Author Salman Rushdie received an apology in court from a former policeman who libeled him in a book about his time in hiding under a fatwa threat.
Rushdie said Ron Evans, an ex-police driver who guarded him after Iran s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a call for his death over the novel “The Satanic Verses in 1989, had penned “surrealist untruths about him.
The false claims made by Evans in the book “On Her Majesty s Service included that Rushdie had bad relations with his police protection team and that they once locked him in a room after he irritated them.
Other untrue allegations included that he had poor personal hygiene and that his relationship with third wife Elizabeth West was based on his wealth.
Speaking outside London s High Court, Rushdie, 61, told reporters he was “very gratified by the result. “This has been an unattractive affair, he said.
“My only interest was to establish the truth. I m happy that the court has made its declaration of falsity and that the authors and publishers have recognized their falsehoods and apologized.
Evans made an apology through his lawyer for 11 counts of falsehood. Judge Nigel Teare also made a declaration of falsehood against him, ghost writer Douglas Thompson and publisher John Blake Publishing.
A declaration of falsehood is a legal remedy which formally recognizes that an allegation is incorrect.
The publisher has destroyed the first run of 4,000 copies of “On Her Majesty s Service and is correcting two chapters.
Rushdie s lawyer David Sherborne told the court that Evans had left the police force following a conviction on nine counts of dishonesty in 2005.
In his book, he had alleged that Rushdie was nicknamed “Scruffy and outside court, the author hit back by claiming Evans had a nickname of his own – “Dodgy Ron.
Indian-born Briton Rushdie, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II last year, provoking fury from some Muslims, said he would not seek damages over the book.
After he was knighted, Iran said the fatwa still stood but in recent years, Rushdie has appeared in public increasingly frequently.
In July, his book “Midnight s Children was named the best-ever winner of the prestigious Booker Prize for novels in English by an author from the Commonwealth and Ireland. -AFP
