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Sara Bradford

Suggestions that Hong Kong's third English-language newspaper was founded to support then-governor Chris Patten and the Hong Kong Government were branded 'disgusting' in court yesterday.

On his 10th and final day on the stand, the founding editor of the now-defunct Eastern Express,  Stephen Vines, told Mr Justice David Yam Yee-kwan the paper was totally independent and free of any bias.

Benjamin Yu SC, counsel for Next  magazine, asked Mr Vines about suggestions from Oriental Press Group counsel Cheng Huan SC that the Eastern Express  was established to support the government of the day.

Last Friday Mr Cheng had said Mr Patten suggested the idea of a third English-language newspaper after losing sway with the South China Morning Post  and the now-defunct Hongkong Standard.

Mr Vines said the accusation was 'rubbish' and 'nonsense'. He also said the paper's editorial line was independent.

Mr Vines said he knew this to be true because he wrote the editorials. Mr Vines also said the suggestions were 'disgusting to those who worked there and the readers who never saw us as a party political animal'.

He told the court the paper had published numerous articles which had not been welcomed by the government of the day.

He gave the example of a series of stories concerning a riot at the Whitehead detention centre for Vietnamese boat people. The Eastern Express  claimed the riot was provoked by detention officials who had also made the matter worse by firing tear-gas into a crowd of boat people.

'We kept doing it until there was an official inquiry and it showed that practically everything we wrote that happened did,' he said. Mr Vines also said Mr Patten was unhappy with several editorials and stories in which he was accused of being more concerned with publicity than the substance of his policies.

Mr Vines is testifying about his 1994 dismissal from the Eastern Express  after an article was published in Next  magazine on September 16 that year concerning the lead-up to his dismissal.

The magazine, its editor-in-chief, Cheung Kim-hung, and printer Toppan Printing Co (HK) Ltd are facing a libel suit brought by Oriental Press Group (OPG) - publisher of the Eastern Express  - which alleges the magazine defamed it by saying it interfered with the paper's editorial independence. OPG claims Mr Vines was sacked for being a 'very bad administrator'.

The case continues today in the Court of First Instance.



Ex-editor rejects 'disgusting' claim paper started as Patten vehicle