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Press freedom 

In a blow to those who think press freedom is an important part of a democratic society, the House of Lords in the UK refused five media organisations the right to appeal over a judgment ordering them to hand over documents leaked by an anonymous source.

What I find so puzzling about this judgement (and I hasten to add that I’m not a lawyer, so my absence of qualification to comment may be total) is that the media organisations are being put up against the wall on a fairly trivial matter (trivial, that is, in everything but commercial terms). Belgian brewing giant is determined to find out who leaked them documents on a possible takeover bid for South African Breweries.

I may be wrong, but I think the US courts would throw the Interbrew caseout with hardly a second glance. It’s not as though the newspapers are concealing a murderer or terrorist by their refusal to hand over documents. I’ll watch with interest to see what the newspapers do (the five are the FT, The Guardian, The Times, The Independent and Reuters).

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