1 Jan 2007 | News and features
Back in 2005 Kofi Annan, then Secretary-General of the UN, stated that the holding of the WSIS in Tunisia offered “a good opportunity for the Government of Tunisia to address various human rights concerns, including those related to freedom of opinion and expression.”
More than one year after the WSIS was held in Tunisia, the Tunisian government has clearly failed to do this, according to members of the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) Tunisia Monitoring Group (TMG), which includes Index on Censorship.
The 16 members of the IFEX-TMG are appealing to incoming UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, to remind the Government of Tunisia of its international obligations. “Tunisia, since being an elected member of the newly-created United Nations Council of Human Rights, has an additional obligation to respect its international commitments in the field of freedom of expression,” say the members of the TMG.
Sadly, the state of freedom of expression in Tunisia is as poor, if not poorer, in early 2007 as it was in late 2005 when the WSIS was held in Tunis,” said Carl Morten Iversen, Secretary General of Norwegian PEN, and Chair of the IFEX-TMG.
Members of the TMG remain deeply concerned by the ongoing harassment of writers, journalists, editors and human rights defenders in Tunisia. Consequently, members of the TMG are once more calling the Tunisian government to bring an immediate end to the persecution of writers, journalists, and human rights defenders, including Sihem Bensedrine, Naziha Rjiba, Moncef Marzouki, Lotfi Hajji and Abdallah Zouari.
n addition, they are repeating their plea for the immediate and unconditional release of internet writer and lawyer Mohammed Abbou who is currently serving a three-and-a-half year prison sentence for criticising Tunisian President Ben Ali in an article posted on the Internet.
To respect its international commitments, the Tunisian government should also release all banned books and publications, should stop censoring books, and should put and end to the blocking of websites,” said Ana Maria Cabanellas, President of the International Publishers Association (IPA).
TMG members also highlighted concerns about the Tunisian government’s censorship of deadly clashes between security forces and armed groups in the end of December 2006 and in early January 2007 in the Southern suburbs of Tunis.
The IFEX-TMG therefore calls on the Tunisian authorities to allow writers, journalists, web loggers and publishers to express themselves freely without fear of persecution or imprisonment in accordance with Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Tunisia is a signatory.
(more…)
15 Apr 1984 | Magazine Editions, Volume 13.02 April 1984
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The April 1984 issue of Index on Censorship magazine.
By Olle Wästberg
Index on Censorship has received about fifty letters and postcards about what is called ‘The Felderer Case’.
Swedish courts found Dietlieb Clüwer Felderer guilty of ‘Agitation against an ethnic group’, according to the Swedish Penal Code, Chapter 16, Paragraph 8, which reads as follows:
‘If a person publicly or otherwise in a statement or other communication which is spread among the public threatens or expresses contempt for a group of a certain race, skin colour, national or ethnic origin or religious creed, he shall be sentenced for agitation against an ethnic group to imprisonment for a maximum of two years or, if the offence is petty, to pay a fine.’
The law is very seldom used. Felderer is the first Swedish citizen to get a prison sentence of this length — 10 months.
The charge against Felderer was as follows: ‘Felderer has on each of several copies of written material, dealing with the subject of the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland, fastened a strand of hair and a piece of soap, and in some cases also a condom, and in one case a piece of a nail. He wrote on each copy that the piece of soap consisted of pure Jewish fat with the scent of Hungarian Jew. In several cases he stapled an apparently used condom and wrote that it had been used by a named representative of Jewish victims on a visit to a Nazi brothel. Felderer sent these communications to recipients in Sweden, Holland, Austria, Germany, Canada and the USA.’
A few examples from Felderer’s mailings: He published a caricature of a Jew, naked, with the following caption (his spelling is given): ‘The naked truth. Childrens’ contest. The name of this handsome-looking fellow is Zyklon B. Goldman. In 1944’s beauty contest at AUSWITCH he was unanimously selected as the prettiest chap of AUSWITCH. Mr Zyklon B. Goldman has just come out of the gas chamber, spick-and span, for his 16th time. Each time he is looking better and better. Each time he is getting healthier and healthier. Mr Zyklon B. Goldman really digs the AUSWITCH gas. How did he look before he entered the gas chamber? Dress Mr Zyklon B. Goldman up and send us your picture. FIRST PRIZE: Sweets for a total of 100 kronor or our book Auschwitz Exit, Vol 1.’
Pamphlets with soap and the text ‘Pure Jewish Fat — Scent: Hungarian Gas Chamber 3, Birkenau’ were posted to different organisations and museums for victims of the Nazi era.
Individual Jews who had been victims of Nazi persecution were sent offensive material. For example, Gideon Hausner, the prosecutor, was sent a used condom with the message that it had been used by Simon Wiesenthal on his 239th visit to a Nazi brothel during the Hitler era.
To see if Mr Felderer’s mental state was such that he should get exemption from punishment the court asked that he be given a psychiatric examination. However, Felderer was found sane. Felderer was not charged for his opinion that Jews were not killed during the Nazi era.
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He was not charged for thinking that ‘what was gassed was lice’. He was charged for the way he was expressing contempt for the Jews and spreading his material.
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NOTE
The letters received by Index support Felderer and characterise him as a victim of the establishment, a political prisoner. A group in Sweden called ‘European Human Rights’ disseminates material on his behalf and claims to be working for freedom of speech. It vilifies Amnesty, PEN and others for ‘working covertly to destroy freedom of speech’. Felderer is an adherent of the ‘Institute for Historical Review’, a US-based group which puts out pamphlets and books denying the existence of the Nazi holocaust and asserting that it is all a hoax by Zionists seeking support for Israel. Felderer is a friend of David McCalden who works from California where he runs ‘Truth Missions’ and promotes the letter campaign for Felderer. These anti-semitic groups use the terminology of liberal protest, human rights bulletins or academic life, as appropriate, to suggest respectability and innocence. The booklists of the Institute for Historical Review, for example, include reputable academic and journalistic books.
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