(IPI/IFEX) – The following is an IPI press release: Warsaw, 18 May 2004 Following are the resolutions passed at the Annual General Assembly of the International Press Institute (IPI) on: – Criminal Defamation and “Insult Laws” – Cuba – Iraq – WSIS II (Tunisia) – Zimbabwe – African Union’s NEPAD initiative …………………………………………………………………………. Resolution on Criminal […]
(IPI/IFEX) – The following is an IPI press release:
Warsaw, 18 May 2004
Following are the resolutions passed at the Annual General Assembly of the International Press Institute (IPI) on:
– Criminal Defamation and “Insult Laws”
– Cuba
– Iraq
– WSIS II (Tunisia)
– Zimbabwe
– African Union’s NEPAD initiative
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Resolution on Criminal Defamation and “Insult Laws”
Meeting at its Annual General Assembly on 17 May 2004 in Warsaw, Poland, the IPI members unanimously passed a resolution stating that laws making defamation a criminal offence and “insult laws”, giving special protection for states and governments and their officials by criminalising criticism, are illegitimate.
Prison terms are never justified for dissemination of news and information or for expressions of opinion, no matter how unsettling or offensive they may seem to those involved.
Recent court judgments sentencing Polish journalists to jail terms or suspended sentences for alleged defamation are accordingly unjustified. There are also numerous criminal charges pending against other journalists in Poland. The IPI membership welcomed President Alexsandr Kwasniewski’s statement at the IPI World Congress on 16 May that he was willing to undertake every effort to help change any legal provisions in Poland that allow for such sentences.
The view that the criminalisation of defamation is illegitimate is shared by the world’s leading courts such as the European Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Human Rights Commission and the US Supreme Court. The clear trend of their opinions is that defamation (libel and slander) should be treated under civil law, to be adjudicated between the parties by civil courts not as criminal offences subject to state punishments.
The UN Human Rights Commission has adopted such longstanding positions of its various Special Rapporteurs as that “sentencing to a prison term for libel or defamation is clearly not a proportionate penalty.” A Commission-endorsed report by the Special Rapporteurs stated in 1992, “Detention, as a negative sanction for the peaceful expression of opinion, is one of the most reprehensible practices employed to silence people and accordingly constitutes a serious violation of human rights.”
A number of established West European democracies continue to keep on their statute books outdated criminal defamation and “insult laws” that are generally no longer used. Yet, their continued existence is regularly cited by authoritarian or transition governmental and judicial authorities to justify the active use of such laws to silence news and commentary. Established democracies should accordingly act swiftly to remove such negative examples from their laws.
In recent years, some countries have fully or partially revoked such laws. Those countries include Argentina, the Czech Republic, Egypt, Ghana, Hungary, Kenya, Moldova, Paraguay, Slovakia, Spain and Sri Lanka. France has eliminated most jail sentences for “crimes of opinion.”
Those actions constitute clear recognition by governments and courts that such laws are in gross violation of everyone’s right “to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers,” as set forth in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. There are legal remedies in civil libel law against perceived defamations. Moreover, as the world’s leading courts have held, public officials need to be afforded less, not more, protection from defamation than ordinary citizens if there is to be the free and vigorous public debate which is the hallmark of a democratic society.
The world’s leading journalists represented in the International Press Institute accordingly call on parliaments to abolish such laws, on governments to refrain from using them where they exist and to call for their revocation, and on courts to refuse to invoke them and to rule that they violate the fundamental human rights of free speech and press freedom.
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Resolution on Cuba
Meeting at its Annual General Assembly on 17 May 2004 in Warsaw, Poland, the IPI members unanimously passed a resolution calling on the Cuban government to uphold freedom of the press and freedom of expression. The IPI members specifically condemn the arrest and imprisonment of at least 28 journalists in 2003.
During March 2003, Cuban authorities arrested 78 people including the journalists. Some of those arrested had participated in the “Varela Project” that gathered 11,000 signatures calling for an improvement in human rights in the country.
In early April 2003, 14 courts across the country stated that the journalists had been convicted of “working with a foreign power to undermine the government.” They were given jail sentences ranging from 14 to 27 years and are currently incarcerated in maximum-security prisons around the country under poor conditions.
The journalists’ one-day trials were held on 3 and 4 April behind closed doors. Their lawyers were given little time to prepare defences and, in some instances, were prevented from meeting their clients before the start of the trials.
The IPI membership strongly believes that the failure of the Cuban government to uphold press freedom and the right of a fair and open trial is not only an affront to the right of individuals to express themselves freely but also a ringing indictment of the failure to introduce democratic reform in Cuba.
Moreover, the IPI membership is of the opinion that the cruel and unjust behaviour of the Cuban government towards journalists and human rights activists is so prejudicial to the cause of human rights that the Cuban government should be excluded from the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
Its presence on this commission is untenable, undermining every attempt to improve human rights around the globe and damaging the good name of the United Nations.
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Resolution on Iraq
Meeting at its Annual General Assembly on 17 May 2004 in Warsaw, Poland, the IPI members unanimously passed a resolution stating that the state of press freedom in Iraq gives rise to grave concerns on several grounds, including:
– safety of local and foreign journalists,
– respect for press freedom principles by the authorities within Iraq,
– pressures by coalition governments on news media outside the country to censor by withholding or altering information and commentary.
So far this year, 14 Iraqi and foreign journalists and other news personnel have been killed in the line of duty. Several of those were killed in incidents involving fire by US forces. Too often soldiers have seemed indiscriminate or reckless in their behaviour toward journalists, investigations have seemed cursory, and there do not seem to be sufficiently strict orders and procedures to avert the repetition of tragic events.
Members of the International Press Institute call upon US and allied forces to conduct full investigations of any and all such incidents and to publish the reports in full. There must also be complete exchanges of views between the military authorities and the news media so that the risks of such incidents are reduced to the absolute minimum.
While it is true that the military authorities are confronted with a major armed insurgency, the actions of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) against news media in Iraq create grave concerns over how it understands the principles of free speech and press freedom.
The outpouring of demonstrations and armed violence by a large part of the population after the CPA’s 60-day closure at the end of March of the Shi’ite weekly “Al Hawza” showed – if any demonstration were needed – that bans of news media outlets are both unwise and counterproductive, no matter how inaccurate or unfair the authorities may deem their reporting or editorials to be.
It was particularly striking that the CPA gave its objections to a commentary comparing CPA administrator Paul Bremer to former President Saddam Hussein as one of the main examples of “incitement” that “Al Hawza” was alleged to have made. The staff replied that, if there is press freedom, such opinions should be allowed.
There have also been repeated actions in Iraq against journalists of the Arab-language satellite news channels Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya, the outlets understood to have by far the highest viewerships of Iraqi audiences.
Not only has the CPA set poor examples for the new Iraqi authorities on dealing with independent press outlets. In Washington, DC, the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff has admitted calling the US television network CBS to hold back the broadcast of compromising photographs showing the abuse of prisoners in Iraq. It is, therefore, no surprise that Iraq’s provisional governing council has also issued bans on news media outlets.
Those in positions of authority in Iraq must not only say they are working for press freedom in that country. They must show that they mean it by allowing the press to operate freely. Furthermore, they must do their utmost to create conditions of safety and full access to information so that journalists may properly do their jobs of informing their publics.
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Resolution on WSIS II (Tunisia)
Meeting at its Annual General Assembly on 17 May 2004 in Warsaw, Poland, the IPI members unanimously called for plans to hold the second World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Tunisia in November 2005 to be abandoned unless that country demonstrates its respect for human rights, notably freedom of expression and press freedom.
Despite such calls, Tunisia continues to imprison its journalists and other citizens for exercising freedom of speech. On 6 April, eight young Internet users were sentenced by a Tunis court to prison terms of up to 26 years. The convicted Internet users were accused of promoting terrorist attacks on the sole basis of files that they downloaded from the Internet.
Such actions show that Tunisia continues to violate its commitments under the United Nations Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to respect free speech and press freedom. The Tunisian press is censored and journalists are jailed along with hundreds of other political prisoners.
The United Nations Secretariat takes the position that it is powerless to alter plans to hold the Summit in Tunisia since these were set by a vote of the member-states of the UN General Assembly.
There are nevertheless a number of important questions that must be answered by Tunisia before the established democracies, press freedom organizations and human rights groups agree to attend such a meeting in that country. These include the following:
– Will journalists and all others jailed for expressions of opinion or for reporting facts the Tunisian government considers inconvenient be freed from prison?
– Will there be assurances that there will be no further prosecutions on such charges, which are contrary to Tunisia’s obligations under international human rights law?
– Will the Tunisian press, written and broadcast, be allowed to report freely on the Summit and also finally be granted its press freedom rights laid out in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the other international human rights texts to which Tunisia is a party and which Tunisia recommitted itself to observe in the Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action of the first World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva in December 2003?
– Will all foreign and local press freedom and human rights organizations that wish to participate in the Summit be allowed to do so, without threats, harassment or administrative obstacles?
– Will local and foreign journalists, as well as NGO’s and other civil society representatives, be allowed to report and circulate freely in the country and to communicate freely – including local and international phone calls and using the Internet without any restrictions, monitoring, blocking or censorship?
– Will free access to websites and other sources containing materials critical of Tunisia be allowed without hindrance?
– Will participants in the Summit be allowed to freely publish and distribute at the conference site any written or recorded materials, such as newspapers, reports, pamphlets or leaflets – including those containing questions, criticisms or information about human rights abuses in Tunisia?
It is not acceptable for a Summit on the Information Society to be held in a country with a restrictive record on the most basic freedom of expression principles.
Unless Tunisia gives its solemn assurances that questions such as the above on respect for free speech and press freedom will be answered in the affirmative and without reservations, the international community should abandon its plans to meet in Tunisia.
If Tunisia’s answers to these questions are not positive, IPI urges the Secretary General of the United Nations to ask the General Assembly to reconsider its decision. If satisfactory answers are not forthcoming, the summit should be transferred to a country known to respect press freedom, or be cancelled altogether.
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Resolution on Zimbabwe
The IPI members meeting at their Annual General Assembly in Warsaw, Poland are deeply concerned at the continuing deterioration of the media situation in Zimbabwe as a result of government action. After the highly criticised closure at gunpoint of the independent daily, the Daily News, the government has issued threats against other independent publications, the Independent and the Standard, describing them as the “running dogs of imperialism”.
This was followed by the government’s Media and Information Committee (MIC) threatening to close a third newspaper, the independent weekly, the Tribune, on a technical breach of the MIC’s registration rules.
In addition, the government made threats against Zimbabwean journalists who act as correspondents for foreign newspapers. They were accused of sending “lying reports” about conditions in Zimbabwe to these papers. The state-owned Herald newspaper in the capital, Harare, issued threats that the government planned to take action against these journalists and a few days later Jonathan Moyo, the Minister of Information in the president’s office, declared that Zimbabwean jails had space for “lying” journalists. In view of these serious developments further limiting the freedom of the press, the IPI members decided unanimously that they have no option but to retain Zimbabwe’s name on the “watchlist” of nations that are seriously eroding media freedom.
For Zimbabwe to be removed from the “watchlist”, the country must restore the media freedoms that it has sought to destroy.
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Resolution on African Union’s NEPAD initiative
The IPI members meeting at their Annual General Assembly in Warsaw, Poland expressed their deep disappointment that the laudable African Union initiative, NEPAD (New Partnership for Africa’s Development), has failed to include the vital role of free and independent media as one of the criteria for assessing whether its member nations comply with the principles of good governance.
Under NEPAD, the African Union envisages applying a “peer review” mechanism for member nations who volunteer for assessment so that they may qualify for donor aid and trade preferences from the world’s Group of Eight richest nations and members of the European Union. Under NEPAD’s only good governance criteria are an efficient civil service, effective parliaments with accountability and an independent judiciary. No place for the media is envisaged under these criteria.
The IPI members believe that the exclusion from such a review of the essential requirement of a free and independent media to conduct a “watchdog” role over government is extremely serious and in consequence any “peer review” finding that a nation has complied with the good governance criteria will be flawed. IPI members believe that the failure to include such a requirement will encourage other African states to assume that a free media is not an essential element of democracy.
In making this assertion IPI is aware that under separate criteria assessing a nation’s promotion of human rights, a need for media freedom is mentioned. However, this requirement is not specific to good governance. The only reference to journalism too is that it should be “responsible”, a term which is often used to limit media freedom. The IPI notes that a country that does not accord freedom to its news media would fail to qualify for membership in the European Union – an indication of the importance this group of nations attaches to the role of a free media.
IPI members unanimously call on the African Union urgently to rectify this omission and to insert in the good governance criteria a requirement for free and independent media.
In addition, IPI urges the African Union to include as a requirement under both these sections an undertaking by governments to commit themselves to remove legislative restrictions on the media. They should also reaffirm the values and principles contained in Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
