Latham defends tweets on student as ‘honest opinion’

MARK Latham will defend a defamation claim by arguing his wrong assumption that a Sydney uni student had plotted to kill senior federal MPs and blow up the Sydney Opera House was “honest opinion” and caused little harm.

Mohamed Kamer Nilar Nizamdeen is suing the One Nation politician (pictured) over two tweets posted the day the University of NSW PhD student was charged with a terrorrelated offence.

Police initially accused Mr Nizamdeen of authoring a notebook containing threats to kill senior politicians and blow up a number of sites.

But the charge was later dropped and his colleague, Arsalan Khawaja, was accused of trying to frame Mr Nizamdeen.

Mr Latham’s lawyer, Tean Kerr, told the Federal Court in Sydney yesterday the matter would be defended on the basis the tweets were “honest opinion” and the harm caused was trivial.

Mr Kerr said the tweets on August 31 were concurrent with a series of news reports mentioning the police allegations made against Mr Nizamdeen and statements made by Senator Fraser Anning.

Mr Latham – who’s to be elected to the NSW Upper House within days – deleted the tweets after the defamation claim was made.