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FREEDOM
OF SPEECH AND PRESS
AND HUMAN RIGHTS
I. Armenia:
US group’s doubts on press freedom
unfounded—paper.
The New York-based office of the Freedom House NGO
has most likely confused its inhabitants. According to
the research of the aforementioned organization, it has
been discovered that Antigua-Barbuda and Gabon and also
Armenia are in the same group, where the press is partly
free.
In
Armenia .” . . All dailies allow the state censors
to check their materials.”—is stated in the
information on Armenia reported by RFE/RL [Radio Free
Europe/Radio Liberty] and disseminated by Armenpress news
agency [the report actually says: “Papers routinely
permit government censors to review material” ]. If
we try to express our opinions softly, it is an insult
addressed to the Armenian dailies, because it means that
nonexistent state censors check, for example,
‘Yerkir’ daily—a publication of the
Armenian Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaktsutyun and
‘Azg’ daily—a publication of the Liberal
Democratic Party of Armenia. In that case, it is strange
how Freedom House reports that “newspapers
expressing the points of view of political parties are
published” [actually: “Scores of private
newspapers claim to be independent or openly affiliated
with political parties” ]. Does it mean that the
viewpoints of political parties, which are expressed in
their newspapers, are formed under the control of state
censors? . . .
Nevertheless,
it is a fact that Freedom House, showing its interest in
democracy, has been trying to become more Catholic than
the Pope of Rome, and, as a result, it has become an
unbeliever. And the Armenian press and in particular
dailies are going on to live without the
“support” of the state nonexistent censors, no
matter how hard the Freedom House wants to register this
(the existence of censors) in reports pleasing to
democracy.
Maybe
the censors of some state regularly check the reports of
Freedom House. They are probably not in Armenia.
[Note:
The Freedom House web site (www.freedomhouse.org), where
the full 1999 report on press freedom worldwide is
published, says that “ Freedom House is led by a
Board of Trustees composed of prominent Democrats and
Republicans, business and labour leaders, foreign policy
experts, former senior government officials, and
journalists—a diverse group sharing the belief that
American global leadership is indispensable in the cause
of freedom.”] (“Who is the owner of Freedom
House?,” Ayastani Anrapetutyun, 9 September 1999)
II. Romania:
Judgment in the Case of Dalban v. Romania.
In a judgment delivered at Strasbourg on 28
September 1999 in the case of Dalban v. Romania, the
European Court of Human Rights held unanimously that
there had been a violation of Article 10 (freedom of
expression) of the European Convention on Human Rights
and that it was not necessary to examine the case under
Article 6 § 1 (fair hearing). Under Article 41 of
the Convention (just satisfaction), the Court awarded the
applicant’s widow 20,000 French francs for
non-pecuniary damage.
Facts
The
case concerned an application lodged with the European
Commission of Human Rights by a Romanian national, Mr
Ionel Dalban, who was born in 1928 and lived in Roman
(Romania).
Mr
Dalban was a journalist and ran a local weekly magazine,
Cronica Romascana. He died on 13 March 1998. In September
1992 Mr Dalban published an article in his magazine about
a series of frauds allegedly committed by Mr G.S., the
chief executive of a State-owned agricultural company,
FASTROM of Roman. The article, and a later one, also cast
suspicion on Senator R.T. in that connection. The
applicant claimed that the information published was
based on Fraud Squad reports. The Romanian courts found
Mr Dalban guilty of criminal libel and sentenced him to
three months’ imprisonment (suspended). He was also
ordered to pay G.S. and R.T. 300,000 Romanian lei.
Despite his conviction, the applicant continued to
publish information concerning the alleged fraud.
In
April 1998 the Procurator-General applied to the Supreme
Court of Justice to have the applicant’s conviction
quashed on the grounds that the offence of criminal libel
had not been made out. In a judgment of 2 March 1999 the
Supreme Court allowed the application. With regard to the
applicant’s conviction for libelling G.S., it
acquitted the applicant on the ground that he had acted
in good faith. In respect of the libel of R.T., the court
quashed the conviction and, while holding that the
applicant had been rightly convicted, decided to
discontinue the proceedings in view of his death.
The
applicant complained that his freedom of expression under
Article 10 of the Convention had been violated. He also
submitted that he had not been given a fair trial,
contrary to Article 6 of the Convention, in that the
courts had not examined the police documents on which his
articles had been based.
Decision
The
Court noted, first, that the applicant had been convicted
by the Romanian courts of libel through the press. It
considered that Mr Dalban’s widow had a legitimate
interest in obtaining a ruling that her late
husband’s conviction had constituted a breach of his
right to freedom of expression. The Court
consequently held that Mrs Dalban had standing to
continue the proceedings in the applicant’s stead.
The
Court dismissed the Government’s argument that the
applicant had ceased to be a “victim” as a
result of the Supreme Court of Justice’s decision,
which the Government saw as having been in his favour.
The Court reiterated that a decision or measure
favourable to an applicant was not in principle
sufficient to deprive him of his status as a
“victim” unless the national authorities had
acknowledged, either expressly or in substance, and then
afforded redress for, the breach of the Convention. The
Court concluded that the applicant’s widow could
therefore claim to be a “victim” for the
purposes of Article 34 of the Convention.
It
was not disputed before the Court that the
applicant’s conviction had constituted
“interference by public authority” or that it
had been “prescribed by law” and had pursued a
legitimate aim (“the protection of the reputation
… of others”). The Court noted that the
articles in issue concerned a matter of public interest:
the management of State assets and the manner in which
politicians fulfil their mandate.
In
cases such as the present one, the national margin of
appreciation is circumscribed by the interest of
democratic society in enabling the press to exercise its
essential role of “public watchdog” and to
impart information of serious public concern. It would be
unacceptable for a journalist to be debarred from
expressing critical value judgments unless he or she
could prove their truth.
In the instant case there was no proof that the
description of events given in the articles was totally
untrue and was designed to fuel a defamation campaign
against G.S. and Senator R.T. The Government did not
challenge the Commission’s conclusion that even
having regard to the duties and responsibilities
incumbent on a journalist who avails himself of the right
set out in Article 10 of the Convention, the
applicant’s conviction could not be considered as
“necessary in a democratic society.” The Court
took notice of that and decided that, in relation to the
legitimate aim pursued, convicting Mr Dalban of a
criminal offence and sentencing him to imprisonment had
amounted to disproportionate interference with the
exercise of his freedom of expression as a journalist.
There had accordingly been a violation of Article 10.
III. Egypt:
Application of Law 93/1996 polarizes Egypt’s
journalists.
Controversy persisted during September over the
two-year prison sentences and ŁE20,000 ($5,880) fines
imposed on three journalists of the Islamist biweekly
newspaper Al-Shaab in August. Al-Shaab’s editor,
Magdi Hussein, and two colleagues were convicted under
Egypt’s Press Law No. 93 of 1996. This is a slightly
diluted version of the infamous Law 95 of 1995, which
imposed heavy fines and prison sentences for defamation
but which was withdrawn by Egypt’s President Hosni
Mubarak in response to a barrage of protests from groups
inside and outside the country.
For
some time Law 93 of 1996 served to deter journalists from
criticizing state officials without actually being
applied. In April 1998, however, after campaigning
against the then Interior Minister, Hassan al-Alfi.
through the pages of Al-Shaab, Magdi Hussein and the
paper’s cartoonist, Mohammed Hilal, were jailed for
libel. Although they were released four months later,
after Egypt’s Court of Cassation annulled the
verdict of the lower court, it seems—as
commentator Steve Negus suggested in Middle East
International—that the regime “crossed a major
psychological boundary” when it put Hussein and
Hilal in prison the first time. Hussein’s second
prison term, starting on August 15, 1999, marked the
culmination of his newspaper’s campaign to discredit
Egypt’s deputy prime minister, Youssef al-Wali, for
allegedly conspiring with Israelis to sabotage Egyptian
agriculture through the import of faulty seeds.
With
Hussein back in jail, controversy ensued as to what
Egypt’s new attorney-general, Maher Abdel-Wahid had
or had not told the semi-official daily, Al-Ahram, about
the affair. Al-Ahram’s chairman, Ibrahim Nafei,
doubles as head of the Journalists’ Syndicate, in
which capacity he lobbied Abdel-Wahid, as
attorney-general, to stay the sentences on the Al-Shaab
journalists and allow them to challenge the verdict in
front of the Court of Cassation. Al-Ahram meanwhile ran
an interview with Abdel-Wahid, quoting him as being
opposed to the imprisonment of journalists for
publication crimes and favoring amendment of the Penal
Code. The article set off a chain reaction, in which
Abdel-Wahid denied the Al-Ahram report and other
government-owned newspapers pitched in to oppose
Nafei’s stand.
IV. Palestinian
lawyers challenge journalist detentions.
Human rights advocacy groups welcomed the release on
October 4 of the popular Palestinian television
presenter, Maher al-Desouqi, but they roundly denounced
the military prosecution authorities for arresting a
civilian, detaining him without charge and thereby
intimidating media professionals from exercising their
rights under Articles 3 and 4 of the Palestinian Press
Law of 1995. Desouqi, who hosts a twice-weekly television
talkshow broadcast by two private stations, Ansar TV and
Al-Quds Educational TV, was detained by the Palestinian
Preventive Security Service on September 15, on charges
of possessing “inciting material” harmful to
the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) chaired by
Yasser Arafat. The arrest came shortly after the mother
of a Palestinian prisoner had criticized the PNA during a
live phone-in on Desouqi’s show.
LAW,
a Palestinian legal and human rights NGO affiliated to
several international bodies, pursued both Desouqi’s
case and that of four journalists detained by the
Palestinian Civilian Police in Ramallah and Gaza on
September 28. Three of the four were newspaper reporters,
working for Al-Ayyam, Al-Risala and Al-Hayat al-Jadida,
while the fourth was the Ramallah correspondent of the
Qatari satellite television channel, Al-Jazeera. The
detainees were released on September 30 with a warning.
Palestinian police chief Ghazi Jabali said they had been
suspected of spreading false information which offended
the PNA.
V.
Iran: Conservatives and reformers play tug-of-war
with the press.
Incensed by the judicial closure of three major
daily newspapers in the last six months, two prominent
Iranian journalists made a public appeal on October 2 to
both the president and the head of the judiciary, asking
them to clarify the law regarding the closures. No sooner
had they launched the appeal than one of them received a
summons to appear before the Press Court.
The
two journalists, Hamid Reza Jalaiepour and Mashallah
Shamsolvaezin, were both associated with the three banned
newspapers. The most recent banning was that of Neshat,
closed in September by the conservative-dominated Press
Court for insulting Islamic values. Neshat’s
publisher, Latif Safari, was sentenced to two and a half
years in prison and banned from journalism for five years
for printing articles opposing capital punishment and
calling on Iran’s rahbar (supreme leader), Ayatollah
Ali Khamenei, to stay out of factional politics. Under
the Iranian legal system, Judge Saeed Mortazavi, who
presided over Safari’s trial, is also a prosecutor.
He was so determined to conclude the trial quickly that
he kept the court in session throughout noon prayers and
late into the day.
The
press has become a key battleground for the struggle
between Iran’s would-be reformers, led by the
President, Mohammed Khatami, who has campaigned to
promote civil society, and the country’s hardline
clerical conservatives, backed by Ayatollah Khamenei. In
their open letter on October 2, Jalaiepour and
Shamsolvaezin asked Khatami to say clearly which
government body could guarantee them the “minimum of
political and professional security” to continue
their activities. They asked the head of the judiciary,
Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, to safeguard their
“civil and religious rights to freely choose a
profession.” They very next day Shamsolvaezin
was called before the Press Court in connection with one
or more of the 74 charges that had been brought against
Neshat.
VI. Sudan:
Newspaper ban is the first for five years.
A presidential decree took effect on September 18
banning publication of the privately-owned newspaper
Al-Rai al-Akher (The Other Opinion). The newspaper,
headed by Amal Abbas, Sudan’s only female
editor-in-chief, has been suspended by the government
several times this year but this was the first statutory
ban on a Sudanese newspaper since Al-Sudan al-Dawlia
(Sudan International) was closed in 1994. Sudanese
journalists and parliamentarians say the ban is
unconstitutional.
Although
the presidential decree gave no reason for the closure,
the official media criticized Al-Rai al-Akher for
“threatening Islam and national unity,”
claiming that it had backed the rebel Sudan People’s
Liberation Army (SPLA) fighting for autonomy in the
southern Sudan.
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