CAIRO, December 2 (IslamOnline.net) - British MP George Galloway won on Thursday, December 2, a libel case against the Daily Telegraph over unverified claims of being on ousted Iraqi president Saddam Hussein’s payroll.

Galloway got £ 150,000 dollars in damages and is also expected to be paid his case costs, estimated to have hit £ I million, reported the Guardian.

Judge Sir David Eady said he was “obliged to compensate Galloway in respect of the publications and the aggravated features of the defendants' subsequent conduct, and to make an award for the purposes of restoring his reputation.”

A confidential memorandum, which the Telegraph claimed was found by one of its reporters in the looted Foreign Ministry in Baghdad, allegedly showed Galloway had received £375,000 a year from the UN-administrated oil for food program.

“There is a word for taking money from enemy regimes: treason,” the paper said in an editorial column, alluding darkly to a death sentence imposed on a British MP early in the 20th century for similar crimes.

The compensation is seen as a major victory for Galloway, who accused the paper of failing to seek a proper response from him and of rushing to print in pursuit of a scoop.

Judge Eady said that Galloway had a 35-minute conversation with Andrew Sparrow, the paper's Westminster correspondent, but was not sent the documents or told that the paper was intending to publish a story.

“Although Galloway was interviewed by telephone on the afternoon of April 21, he was not given the opportunity of reading the Iraqi documents beforehand; nor were they read to him,” he added.

“He did not, therefore, have a fair or reasonable opportunity to make inquiries or meaningful comment upon them before they were published.”

The Telegraph did not argue on the veracity of the claims, claiming that publication could be defended on the grounds of the “qualified privilege” that the story was of overriding public interest and was published in good faith.

But Justice Eady said the paper did not qualify for this type of defense in the libel action because it failed to give Galloway sufficient time to respond to the allegations.

He stressed that the defendants were not “under a social or moral duty to make the allegations about Galloway at that time, and without any attempt at verification.”

Whether a paper has give the subject of a story sufficient time to respond to allegations is one of the 10 key circumstances a judge has to consider in libel actions following House of Lords recommendations after the landmark ruling on a case brought against the Sunday Times in 1999.

Thursday's victory follows another libel success for anti-war Galloway.

The US newspaper admitted a story it ran on April 25, alleging Baghdad paid Galloway 10 million dollars (8.5 million euros) over a decade, was based on bogus documents.