Justin Sun, the founder of TRON blockchain and numerous stablecoins, the owner of Poloniex, and an advisor to HTX, has been celebrating a recent victory in a Chinese court against the Chongqing Business Media Group. However, the question remains whether this victory will benefit him outside the mainland. The likelihood is that it absolutely will not.
A court in Chongqing stated that the Chongqing Business Media Group claimed that Sun was under investigation by the FBI for insider trading. However, the court found these claims “completely unfounded,” and Sun won on the grounds of defamation.
Many of these claims stem from an article in Verge in March 2022, none of which has been retracted since publication.
Protos previously reported on Sun’s false claims about diplomatic immunity, as well as his alleged unrestrained policies towards BitTorrent.
However, Sun cannot expect to sue and win against media companies outside of China, mainly due to the much stricter and less flexible rules and regulations in China.
Unlike free and democratic countries such as the United States, where there are almost no successful defamation cases, China places the burden of proof on media companies or individual journalists. Article 51 of the Chinese Constitution states: “When citizens of the People’s Republic of China exercise their freedoms and rights, they may not infringe upon the interests of the state, society, or the collective, or upon the lawful freedoms and rights of other citizens.”
However, Reporters Without Borders reports that China ranks near the bottom in terms of press freedom (172 out of 180 countries) and currently has over 100 journalists imprisoned.
In this scenario, the Chongqing Business Media Group getting away with a simple apology and a fine of 500 yuan (69 USD) is not so bad.
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