By South China Morning Post | Created at 2024-10-22 07:23:44 | Updated at 2024-10-22 09:26:27
2 hours ago
Lee Hsien Yang, the brother of former Singapore prime minister Lee Hsien Loong, has said that he is a “political refugee from Singapore” under the 1951 UN Refugee Convention after he sought “asylum protection” from the UK in 2022.
The two sons of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew have been estranged since Lee Hsien Yang, 67, the younger of the brothers, and his late sister Lee Wei Ling made public the conflict with their older brother in 2017, alleging the then prime minister was misusing his power to scuttle their efforts to demolish the family bungalow in line with their father’s wishes.
In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Lee Hsien Yang recalled how he and his sister wrote in a statement in 2017 that they did not trust Lee Hsien Loong as a brother or as a leader.
“We stated that we feared the abuse of the organs of the Singapore state against us and against my family. Because of that risk, I was unable to attend Wei Ling’s funeral,” said Lee Hsien Yang.
Lee Wei Ling, died on October 9 aged 69, four years after being diagnosed with progressive supranuclear palsy, a rare and degenerative brain disease.
In his latest Facebook post on Tuesday, Lee Hsien Yang said he sought asylum protection in 2022 citing the “Singapore government’s attacks against [him]”.
