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Association of European Journalists |
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Article from BBC Online |
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Viewpoint:
Media freedom dented By William
Horsley, writer on European affairs London, 13 November 2007 Was it lèse majesté or just a
good laugh? Scurrilous libel or a witty commentary on a topical issue for
Spanish parents? A court in Spain
has convicted Manel Fontdevila, cartoons editor of the popular satirical
weekly magazine, El Jueves, and cartoonist "Guillermo" of
"damaging the prestige of the crown". Both men received a hefty
3,000-euro (£2,100) fine.
It was a
caricature of Prince Filipe having sex with his wife, Princess Letizia, and
telling her: "Do you realise that if you get pregnant, it will be
the closest thing to work I've done in my life?" More
censorship The cartoon is
funny, but the issue raised by its banning is serious. The episode has
worrying echoes of last year's frenzied and violent protests against the
cartoons about the Prophet Muhammad printed in European newspapers. Those cartoonists
faced death threats, a number of people died in disturbances around the
world, and the end result was a defeat for freedom of expression. In the Spanish
case, censorship of the magazine has already taken place and will not be
reversed. Within hours of the cartoon's appearance Spanish judges ordered the
seizure of all copies of that edition of the magazine. This is only one
of a growing number of recent cases of media censorship or self-censorship in
Europe that have arisen thanks to restrictive laws or monopolistic patterns
of media ownership. Some, like the
Spanish case, involve attempts to prosecute journalists for violating laws
that give special protection to the most powerful and privileged figures in
public life. In Romania, a law
has just been passed which exposes journalists to the risk of seven years in
jail if they publish video footage taken secretly of politicians taking
bribes. It follows a case in which film of a government minister accepting a
secret cash payment was shown on TV, leading to his resignation. In France, a
newspaper expose written during this year's presidential election campaign,
revealing that Cecilia Sarkozy - the then wife of winning candidate Nicolas |
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Sarkozy - failed
to cast her vote, was removed on orders from the newspaper's owner, a close
associate of the new President. In Turkey, the
infamous Article 301 of the criminal code makes it an offence punishable by
jail terms to insult the armed forces or those in positions of high office. Criminal prosecutions Turkish officials
insist that similar laws protecting the holders of high offices of state also
exist in France and other Western countries. But a Turkish
legal expert explained the difference: "It's like the laws in some
American states that still ban oral sex between married couples," he
said. "They exist on paper but are no longer used!" In Turkey,
hundreds of journalists have been prosecuted under Article 301 and similar
laws. Miklos Haraszti
is Europe's chief enforcer of media freedom on the governments and courts of
the 56 member states of the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Co-operation
in Europe). He says that
oppressive laws against the media, intimidation and threats of dismissal, are
all being used as weapons to censor the work of journalists in Eastern and
Western Europe today. The latest
evidence for that harsh verdict comes from a Survey of Media Freedom in 20
European states presented to the OSCE's Representative for Media Freedom last
weekend. The study, entitled Goodbye to
Freedom?, was published by the independent Association of European
Journalists. 'Unusable' laws It finds that
within the past year alone, journalists in 18 out of 20 European countries -
including would-be models of democracy like Germany, the Netherlands and
France - have faced criminal prosecution, or been jailed for breaking various
laws that impede them from reporting on matters of public interest. (The two
exceptions were the Czech Republic and the UK.) Yet each year
dozens of judgements made by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg
overturn the convictions of journalists on libel or secrecy charges in
national courts. So is it really
time for the media in Europe to say "Goodbye to Freedom"? Miklos
Haraszti says simply that European governments must not pass laws, like
criminal libel for journalists, which are "unusable". The prosecution
and conviction of the cartoonists who published a funny sketch of a Spanish
prince to make their viewers laugh has chipped away a bit more from the
fragile pillar of media freedom in Europe. William Horsley is media freedom representative for the Association of European Journalists |
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