Britain looks like it's changing its laws to get rid of libel tourism:

Britain is about to change its libel laws. This development rates as world news for a few reasons: Britain will no longer be the favored site for "libel tourism," which will have an impact on publications covering topical issues such as terrorism and those who fund it. Secondly, it demonstrates that when the United States changes its laws to right an injustice, other countries, even those with venerable legal traditions like Britain, have to follow suit.

Under the current law, one could bring suit against someone who published a book in the United States or an English Internet site, however obscure, for libel. The plaintiff did not have to demonstrate that he had sustained any actual loss. He just had to say that he was likely to do so. British libel laws placed the burden of proof on the defendant rather than on the plaintiff.

The British decision can be viewed as a victory for Doctor Rachel Ehrenfeld, an Israeli-American counterterrorism expert. She published a book entitled Funding Evil: How Terrorism Is Financed and How to Stop It, in which she accused Khalid bin Mahfouz, a banker to the Saudi royal family and one of the world's plutocrats. of setting up a banking system to assist Osama bin Laden and using his charitable foundations as a front for terrorist organizations.

[...] A person submitting a libel suit will have to prove, according to Kenneth Clark, the Secretary of Justice, that England and Wales are "clearly the most appropriate place in which to bring an action."

According to Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, "We are addressing libel tourism by tightening the rules, so that it is much harder to bring overseas claims to our courts when there is little connection to the UK. If such a link can't be demonstrated our judges will simply turn the case away."

English may eventually be supplanted by Mandarin Chinese, but as of now it is the world's lingua franca and therefore this is far more than a legal nicety. It is a victory for free speech worldwide.

It remains to be seen if other countries around Europe will follow suit to boot, including France, which needs to abolish their own laws favoring the plaintiff in a lawsuit. If Britain does abolish their screwed up law, it'll be welcome alright, but it's just a start, since many other countries have to follow the example too, and eliminate any and all unjust rulings. One way to do this is by forming movements that campaign at their local parliaments for alterations.