Swedish journalists from Realtid face defamation suit in the UK

London's High Court has heard that a £13m defamation claim should be dismissed as the claimant, a Swedish businessman is engaged in “libel tourism,” rather than bringing his claim against Swedish journalists, over an article written in Sweden, before a Swedish court. Earlier this week, Blueprint for Free Speech and 23 other freedom of expression organisations signed a statement expressing concern about the case.

In an unusual move, the court agreed that counsel for the accused, Swedish publication Realtid, Greg Callus should present first, contrary to the usual procedure of the defence responding to the prosecution.

The defence barrister began by challenging the argument that the “centre of interest” of businessman Svante Kumlin, the lead claimant in the case, and the others were in London noting that one lived in Monaco and the other only visited the city occasionally.

He also told the court that website analysis showed that only 0.85% of people who had read the articles were from the UK, while the most contentious one had a grand total of eight UK readers. There was also no evidence that any of these people read or understood Swedish.

Callus submitted to the presiding judge, Mr Justice Knowles, that to show libel in English law the claimant had to show “serious harm,” resulted from a statement or publication. He asked how many of the eight UK readers were going to have any involvement in a solar energy company. It's "fanciful," he said. He also noted that, that the company would have been able to reassure any potential investors that the article was not true, but while an email from one business partner asking about the articles was part of the claimants' evidence, defence requests to see how the company responded had been refused.

The barrister also argued that as the supposed financial damage happened because contracts were cancelled by businesses based in Singapore and Geneva, it was hard to see how could this be attributed to their availability, in Swedish, to people who may have read them in the UK.

After the lunch break, Mr Callus resumed his submissions for the defence. On the subject of where a libel case should be brought he said this used to be clear but, "the Internet changes everything as everything is technically published everywhere." He argued it is only fair that a responsible publisher, considering whether to report something, should know which jurisdiction they might be sued under, and what national laws they had to obey.

The defence barrister then turned to the lead claimant's assertion that his “centre of interest,” was the UK. He noted that the first claimant Mr Kumlin says he has "held a flat in London since September 2020," and spends about 25% to 30% of his time there. He remarked that this would mean he would have to pay tax in England, adding, “which, if true, he certainly would have mentioned.”

Callus then showed the court evidence from the electoral register showing Kumlin only re-registered in December 2020, which Callus called "a coincidence of timing," considering when the claim of libel was made, adding "He wasn't on the register when the claim was made" in November 2020.

He continued by saying the claimant's LinkedIn page also says he lives in Monaco and while he mentions eight companies in his profile, not a single one is based in the UK. The defence barrister said of Kumlin’s argument his centre of interest was the UK, "He does not have even a remotely arguable case."

The barrister then gave the example of former UKIP leader Nigel Farage,

arguing, “Nigel Farage may have been habitually resident in Strasbourg, as a member of the European parliament, but no-one could argue that the UK was not his "centre of interest and the place where his reputation rested.”

Mr Justice Knowles then intervened to note that Amazon had its HQ in Luxembourg, but no-one could argue that was its centre of interest.

Callus agreed to say that Netflix might exhibit at the Cannes film festival, but that didn't make it French.

The barrister said it was clear what law should apply when "four Swedish journalists are writing about a Swedish citizen, in Swedish to an audience that is 90% Swedish."

The defence barrister then ended his submissions and Mr Price, for the claimants rose to reply.

Price began by suggesting that Callus had put a "rather ambitious argument." He said his client had suffered "reputational damage," in the UK as people he dealt with here had seen the articles in question. His company is, he said, an English company, with a workforce there.

The presiding judge then intervened to say that, in law, a company did not have a reputation to damage, and his client would have to show actual financial harm.

Price replied that he was relying on the concept of "malicious falsehood," and would be showing the financial loss caused by the articles in question because they were downloaded and read in the UK. He noted that the defendants continued to publish articles about his clients, including one produced yesterday.

Price then moved onto the issue of "serious harm," which has to be shown to have occurred in order to establish libel in English law.

The barrister said he accepted that there were very few English readers of the articles, but that those who did were important to the claimants and caused them reputational damage.

Counsel then said it would be an impossible burden to expect the claimants to call round people asking if they had seen the article and what they thought of it, as this would be "embarrassing."

Price then asked if he could have time to "gather his thoughts," but the judge said it was a bit early to finish and he should "go on for a few minutes," and asked about the part of the claim that the articles had blocked the sale of a solar farm?

Mr Price said he would rather deal with that tomorrow morning, adding, "we don't need to get into the detail of each and every case of causation, because that would be a nightmare."

He then said that the issue was not just a direct financial loss, but also a "loss of opportunity." Adding "if left unchecked this sort of thing will keep happening, and further contracts will be lost."

Price added that the sector involved was very small, and the damage could have occurred amongst people who were interested in the subject, despite no large scale publication.

Court then adjourned for the day, with the judge agreeing it was "time to draw stumps."

The case continues.