(Adds details of the Foreign Influence Act in paragraphs 4, 12 and 13)
By Xinghui Kok
SINGAPORE, July 19 (Reuters) – Singapore has ordered five social media platforms to block their users in the city-state from accessing 95 accounts, mostly linked to exiled Chinese tycoon Guo Wengui, the government said on Friday.
The order was issued under the Foreign Interference (Countermeasures) Act to X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Tiktok for accounts that made more than 120 posts about the leadership transition in Singapore between April 17 and May 10.
The “coordinatedly published” posts claim that Singapore is “in the pocket of a foreign actor and that this foreign actor was involved behind the scenes in the selection of Singapore’s fourth-generation head of state,” the Home Office said.
This is the first time that the anti-foreign interference law, passed in October 2021, has been used to block access to social media posts.
Singapore swore in Lawrence Wong as its fourth Prime Minister on May 15.
Guo, who was linked to 92 of the 95 accounts, is an exiled Chinese businessman and an outspoken opponent of Beijing’s communist government. He was found guilty in the U.S. on Tuesday of stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from online followers.
He is a former real estate developer who left China in 2014 during an anti-corruption campaign. Guo had paid former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon $1 million as part of a consulting contract designed to lend legitimacy to his movement against the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
In 2020, Guo and Bannon founded a right-wing movement called the New Federal State of China with the stated goal of overthrowing the Chinese Communist Party as the Chinese government.
Singapore’s Home Affairs Ministry said Guo and his affiliated organizations – the New Federal State of China and the Himalayan Supervisory Organization – had published a number of other Singapore-related reports.
“The network’s coordinated actions and precedent of using Singapore to advance its agenda have demonstrated its willingness and ability to spread false narratives that are detrimental to Singapore’s interests,” the ministry said.
There is reason to believe that Guo’s network would use the 95 accounts to launch hostile information campaigns aimed directly at Singapore and could “undermine sovereignty and social cohesion”.
In February, Singapore used the Foreign Interference Act to classify a naturalized citizen as a “politically significant person” because he was pursuing the interests of another state in Singapore.
Earlier this month, the National Trades Union Congress was classified as a “politically significant person.” Politically significant people must declare political donations of S$10,000 (US$7,440.48) or more.
(1 US dollar = 1.3440 Singapore dollars) (Reporting by Xinghui Kok; editing by Arun Koyyur)
