Council of Europe s can use the freedom of speech to campaign and
lobby government ministers. The
European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), signed on 4 November 1950, guarantees a broad range of human rights to inhabitants of member countries of the
Council of Europe, which includes almost all European nations. These rights include Article 10, which entitles all citizens to free expression. Echoing the language of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights this provides that: :Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises. The convention established the
European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). Any person who feels his or her rights have been violated under the convention by a state party can take a case to the Court. Judgements finding violations are binding on the States concerned and they are obliged to execute them. The
Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe monitors the execution of judgements, particularly to ensure payment of the amounts awarded by the Court to the applicants in compensation for the damage they have sustained. The convention also includes some other restrictions: :The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are
necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or the rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary. For example, the Council of Europe
Explanatory Report of the
Additional Protocol to the Convention on Cybercrime states the "European Court of Human Rights has made it clear that the denial or revision of 'clearly established
historical facts – such as the
Holocaust – [...] would be removed from the protection of Article 10 by Article 17' of the ECHR" in the
Lehideux and Isorni v. France judgment of 23 September 1998. Each party to the Convention must alter its laws and policies to conform with the convention. Some, such as Ireland or the United Kingdom, have expressly incorporated the Convention into their domestic laws. The guardian of the convention is the European Court of Human Rights. This court has heard many cases relating to freedom of speech, including cases that have tested the professional obligations of confidentiality of journalists and lawyers, and the application of defamation law, a recent example being the so-called "
McLibel case".
European Union Citizens of the European Union enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration. Currently, all members of the
European Union are signatories of the European Convention on Human Rights in addition to having various constitutional and legal rights to freedom of expression at the national level. The
Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union has been legally binding since December 1, 2009 when the
Treaty of Lisbon became fully ratified and effective. Article 11 of the Charter, in part mirroring the language of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights, provides that :1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. :2. The freedom and pluralism of the media shall be respected. The
European Court of Justice takes into account both the Charter and the Convention when making its rulings. According to the
Treaty of Lisbon, the European Union accedes to the European Convention as an entity in its own right, making the Convention binding not only on the governments of the
member states but also on the
supranational institutions of the EU.
Austria In Austria, the right of free speech is subject to limitations, notably the prohibition to call the prophet Muhammad a pedophile, which was reaffirmed by a court in 2009. The
European Court of Human Rights upheld the verdict in 2018.
Czech Republic with a group of followers. Halík has been chanting daily for over five years against abortion via megaphone in front of a maternity hospital in
Brno,
Moravia. band
Visací zámek which composed a popular song "
The President Is a Faggot" about
Václav Klaus, 2003–2013 Czech President Freedom of speech in the Czech Republic is guaranteed by the Czech
Charter of Fundamental Rights and Basic Freedoms, which has the same legal standing as the
Czech Constitution. It is the first freedom of the charter's second division - political rights. It reads as follows: :
Article 17 ::(1) The freedom of expression and the right to information are guaranteed. ::(2) Everyone has the right to express their opinion in speech, in writing, in the press, in pictures, or in any other form, as well as freely to seek, receive, and disseminate ideas and information irrespective of the frontiers of the State. ::(3) Censorship is not permitted. ::(4) The freedom of expression and the right to seek and disseminate information
may be limited by law in the case of measures necessary in a democratic society for protecting the rights and freedoms of others, the security of the State, public security, public health, and morals. ::(5) State bodies and territorial self-governing bodies are obliged, in an appropriate manner, to provide information on their activities. Conditions therefore and the implementation thereof shall be provided for by law. Specific limitations of the freedom of speech within the meaning of Article 17(4) may be found in the Criminal Code as well in other enactments. These include the prohibition of: • unauthorized handling of personal information (Article 180 of the Criminal Code), which protects the right to privacy, • defamation (Article 184 of the Criminal Code), • dissemination of pornography depicting disrespect to a human, abuse of an animal, or dissemination of any pornography to children (Article 191 of the Criminal Code), • seducing to use or propagation of use of addictive substances other than alcohol (Article 287 of the Criminal Code), which protects public health, • denigration of a nation, race, ethnic or other group of people (Article 355 of the Criminal Code), i.e. hate speech, • inciting of hatred towards a group of people or inciting limitation of their civil rights (Article 356 of the Criminal Code), • spreading of scaremongering information (Article 357 of the Criminal Code), e.g. fake bomb alerts, • public incitement of perpetration of a crime (Article 364 of the Criminal Code), • public approval of a felony crime (Article 365 of the Criminal Code), • public display of sympathy towards a movement oriented at curbing rights of the people (Article 404 of the Criminal Code), e.g. propagation of hate-groups, • public denial, questioning, endorsement or vindication of genocide (Article 405 of the Criminal Code), e.g.
Holocaust denial, • incitement of an offensive war (Article 407 of the Criminal Code). Most of the limitations of the free speech in the Czech Republic aim at protection of rights of individuals or minority groups. Unlike in some other European countries there are no limits on speech criticizing or denigrating government, public officials or state symbols.
Denmark Freedom of speech in Denmark is granted by the Constitution (
Grundloven): :§ 77 Any person shall be at liberty to publish their ideas in print, in writing, and in speech, subject to their being held responsible in a court of law. Censorship and other preventive measures shall never again be introduced. Because of the constitutions only protects against censure, there are some laws where you can be prosecuted for what you say. Hate speech is illegal according to the
Danish Penal Code § 266(b): :Any person who, publicly or with the intention of disseminating ... makes a statement ... threatening ('
), insulting ('), or degrading ('''') a group of persons on account of their race, national or ethnic origin or belief shall be liable to a fine or to simple detention or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.
Finland Finland has been ranked in the
Press Freedom Index as the country with the best press freedom in 2002–2006, 2009–2010, and 2012–2014. According to the Constitution, everyone has freedom of expression, entailing the right to express, disseminate and receive information, opinions and other communications without prior prevention by anyone. The Finnish mass-media has
its own self-regulatory organ which regulates the ethics of the press. A demonstration or other public assembly requires no permission from the police or other authorities. If a public meeting is held outdoors, the police must be notified of the event no later than six hours before the assembly is scheduled to begin, but the police have no authority to prohibit the event.
Defamation is a crime only if the target is a private person. Defamation of corporations is never a crime unless it's covered by competition regulations or similar legislation. Sentences have never been given for publishing pro-drug propaganda. There are few restrictions regarding
obscenity. It's illegal to display obscene visual material in a public place in a manner that is likely to cause public offense. Finland had a film censorship board until 2001 when the scope of the board was limited to giving age ratings to movies. After the abolition of film censorship there are no restrictions on sex shown in movies regardless of the venue of display, violent pornography being the only exception to the rule. After the abolishment of film censorship, banning movies that contain brutal violence has been extremely rare. Disparagement of the
flag of Finland is an offense that can be punished with a fine. The ban specifically includes using a flag with unauthorized addenda. This is the only law restricting disparagement of the state and its symbols and institutions.
Blasphemy and
hate speech are forbidden. The blasphemy law applies to all religions. The hate speech law protects people of different sexual orientations, races, skin colors, places of birth, national or ethnic origins, religions or beliefs and disabled people. The sentence for committing these crimes could theoretically be imprisonment, but during the modern juridical history the sentence has always been a fine. The hate speech law is relatively lax. It prohibits only threatening, insulting and defaming the aforementioned groups, while criticism and expression of opinions against these groups of people are not per se forbidden. For instance, unlike in 16 other European countries
denying the Holocaust is legal. During the years 2000–2013 there were 21 successful court cases regarding hate speech. The expressions ruled illegal include stating that some groups are trash, a group is a racial monster that needs to be destroyed, and comparing
asylum seekers to animals and saying that violence against foreigners is acceptable. A Finnish member of
EU parliament Jussi Halla-aho was sentenced for both
blasphemy and
hate speech in 2012 by the
Supreme Court after saying that "
Islam is a
paedophilia religion" and "it's a national and possibly even genetic special characteristic of the
Somali people to rob passers-by and to be parasites living on the tax-payers' money". According to Jussi Halla-aho himself, the latter was meant to criticize the fact that saying that Finns drink a lot and then kill people due to possibly genetic reasons was held to be in accordance of the ethics of the press by the self-regulatory organ of the mass-media. Fines are income-based in Finland. Halla-aho was sentenced to 50
day-fines and had to pay €550 based on his income.
France The
Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, of constitutional value, states, in its article 11: :The free communication of thoughts and of opinions is one of the most precious rights of man: any citizen thus may speak, write, print freely, save [if it is necessary] to respond to the abuse of this liberty, in the cases determined by the law. In addition, France adheres to the European Convention on Human Rights and accepts the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights. The
Press Law of 1881, as amended, guarantees freedom of the press, subject to several exceptions. The Pleven Act of 1972 (after
Justice Minister René Pleven) prohibits incitement to hatred, discrimination, slander and racial insults. The
Gayssot Act of 1990 prohibits any racist,
anti-Semitic, or xenophobic activities, including
Holocaust denial. An addition to the Public Health Code was passed on 31 December 1970, which punishes the "positive presentation of drugs" and the "incitement to their consumption" with up to five years in prison and fines up to €76,000. Newspapers such as
Libération,
Charlie Hebdo and associations, political parties, and various publications criticizing the current drug laws and advocating drug reform in France have been repeatedly hit with heavy fines based on this law. France does not implement any governmental prior censorship for written publications. Any violation of law must be processed through the courts. The government has a commission recommending
movie classifications, the decisions of which can be appealed before the courts. Another commission oversees publications for the youth. The Minister of the Interior can prohibit the sale of
pornographic publications to minors, and can also prevent such publications from being publicly displayed or advertised; such decisions can be challenged before administrative courts. The government restricts the right of broadcasting to authorized radio and television channels; the authorizations are granted by an independent administrative authority; this authority has recently removed the broadcasting authorizations of some foreign channels because of their antisemitic content. In July 2019, the French
National Assembly has passed the bill for strengthen online hate speech laws. The company requires to remove the content in 24 hours. On 18 June 2020, the French Constitutional Council struck down core provisions of the law. In the 11 June 2020 judgement, the
European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) found that BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) activists in the Baldassi case rightful. It confirmed the generous case law on the freedom of expression in the context of political debate: called to boycott represent a legitimate exercise of freedom of opinion as far as they do not prompt violence, hatred, or intolerance by any means. In the aftermath of the
murder of Samuel Paty, a contentious discourse on freedom of speech in France was invoked. President
Emmanuel Macron strenuously defended the re-publishing of the Charlie Hebdo
cartoons, considering this a pure act of freedom of expression that is in line with the state principle of
laicity. This was met with outbursts in the
Islamic world and reactions from different world leaders and international organizations regarding whether freedom of speech should be absolute.
Amnesty international denounced what they perceived as selective exploitation of freedom of speech in France. Citing a number of measures taken after the incident that they likened to prior
security changes, the organization reported arrests for "apology of terrorism", which they considered an arbitrary charge to curb opposition to the publication of the cartoons. The organization also criticized the country for its prosecutive record of "contempt for public officials" in France, including the BDS case and another in 2019 where two defendants were convicted for burning an effigy of Macron. It argued that such selectivity is to cover up other laicist violations of freedom of speech, like prohibiting Muslims from wearing religious symbols in schools and public sector jobs. Numerous agencies, such as
FT,
Politico,
Le Monde, and
AP were ordered to remove articles and change content on the orders of the
French Government, vis a vis President Macron.
Germany Freedom of expression is granted by Article 5 of the
Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, which also states that there is no censorship and that freedom of expression may be limited by law. The press is regulated by the
law of Germany as well as all 16
States of Germany. The most important and sometimes controversial regulations limiting speech and the press can be found in the
Criminal code: •
Insult is punishable under Section 185.
Satire and similar forms of art enjoy more freedom but have to respect
human dignity (Article 1 of the Basic law). •
Insult or Slander of Politicians (including local politics) is punishable under Section 188. •
Malicious Gossip and
Defamation (Section 186 and 187). Utterances about facts (opposed to personal judgement) are allowed if they are true and can be proven. Yet journalists are free to investigate without evidence because they are justified by
Safeguarding Legitimate Interests (Section 193). •
Hate speech may be punishable if against
segments of the population and
in a manner that is capable of disturbing the public peace (Section 130
[Agitation of the People]), including racist agitation and antisemitism. •
Holocaust denial is punishable according to Section 130 subsection 3. •
Membership in or support of banned political parties (Section 86). Currently banned parties include the
SRP and the
KPD. •
Dissemination of Means of Propaganda of Unconstitutional Organizations (Section 86). •
Use of Symbols of Unconstitutional Organizations (
Section 86a). Items such as the
Swastika are banned. •
Disparagement of •
the Federal President (Section 90). •
the State and its Symbols (Section 90a). •
Insult to Organs and Representatives of Foreign States (Section 103). (will no longer be valid as of 2018) •
Rewarding and Approving Crimes (Section 140). •
Casting False Suspicion (Section 164). •
Insulting of Faiths, Religious Societies and Organizations Dedicated to a Philosophy of Life if they could disturb public peace (Section 166). •
Dissemination of Pornographic Writings (Section 184). The prohibition of insult, which has been widely criticized, led to 26,757 court cases, 21,454 convictions and 20,390 fines in 2013 alone.
Politico has called Germany's
hate speech laws "arguably the strictest anywhere in the Western world". Laws which have led to censorship or
chilling effects online include
NetzDG and a type of
ancillary copyright for press publishers which is a model for a pan-EU taxation proposal as of 2018. Outdoor assemblies must be registered beforehand. Individuals and groups may be banned from assembling, especially those whose fundamental rights have been revoked and banned political parties. • 14.3.a: insult Christianity or any other
known (Greek: ) religion, • 14.3.b: insult the
President of Greece, • 14.3.c: disclose information related to the
Greek Armed Forces or to various aspects of Greek National Security, • have as a purpose the
forceful overturning of the Greek
System of Government (Greek: ), • 14.3.d:
clearly (Greek: ) offend public decency,
in the cases defined by Greek
Law (Greek: ).
Hungary Articles VII, VIII, IX, and X of the
Fundamental Law of Hungary establishes the rights of freedom of expression, speech, press, thought, conscience, religion, artistic creation, scientific research, and assembly. Some of these rights are limited by the penal code:
Ireland Freedom of speech is protected by Article 40.6.1 of the
Irish constitution. However the article qualifies this right, providing that it may not be used to undermine "public order or morality or the authority of the State". Furthermore, the constitution explicitly requires that the publication of "seditious, or indecent matter" be a criminal offence. This led to the government passing blasphemy legislation on 8 July 2009. However, in May 2018 there was a referendum which removed the word "blasphemous" from the constitution. The scope of the protection afforded by this Article has been interpreted restrictively by the judiciary, largely as a result of the wording of the Article, which qualifies the right before articulating it. Indeed, until an authoritative pronouncement on the issue by the Supreme Court, many believed that the protection was restricted to "convictions and opinions" and, as a result, a separate right to communicate was, by necessity, implied into Article 40.3.2. Under the
European Convention on Human Rights Act 2003, all of the rights afforded by the European Convention serve as a guideline for the judiciary to act upon. The act is subordinate to the constitution.
Italy In
Italy the
Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, as stated in Article 21, Paragraph 1: :Anyone has the right to freely express their thoughts in speech, writing, or any other form of communication. The Article also gives restrictions against those acts considered offensive by
public morality, as stated in Paragraph 6: :Publications, performances, and other exhibits offensive to public morality shall be prohibited. Measures of preventive and repressive measure against such violations shall be established by law. Such restrictions are enforced through the Italian
Penal Code which, for example, includes articles that prohibit: •
insults against the honor and prestige of the
President (Art. 278), •
vilification of a person's
religion (Art. 403), •
insults against the
honor and
decorum of others (Art. 594) (repealed as of 2016), and •
defamation of another person (Art. 595). The Supreme Court has long since ruled that the legitimate exercise of the rights of news reporting and journalistic criticism is conditioned by the limit, in addition to truth and public interest, of continence, understood as the formal correctness of the exposition and not exceeding what is strictly necessary for the public interest, so as to ensure news and criticism do not appear through instruments and methods that are detrimental to the fundamental rights to honor and reputation. Commercial advertising of artwork owned by the government, such as
Michelangelo's David (created in the 16th century), require an assessment of the adequacy of the image, which must respect cultural dignity.
Malta Blasphemy against the
Roman Catholic church was illegal in Malta. However, the law was repealed in 2016.
Netherlands '' (The Scream) is a memorial commemorating
Theo van Gogh and a symbol of the freedom of speech. Article 7 of the Dutch Constitution (
Grondwet) in its first paragraph grants everybody the right to make public ideas and feelings by printing them without prior censorship, but not exonerating the author from their liabilities under the law. The second paragraph says that radio and television will be regulated by law, but that there will be no prior censorship dealing with the content of broadcasts. The third paragraph grants a similar freedom of speech as in the first for other means of making ideas and feelings public, but allowing censorship for reasons of decency when the public that has access may be younger than sixteen years of age. The fourth and last paragraph exempts commercial advertising from the freedoms granted in the first three paragraphs. The penal code does have laws sanctioning certain types of expression. Such laws and freedom of speech were at the centre of a public debate in The Netherlands after the arrest on 16 May 2008 of cartoonist Gregorius Nekschot. On 1 February 2014, the
Dutch Parliament abolished the law penalizing blasphemy. Laws that punish discriminatory speech exist and are occasionally used to prosecute. The Dutch Criminal Code § 137(c) criminalizes: and it was one of the key dimensions distinguishing the
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from the more restrictive
absolute monarchies, common in contemporary Europe. On 18 July 2003, about 30 human rights activists were temporarily detained by the police, allegedly for insulting
Vladimir Putin, a visiting head of state. The activists were released after about 30 minutes and only one was actually charged with insulting a foreign head of state. A law forbidding anyone from blaming the state of Poland for
Holocaust atrocities during World War II was voted by lawmakers on January 26, 2018. Following passage of the law the nationalist government normalized
hate speech and censored fact-based investigations. In 2019, Polish authorities arrested an LGBT activist. They charged her with blasphemy for hanging posters of the
Virgin Mary beside baby
Jesus with a rainbow-coloured
halo. Also in 2019, a 1973 art video exhibit of a woman eating a banana was removed on "moral grounds" which prompted protests against the act of censorship.
Insulting a monument is a crime in Poland, punishable by a fine or restriction of liberty. The crime does not require physical damage to the monument; a separate article criminalizes
vandalism.
Portugal After Salazar's dictatorship was overthrown in 1974, Article 37 of the
Constitution of Portugal prohibits censorship of opinion and information, but the 180th article of the
Portuguese penal code establishes the notion of crimes against honour, making any statement of fact or any judgement expressed either verbally, visually or by other means, that is offensive to the honor of an individual either to a 3rd party or to the targeted person — even if it's in the form of suspicion and even if that person is deceased, up to 50 years — a criminal offense punishable with imprisonment of up to 6 months or a fine of up to 240 days. If the offense is directed towards either the
assembly of the republic, the
government,
the courts, the
council of state, the
Public Ministry or any member of those, the prison time goes up from 6 months up to 2 years with an added fine. Any crime against the honor of the
president is punishable with imprisonment from 6 months up to 3 years with an added fine. It's also illegal to prevent the president of fulfilling the duties of the office, or to incite any resident in Portugal or any member of
the military of doing so or to make them rise up against the authority of the president. If a person is condemned of any of those crimes, and only by request of the accuser, has the sentence publicly known.
Spain Article 578 of the
Penal Code of Spain prohibits the "
Glorification or
justification, by any means of public
expression or
dissemination, of the crimes included in Articles 571-577 of this Code or of those who participated in its execution, or performance of acts involving disrepute, contempt or humiliation of the victims of terrorist offenses or their families[...]". In January 2014, a judge of the '''' banned a planned march in
Bilbao in support of jailed members of the
Basque terrorist group
ETA that was organized by the group ("Drop for drop" in
Basque) on the basis that he considered the group to be the successor to Herrira, whose activities had been banned because of its suspected links to jailed ETA militants. In February 2014, a
Twitter user was convicted for expressing praise for the terrorist group
GRAPO inactive since 90s but not yet formally self-dissolved.
Sweden Freedom of speech is regulated in three parts of the
Constitution of Sweden: • '''', Chapter 2 (Fundamental Rights and Freedoms) protects personal freedom of expression "whether orally, pictorially, in writing, or in any other way". • '''' (Freedom of the Press Act) protects the freedom of printed press, as well as the principle of free access to public records (Principle of Public Access) and the right to
communicate information to the press anonymously. For a newspaper to be covered by this law, it must be registered and have a "legally responsible publisher", a Swedish legal term meaning a person who is ultimately accountable for the printed material. • '
(Fundamental Law on Freedom of Expression) extends protections similar to those of ' to other media, including television, radio and web sites. Hate speech laws prohibit threats or expressions of
contempt based on race, skin colour, nationality or ethnic origin, religious belief or sexual orientation. In the weeks preceding the
election of 2010, the privately owned TV channel
TV4 refused to show an advertisement of the
Sweden Democrats party, fearing that it could be prosecuted for publishing hate speech. The ad displayed women in traditional Islamistic
burkhas reaching for an emergency brake labelled with the text "Pensions", and an elderly woman reaching for an emergency brake labelled with the text "Immigration", thus implying that there is a fiscal conflict between pension payments and allowing immigration. The law regulating TV and radio broadcasts had previously expressly prohibited discrimination against advertisers, granting a rejected advertiser the right to complain to a national board. However, the ban was lifted just two months before the election, thus making it possible for TV and radio broadcasters to opt out on some parties while showing the commercials of other parties. This was the first election when the
Sweden Democrats gained seats in the
Swedish Parliament. Some Danish ministers criticized the TV4 decision as democratically unacceptable. A former police intendent, Erik Rönnegård, stated in the juridical newspaper,
Dagens Juridik, that not banning the party showed incompetence of both the police and the judiciary. According to the largest Swedish newspaper
Dagens Nyheter the governmental decision not to ban the party has been criticized "by many". The Swedes Party was disbanded on 10 May 2015. Other laws or exceptions related to freedom of expression in Sweden concern
high treason, war mongering,
espionage, unauthorized handling of classified information, recklessness with classified information,
Insurgency,
treason, recklessness that damages the nation, rumour mongering that hurts national security, inciting crime, crimes that obstruct civil liberties, illegal depictions of violence,
libel, insults, illegal threats, threats towards police officers or security guards and abuse during legal proceedings.
Norway Article 100 of the Norwegian
Constitution has granted freedom of speech since 1814 and is mostly unchanged since then. Article 142 of the penal code was a law against blasphemy, but no one has been charged since 1933. It was removed as of 29 May 2015. Article 135a of the penal code is a law against hate speech, which is debated and not widely used. Article 100 in the Constitution states: • There shall be freedom of expression. • No person may be held liable in law for having imparted or received information, ideas or messages unless this can be justified in relation to the grounds for freedom of expression, which are the seeking of truth, the promotion of democracy and the individual's freedom to form opinions. Such legal liability shall be prescribed by law. • Everyone shall be free to speak their mind frankly on the administration of the State and on any other subject whatsoever. Clearly defined limitations to this right may only be imposed when particularly weighty considerations so justify in relation to the grounds for freedom of expression. • Prior censorship and other preventive measures may not be applied unless so required in order to protect children and young persons from the harmful influence of moving pictures. Censorship of letters may only be imposed in institutions. • Everyone has a right of access to documents of the State and municipal administration and a right to follow the proceedings of the courts and democratically elected bodies. Limitations to this right may be prescribed by law to protect the privacy of the individual or for other weighty reasons. • It is the responsibility of the authorities of the State to create conditions that facilitate open and enlightened public discourse. Norway has however several laws that ban the right to impart information, such as laws against alcohol and tobacco advertisement on television, radio, newspapers and on the internet.
Russia was sentenced to 7 years in prison under Russia's
war censorship laws for his
anti-war statements in 2022. Various aspects of the contemporary press freedom situation are criticized by multiple international organizations. The
Russian Constitution provides for freedom of speech and press, however, government application of
law, bureaucratic
regulation, and politically motivated
criminal investigations have forced the press to exercise
self-censorship constraining its coverage of certain controversial issues, resulting in infringements of these rights. According to
Human Rights Watch, the Russian government exerts control over civil society through selective implementation of the law, restriction and censure. In 2014, Russia strengthened criminal responsibility for crimes under Art. 280 ("public calls for extremist activity"), Art. 282 ("inciting hatred or hostility, and humiliation of human dignity"), Art. 282 Part 1 ("the organization of an extremist community") and Art. 282 Part 2 ("the organization of an extremist organization") of the
Criminal Code. Under the strengthened laws, those convicted of "extremist activity" face up to six years in prison. During
2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine censorship laws were enacted, prohibiting a dissemination of "unreliable information" about the operation and "discrediting" the
Russian Armed Forces. The laws provide imprisonment for up to 15 years for a "dissemination of unreliable information about
Russian Armed Forces and its operations". What is considered "unreliable information" is decided by the Russian government.
Roskomnadzor ordered mass media organizations to remove any material using the terms "war", "assault", "invasion", etc. In addition, Roskomnadzor ordered to block access to the
Russian Wikipedia in Russia, over the article "" ("Russia's invasion of Ukraine (2022)"). was sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison for discussing the
Bucha massacre in Ukraine on a
YouTube stream.In March 2022, Russian journalist
Alexander Nevzorov wrote to the Chairman of Russia's Investigative Committee
Alexander Bastrykin that Russia's 2022 war censorship laws violate the freedom of speech provisions of the Constitution of Russia. The Russian Constitution expressly prohibits
censorship in Chapter 2, Article 29. A man holding a blank sheet of paper was immediately detained in
Novosibirsk. At several protests across the country, many demonstrators have been arrested for simply holding blank sheets of paper. A Russian
streamer, Stepan Soffy, was detained after desecrating the Russian flag over an online donation. As of December 2022, more than 4,000 people were prosecuted under "fake news" laws in connection with the war in Ukraine. On 17 April 2023, Russian opposition politician and anti-war activist
Vladimir Kara-Murza was convicted on charges of
treason and "spreading disinformation" about the Russian military, and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Kara-Murza's conviction is the longest sentence for political activity since the
fall of the Soviet Union, and the length of the sentence is comparable only to
Stalin's purges in the 1930s. Some critics suspect
opponents of Vladimir Putin who
died in suspicious circumstances have been assassinated.
Switzerland Freedom of expression and information is protected by Article 16 of the
Swiss constitution, which states that: 1. Freedom of expression and of information is guaranteed. 2. Every person has the right to freely form, express and impart their opinions. 3. Every person has the right freely to receive information, to gather it from generally accessibly sources and to disseminate it. Article 261 of the
Swiss Criminal Code covers "the attack on the freedom of faith and on the freedom to worship" and "discrimination and incitement to hatred". In regards to the first section it states that: "any person who publicly and maliciously insults or mocks the religious convictions of others, and in particularly their belief in God, or maliciously desecrates objects of religious veneration, any person who maliciously prevents, disrupts or publicly mocks an act of worship, the conduct of which is guaranteed by the Constitution, or any person who maliciously desecrates a place or object that is intended for a religious ceremony or an act of worship the conduct of which is guaranteed by the Constitution. is liable to a monetary penalty." The second section states that: "any person who publicly incites hatred or discrimination against a person or a group of persons on the grounds of their race, ethnic origin, religion or sexual orientation, any person who publicly disseminates ideologies that have as their object the systematic denigration or defamation of that person or group of persons, any person who with the same objective organises, encourages or participates in propaganda campaigns, any person who publicly denigrates or discriminates against another or a group of persons on the grounds of their race, ethnic origin, religion or sexual orientation in a manner that violates human dignity, whether verbally, in writing or pictorially, by using gestures, through acts of aggression or by other means, or any person who on any of these grounds denies, trivialises or seeks justification for genocide or other crimes against humanity, any person who refuses to provide a service to another on the grounds of that person's race, ethnic origin, religion or sexual orientation when that service is intended to be provided to the general public, is liable to a custodial sentence not exceeding three years or to a monetary penalty. Article 258 of the Swiss Criminal Code (Causing fear and alarm among the general public) states that: "Any person who causes fear and alarm among the general public by threatening or feigning a danger to life, limb or property is liable to a custodial sentence not exceeding three years or to a monetary penalty." Article 259 of the Swiss Criminal Code (Public incitement to commit a felony or act of violence) states that: "Any person who publicly incites others to commit a felony is liable to a custodial sentence not exceeding three years or to a monetary penalty."
United Kingdom grants the
parliamentary privilege for freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in
Parliament and is still in effect.
United Kingdom citizens have a
negative right to freedom of expression under the
common law. In 1998, the United Kingdom incorporated the
European Convention, and the guarantee of freedom of expression it contains in Article 10, into its domestic law under the
Human Rights Act. However, there is a broad sweep of exceptions including threatening, abusive or insulting words or behavior intending or likely to cause
harassment, alarm or distress or cause a
breach of the peace (which has been used to prohibit
racist speech targeted at individuals), sending any article which is indecent or grossly offensive with an intent to cause distress or anxiety (which has been used to prohibit speech of a racist or anti-religious nature),
incitement,
incitement to racial hatred, incitement to religious hatred, incitement to
terrorism including encouragement of terrorism and dissemination of terrorist publications, glorifying terrorism, collection or
possession of a document or record containing information likely to be of use to a terrorist,
treason including advocating for the
abolition of the monarchy or
compassing or imagining the death of the
monarch,
sedition (no longer illegal, sedition and seditious libel (as
common law offences) were abolished by section 73 of the
Coroners and Justice Act 2009 (with effect on 12 January 2010)), indecency including corruption of
public morals and
outraging public decency, defamation,
prior restraint, restrictions on court reporting including names of victims and evidence and prejudicing or interfering with court proceedings, prohibition of post-trial interviews with
jurors, time, manner, and place restrictions, harassment, privileged communications, trade secrets, classified material, copyright, patents, military conduct, and limitations on commercial speech such as advertising. So-called "
gagging orders" also serve as a form of censorship. In politics, it is an offence to make false statements about the conduct or character of a political candidate, but it is not an offence to make other false statements about them. UK laws on
defamation are among the strictest in the western world, imposing a high
burden of proof on the defendant. However, the
Education (No. 2) Act 1986 guarantees freedom of speech (within institutions of further education and institutions of higher education) as long as it is within the law (see section 43 of the Education (No. 2) Act 1986). UK defamation law may have experienced a considerable liberalising effect as a result of the ruling in
Jameel v Wall Street Journal in October 2006. A ruling of the
House of Lords—the then highest court of appeal—revived the so-called
Reynolds Defence, in which journalism undertaken in the public interest shall enjoy a complete defence against a libel suit. Conditions for the defence include the right of reply for potential claimants, and that the balance of the piece was fair in view of what the writer knew at the time. The ruling removed the awkward—and hitherto binding—conditions of being able to describe the publisher as being under a duty to publish the material and the public as having a definite interest in receiving it. The original House of Lords judgment in Reynolds was unclear and held 3–2; whereas Jameel was unanimous and resounding.
Lord Hoffman's words, in particular, for how the judge at first instance had applied Reynolds so narrowly, were very harsh. Hoffman LJ made seven references to
Eady J, none of them favorable. He twice described his thinking as unrealistic and compared his language to "the jargon of the old Soviet Union". The
Defamation Act 2013 reformed English defamation law on issues of the right to freedom of expression and the protection of reputation, and abolished the Reynolds Defence (
Reynolds v Times Newspapers Ltd), also replacing the common law defences of justification and fair comment. The
Video Recordings Act 2010 requires most video recordings and some
video games offered for sale in the United Kingdom to display a classification supplied by the
BBFC. There are no set regulations as to what cannot be depicted in order to gain a classification as each scene is considered in the context of the wider intentions of the work; however images that could aid, encourage, or are a result of the committing of a crime, along with sustained and graphic images of torture or sexual abuse are the most likely to be refused. The objectionable material may be cut by the distributor in order to receive a classification, but with some works it may be deemed that no amount of cuts would be able to make the work suitable for classification, effectively banning that title from sale in the country. Cinemas by convention use BBFC classifications, but recordings refused a classification by the BBFC may still be shown in
cinemas providing the local authority, from which a cinema must have a licence to operate, will permit them. The
Malicious Communications Act 1988 and
Communications Act 2003 have been used to restrict what individuals may post on
social networks. In 2016, over 3,300 people were arrested under this law. The 2018 trial and conviction of
Mark Meechan, a Scottish
YouTuber, provoked an international response. In similar circumstances a woman from
Liverpool was convicted of sending "an offensive message" after quoting rap lyrics including the word
Nigga on her
Instagram (later overturned on appeal). In February 2019, former London mayor and former Prime Minister,
Boris Johnson, wrote an article in
The Telegraph titled: "Why are the police wasting time arresting Twitter
transphobes when they could be tackling knife crime?" in which he complains of the heavy-handedness of police to Twitter posts in the United Kingdom. In February 2020 a previous visit by British police to a man who was told to
check your thinking and accused of posting transphobic tweets was found to be unlawful by the
High Court. The court determined the police force's actions were a "disproportionate interference" with his right to freedom of expression. In February 2021 a Scottish man from
Lanark was arrested for an
offensive tweet about a deceased World War II veteran that included the message
The only good Brit soldier is a deed one, burn auld fella, buuuuurn. The British police also record "non-crime hate incidents". The Metropolitan Police recorded almost 5,000 such incidents between June 2022 and April 2024. In 2024, a trainee midwife was put on Special leave from her placement and had to undergo a Fitness to Practice investigation after responding to a question about whether midwives could opt out of abortions by sharing the official guidance about conscientious objection and stating that she herself was anti-abortion. The investigation concluded that she had 'no case to answer.' == North America ==