(IPYS/IFEX) – On 3 July 2001, in a plenary session, Venezuela’s highest tribunal ratified ruling 1013 in its entirety. The ruling denies media owners and employees the right to reply, calls for the ascertainment of columnists’ ideological tendencies and financial penalties against news agencies. The president of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (Tribunal Supremo de […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – On 3 July 2001, in a plenary session, Venezuela’s highest tribunal ratified ruling 1013 in its entirety. The ruling denies media owners and employees the right to reply, calls for the ascertainment of columnists’ ideological tendencies and financial penalties against news agencies.
The president of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (Tribunal Supremo de Justicia, TSJ), Magistrate Iván Rincon Urdaneta, noted that ruling 1013 “cannot be reversed, modified or dismissed.” In the judge’s opinion, no one had been able to provide a legal argument demonstrating that the magistrates had committed an error.
It is interesting to note that the judge who originally made the ruling, Jesús Eduardo Cabrera, failed to attend a meeting in which journalists were given an opportunity to expand on the content of this controversial ruling, although all the magistrates, headed by the TSJ president, were in attendance.
“This sentence is no longer before Magistrate Cabrera or the Constitutional Court, as it was adopted in its entirety by the plenary. That is to say, all the Superior Tribunal of Justice magistrates now stand behind this ruling,” emphasised the president of Venezuela’s highest judicial body.
On 3 July, the former president of the Supreme Court of Justice (as the TSJ was known before the 1999 Constitution), Cecilia Sosa Gomez, filed an appeal with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) denouncing anomalies in the decision, in the hope that the hemispheric organisation will recommend that ruling 1013 be suspended.
Similarly, Hermann Escarrá, Venezuela’s representative before the IACHR, announced that between 9 and 12 July he would also appeal to the same body, which oversees the state of human rights on the continent, and ask that this unusual ruling that limits freedom of expression in Venezuela be rejected.
Recommended Action
Contact the Journalists’ National College for further information on the ruling:
Levy Benchimol
President
Fax: +58 212 999 70 52
E-mail: benshimol@cemex.com.ve
José Gregorio Salazar
Secretary General
Press Workers’ National Union
Fax: +58 212 793 28 83
E-mail: sntp@reacciun.ve
Send appeals to authorities:
– protesting the sentence’s ratification and calling for its annulment
Appeals To
Iván Rincon Urdaneta
President of the Superior Tribunal of Justice
E-mail: ivanrincon@tsj.gov.ve
Colonel Luis Alfonso Dávila
Venezuelan Foreign Minister
E-mail: ministro@mre.gov.ve
Please copy appeals to the source if possible.
