Lithuania and the law in London

A mini-trend,

First, this case, which is about a Mr Khalid Ansari, who seems to be an academic in the field of tourism. Some Lithuanian academics saw him and his work, and one of them wrote an email about. In it, she said that Mr Ansari was "overpowering to a point of being arrogant; pompous and dictatorial in his conversations" and that "it was obvious that he has no publication record". She also added he "was observed excessively abusing alcohol on two successive days of the visit and he was not able to concentrate on the work to be completed. [Also he] behaved sexually inappropriately, three times inviting the Lithuanian Project Coordinator V Zilinskaite for a 'night cap' in front of other people present at dinner. This is unprofessional, unethical and is regarded as sexual harassment." I should say that the author of the email was Project Coordinator V Zilinskaite herself. Anyway, all of that turns out to have been was libellous and I should inform you that Mr Ansari has received a payment of £112,500 inclusive of damages, interest and costs from the University of Vilnius, which has also made a statement in open court acknowledging that the allegations in the email were untrue and ought not to have been made. Mr Ansari has also got judgment against Ms Zilinskaite for damages to be assessed. The Court of Appeal has now held that he can also sue Manchester Metropolitan University and Dr Knowles, one of their staff, for the libel on top of that. My guess is that Mr Ansari and Ms Zilinskaite have different views about the English justice system.

Second, a case about a car accident in Lithuania. A sad story, but did you know that you can sue the Motor Insurers' Bureau in England for an accident caused by a Lithuanian in Lithuania? The unsurprising fact is that, if you do, you get more in England than you would have done in Lithuania.