Mark Henderson's client, a prominent journalist, makes successful libel claim against the Metro

Mark Henderson and Rahman Lowe (Mark's instructing solicitors) successfully represented Mr Roshan Salih with his defamation claim against the Metro (Associated Newspapers Ltd).

Mr Salih is a prominent journalist and documentary film presenter. He presents a current affairs programme on Press TV, and in his long career has worked for news organisations such as ITV, Channel 4, Discovery Channel, Al Jazeera, and Islam Channel. He is the Editor of 5Pillars, a cross-sectarian website, which is the largest regulated Muslim news website in Europe and North America.

The proceedings resulted in the Metro website agreeing to withdraw a false allegation, made by republishing a tweet on 28 January 2018, that Mr Salih was a ‘sectarian extremist’. The Metro dissociated itself from the allegation, making clear that the allegation was neither adopted nor endorsed. 

Mr Salih, a Sunni Muslim, has written extensively about the need for peace and unity with Shia Muslims and therefore there was no basis to support the description in the tweet from a member of the public that the Metro published suggesting that he promotes intra-religious conflict.

The Metro has now removed the offending tweet and published the following retraction and clarification online:

“An earlier version of this article included a tweet posted in response to the programme which referred to Roshan Salih as a “sectarian extremist”. The view was that of the individual concerned and was not adopted or endorsed by Metro.co.uk. We are happy to make this clear”.

You can read more about the case on Rahman Lowe's website by clicking here.