The Press Council’s Complaints Commission issued five decisions upholding BCHR’s complaints regarding anti-migrant comments published on the Facebook profiles of the Belgrade daily Blic and the Srbija danas portal The Belgrade Centre for Human Rights had filed four complaints against Blic and one complaint against Srbija danas, because of the posted comments amounting to hate speech and discrimination against migrants, asylum seekers and refugees; these comments were not only offensive but incited direct and indirect violence as well.
In all five cases, the Commission found the two outlets in violation of Section IV of the Press Code of Ethics (Journalists’ Responsibilities) on the journalists’ obligation to oppose everyone violating human rights or promoting any form of discrimination, hate speech and incitement to violence; and Section V of the Code (Due Diligence) under which journalists must be aware of the risk of discrimination being spread by media and do their utmost to avoid discrimination based, inter alia, on race, gender, age, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinions, or national or social origin.
Although the texts that elicited the comments were not disputable in themselves, the Complaints Commission found that the outlets’ staff should have borne in mind that discriminatory posts on social media encouraged the dissemination of prejudice and hate against migrants and that their removal in the impugned cases would not have amounted to a restriction of the freedom of speech; rather, the outlets were under the obligation to oppose anyone violating human rights, advocating discrimination and hate, and inciting violence.
Given that the posts were published on the Facebook profiles of Blic, which is followed by around 950,000 people, and of Srbija danas, which has over 300,000 followers, the decisions of the Press Council’s Complaints Commission are poignant public criticism of media overstepping the bounds of freedom of speech and jeopardising minority groups, in this case the migrants, with their discriminatory texts. Such decisions by the Press Council, an independent self-regulatory body rallying publishers and owners of print and online media and news agencies, as well as media professionals, are also a welcome and appropriate response to the increasingly frequent hate speech in the traditional and social media. The BCHR will continue to monitor and react to all posts disseminating hate speech, inciting discrimination and undermining the fragile culture of human rights and tolerance in Serbia.
