THERE are no legal restraints on Lee Hsien Yang, the younger son of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew, and his wife Lee Suet Fern returning to Singapore, said the police.
“They are and have always been free to return to Singapore,” the police said in a statement on Oct 11 in response to media queries.
The statement added that the police had asked Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Suet Fern to assist in investigations in June 2022 by attending an interview.
It said: “They had initially agreed but in the end did not turn up for the scheduled interview, left Singapore on Jun 15, 2022, and have not returned since.”
The subject of Lee’s possible return to Singapore has re-emerged following the death of his older sister, Dr Lee Wei Ling, on Oct 9.
Lee had earlier said he would not be returning to Singapore for the wake and funeral, and that his son Li Huanwu would be helping with them.
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Dr Lee died aged 69, four years after being diagnosed with a rare brain disorder called progressive supranuclear palsy.
In 2023, Lee said in a Facebook post that he may never return to Singapore amid the ongoing police investigation, the root of which is a legal disagreement between Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong and his younger siblings over the fate of their late father’s house in Oxley Road.
Among the differences was a demolition clause – relating to the demolition of the 38 Oxley Road house after Lee Kuan Yew’s death – which had not been in the sixth or penultimate will but was in the last.
This clause became a sticking point among the late Lee’s children.
In 2020, the Court of Three Judges and a disciplinary tribunal found that Lee Hsien Yang and Lee Suet Fern had lied under oath during disciplinary proceedings against Mrs Lee, a lawyer, over her handling of the last will of Lee Kuan Yew, who died on Mar 23, 2015, at the age of 91.
The police then became involved. THE STRAITS TIMES
