The action involves statements by a shareholder in a City-sponsored residential cooperative corporation at a meeting of shareholders to the effect that plaintiff, the corporation's president, was not diligent in paying certain taxes. Assuming the statements in issue were assertions of fact and not mere opinion, and assuming further that they were not true, they are protected by a qualified "common-interest" privilege (see, Liberman v Gelstein, 178 A.D.2d 215), which, in order to overcome, requires a showing that the statements were published with personal spite, ill will, or culpable recklessness or negligence (D'Avino v Trachtenburg, 149 A.D.2d 401, 403, lv denied 74 N.Y.2d 611). We agree with the IAS court that plaintiff's conclusory assertions of malice failed to raise a genuine issue of fact in this regard (supra; see also, Friedman v. Ergin, 110 A.D.2d 620, 621, affd 66 N.Y.2d 645).
Concur — Murphy, P.J., Carro, Milonas, Wallach and Smith, JJ.