King & Spalding has recruited UK and European tax specialist Daniel Friel as a partner in its international tax practice in the London office. Previously, Friel was a partner and vice chair of the tax and benefits practice at Latham & Watkins.

Clifford Chance's London M&A and corporate partner Kathy Honeywood will be relocating to Singapore in May to head the firm's tier one corporate practice in South East Asia. Honeywood will replace M&A and corporate partner Simon Clinton who will be relocating to London later this year. In London, Clinton will continue working with Asia Pacific clients, leveraging off his 15 years of experience in the region.

Linklaters has lost Hong Kong capital markets partner David Ludiwck, who is departing for Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. The former Davis Polk & Wardwell man relocated to Hong Kong from London is 2009. His departure will leave Linklaters with five US law specialist partners in Asia.

Renowned defamation and libel lawyer Mark Lewis, who acted in the phone hacking scandal for the family of Millie Dowler, has joined Seddons as a partner. He joined the firm from Taylor Hampton. Lewis has over 25 years of experience in libel, privacy, confidentiality, reputation management and intellectual property matters.

Covington & Burling has hired King & Wood Mallesons London head of litigation, Alex Leitch, to its City office, as its plans to build up the practice this year. Leitch became a partner at King & Wood Mallesons (then known as SJ Berwin) in 2000.

Bird & Bird has hired King & Wood Mallesons' Wing On Chui as a partner in its Hong Kong corporate practice. The equity capital markets specialist has handled IPOs for Peoples Republic of China (PRC) enterprises and non-PRC companies on the Hong Kong stock exchange. The hire takes Bird & Bird's partner headcount to 36 in the Asia Pacific region.

Eversheds' Tunisian office, Eversheds El Heni has promoted Emna Louati to partner. Louati, who joined as Of Counsel only one year ago, was previously a partner at Ben Ahmed & Associates. She advises on a wide range of corporate issues including M & A, privatisations, competition, intellectual property and IT.

Transport partner Barbara Klett has also joined Eversheds' Switzerland office from law firm Kaufmann Rüedi Rechtsanwälte AG. Klett's work focuses on litigation and mediation around liability and insurance law, in addition to Swiss and international logistics and transport law.

Eversheds has also appointed HMRC tax and funds expert John Buckeridge as a consultant with the firm. Buckeridge was a policy and technical adviser on collective investments in the financial products and services team at HMRC, where he helped develop tax legislation relating to collective investment schemes and their investors.

CMS has recruited Pieter Bekker, chair in international law at the University of Dundee in Scotland, into the firm's international arbitration practice as a partner. Bekker will continue teaching while focusing on international disputes for energy clients at CMS.

K&L Gates has two new partners in its London office as part of firm wide promotion of 50 people to partner level. New partner James Spencer is a member of the firm's banking and asset finance group, who focuses on real estate finance, senior-subordinate structures, and commercial mortgage backed securities transactions. Tom Wallace, who advises public and private companies on corporate finance matters and cross-border M&A, has also been made a partner.

Gunnercooke has expanded its tax division by making two new senior partner hires including Fiona Dillon, who previously worked at Keoghs, Pannone and JMW and Katerina Nomikou, previously at EY, PwC and KPMG.

Withers has hired Bruce Hood from Wiggin and Dana as a partner in its New York tax group. The firm has cited Hood's experience in the Dutch and South American regions as a fillip for its Latin American and European practices.

Dentons has picked up banking and finance partner Brendan Slack, the former real estate finance group head at legacy Speechly Bircham. Slack specialises in advising lenders, borrowers and private equity sponsors on a wide range of domestic and international real estate, asset backed and leverage finance transactions, including syndicated and bilateral facilities, and associated security and bespoke finance documentation.

Roger Potgieter has returned to Shoosmiths as part of a five lawyer asset finance team moving to the firm from DWF. Janet Dalton will become the new head of Shoosmiths' financial services team in Manchester with associates Suzanne Taylor and Aleea Bhatoo joining the same office.
Potgieter, who was at Shoosmiths before stints at Cobbetts and DWF, will join the firm's Birmingham office with solicitor Charlotte Healey.