News ban over Scots QC's arrest

A MEDIA blackout has been imposed in Tonga over a court case involving a Scots QC arrested in connection with the nation's worst shipping disaster.

Lord Ramsay Dalgety, QC, a former director of Scottish Opera, was arrested and charged with perjury last Friday after a royal commission of inquiry into the sinking of the ferry MV Princess Ashika last August.

The tragedy claimed 74 lives, including that of Daniel MacMillan, 48, from Islay.

Lord Dalgety, 64, is secretary of the Shipping Corporation of Polynesia, operators of the government-owned ferry.

Dr Graeme Were, a Tonga expert at University College London, said the country was taking tentative steps away from monarchical rule following pro-democracy riots in November 2006 in which eight people died.

"The state controls the media in Tonga and the democratic movement has to operate against that background.

"Journalists who write an inflammatory article would come a cropper, without doubt."