LONDON -- Boxing promoter Don King won the first round of a legal battle with heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis on Monday when a judge refused to throw out his libel suit.

King is suing Lewis, his promotions company and American lawyer Judd Burstein. King seeks an apology and unlimited damages.

Lawyers for Lewis applied to the High Court in London to dismiss the suit, arguing it should be in a U.S. court. Justice Sir David Eady ruled it was a case that could be heard in London.

"I was accused of being a bigot and an unrepentant anti-Semite," King said outside court Monday. "I was deeply hurt and offended by these remarks, and I came to the UK to protect my reputation here."

Burstein is the lawyer representing Lewis in his lawsuit against King in New York, in which the boxer says the promoter was instrumental in stopping his rematch with Mike Tyson.

Lewis knocked out Tyson in eight rounds in Memphis in June 2002.