UK paper asked to pay compensation to Iraqi PM

London: The Guardian, a renowned British daily, should pay Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki financial compensation to the tune of 100 million dinar (52,000 pounds) for describing him as an autocratic ruler, ordered a UK court.

The court upheld a complaint of defamation submitted by Maliki's intelligence service against the newspaper over the article written in April by a local Iraqi reporter.

The article quoted unnamed members of the Iraqi national intelligence service who claimed that the prime minister was beginning to run Iraqi affairs with an authoritarian hand.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband told the Guardian: "I was very concerned to hear reports of today's court ruling. Media freedom is vital in any democracy."

The Guardian said it would appeal the decision, which it described as a further blow to free speech in the war-torn country.

"This is a dismaying development. Prime Minister Maliki is trying to construct a new, free Iraq," the newspaper's editor Alan Rusbridger said.

"Freedom means little without free speech - and means even less if a head of state tries to use the law of libel to punish criticism or dissent."