Below is a video of an intervention given by Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff at this fall’s Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Human Dimension Conference in Warsaw.
Many thanks to Vlad Tepes and RAIR Foundation for uploading this video:
See also the extended RAIR Foundation report.
Below is the prepared text for Elisabeth’s intervention. Note: “pS” is short for “participating states”.
Intervention by Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa
Warsaw Human Dimension Conference
Plenary Session 3: Fundamental Freedoms I, including:
- Freedom of opinion, expression, media freedom
- Human Rights Defenders
- Safety of journalists
Warsaw, October 2, 2024
Journalists and independent media outlets, especially those critical of the government line, are increasingly facing a multitude of challenges in doing their duty have been subjected to harassment by courts and governments in the OSCE region west of Vienna. These independent journalists are the targets of physical attacks, such as
- Michael Stürzenberger, who was dubbed by the media as “anti-Islamist” and even blamed for the stabbing attack because he “brought it upon himself”;[1]
- they are vilified by the legacy media outlets; they are banned by the government, not an independent judiciary like the German magazine Compact;[2], [3], [4] or Mark Steyn, who was accused by the British media regulator Ofcom of “misleading viewers” with respect to COVID-19 vaccines and who subsequently lost his job.[5], [6]
- they are demonetized by bank institutions canceling their bank accounts;
- they are the target of government lawfare in the case of citizen-journalist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, known as Tommy Robinson, who is denied public interest protections for reporting on the Jamal Hijazi case and is now facing four years of imprisonment for contempt of court;[7]
- they are even arbitrarily banned from doing their duty and reporting from inside the Austrian parliament on Austria’s election results, where bogus “security concerns”, claims of “right-wing extremism” as well as “Nazi” (whatever that means in this context) are cited, the only claim the establishment can still bring forward to silence critical voices.[8], [9]
The silencing of critical voices doesn’t happen over there; it’s happening right here in front of our eyes.
Ladies and gentlemen, are you even interested in the truth? What does the UK government gain by imprisoning people like TR as a sacrificial lamb? The UK is emptying prisons to accommodate people who vented their anger and perhaps did not use the right words. The UK is releasing convicted rapists for 77-year-olds who uttered hurtful words, all in the name of looking for a counter-narrative to escape addressing the root cause of a problem.
What is freedom of speech worth nowadays? According to recent polls, not much. It is apparently no longer cared about or seen as a value worth defending. For instance, a majority (53%) of Americans no longer support First Amendment protections for free speech and believe the government should restrict “false” information online. Fewer (40%) Germans feel free to express their political opinions than in any other year since the early days of the Federal Republic.
Lawfare and political justice are also on the rise in pS such as Germany. Take, for instance, the case of American-born playwright CJ Hopkins[10] who was taken to court for posting an image of a white medical mask with a white swastika shining through, while explaining his reasoning behind the image. His acquittal was overturned on Sept. 30. He is now a “hate speech criminal.” In German Basic Law, the fundamental rights of freedom of expression and freedom of art is enshrined a constitutive of a democracy.
I would remiss to mention that there is at least some hope given that the Irish people have rejected the most draconian parts of the Incitement to Violence or Hatred and Hate Offences Bill 2022, stuck in the Irish Senate, will proceed without the draconian speech restrictions that had previously been advanced.[11]
Nevertheless, we currently are living during one of the most dangerous times for free speech in our history, with a few examples:
- In the UK, free speech in under siege.[12]
- Germany is planning wide-ranging plans to restrict free speech.[13]
- The European Union is planning to make “hate speech” a serious crime.[14]
- US Vice President Kamala Harris calls for government oversight or regulation for social media platforms.[15]
- Former US Secretary of State calls the First Amendment “a major block” to combating misinformation.[16]
- Canada is introducing a bill which would impose draconian criminal penalties on free speech to stop future crimes that haven’t been committed yet.[17]
More and more, it feels like we defeated communism only to recreate an equivalent system, which threatens to be much worse, insofar as its informal nature and soft asymmetrical methods are in place to confuse everybody and thwart opposition.
Therefore, Pax Europa calls on OSCE pS and OSCE institutions to re-evaluate their commitment to true freedom of expression as enumerated in OSCE commitments.
BPE also recommends:
- That pS and national authorities ensure safe and free working conditions for independent media and journalists both east and west of Vienna and refrain from prosecution for documentable truth.
- That the OSCE Representative for Freedom of the Media declare that the documentable truth can never constitute “hate speech.”
- That pS remove all restriction and barriers to the free flow of information to restore freedom of speech.
Notes:
For links to previous articles about the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, see the OSCE Archives.