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Reporters Without Borders deplores yesterday’s decision by the Hague-based International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia to find former journalist Florence Hartmann guilty of contempt for revealing an agreement which the tribunal secretly reached with the Serbian government in connection with the trial of former President Slobodan Milosevic.

The court imposed a fine of 7,000 euros on Hartmann, a French national and onetime spokeswoman of prosecutor Carla del Ponte, after ruling that she “knowingly and wilfully interfered with the administration of justice.”

“The only honourable outcome to these sad proceedings would have been Florence Hartmann’s acquittal,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Unfortunately, this did not happen and we regret it deeply. This conviction undermines the credibility of international criminal justice. How can you trust a court that chooses to conceal documents that would help to render justice and then suppresses information about its own functioning?”

The tribunal brought the case against Hartmann for reporting in her 2007 book Peace and Punishment that some of the tribunal’s members obtained Serbian government documents for use in the case against Milosevic in exchange for an agreement not to disclose other information that could have implicated in Serbia in war crimes.

“Regardless of the size of the fine imposed on Hartmann, it is the mere fact of her conviction that is a disgrace,” Reporters Without Borders said. “It means the public is being denied a legitimate interest in an entire section of the tribunal’s activities. International justice would be strengthened by an open debate about the compromises that are acceptable in order to prepare genocide and war crimes prosecutions.”

The press freedom organisation added: “Aside from Hartmann’s case itself, this decision sets a dangerous precedent for all journalists covering the tribunal’s activities and could lead to self-censorship that would jeopardise our knowledge and understanding of its workings.”

Hartmann’s lawyer, Guénaël Mettraux, told Reporters Without Borders he was very disappointed. “By adopting a very strict definition of contempt, this ruling imposes narrow limits on journalists’ work, limits that are not just formal but also criminal,” he said. “It remains to be seen if it will be treated as representative of the current state of international law on this point. Either way, it sends a very bad signal to less democratic regimes.”

Reporters Without Borders reiterates its support for Hartmann and hopes her innocence will be fully recognised on appeal.

(Photo AFP)

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Reporters Without Borders is outraged by an Amsterdam court’s ruling today that the Associated Press violated the Dutch royal family’s privacy by distributing photos of them in an Argentina ski resort. The court ordered the news agency to pay 1,000 euros for each further publication of the photos up to a ceiling of 50,000 euros.
“We are shocked and disappointed by the court’s decision,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Presidents and monarchs all of the world who like to take great care of their image will now be able to refer to this decision to justify lawsuits against news media that dare to use photos that have not been cleared by their public relations departments.
“It is disgraceful that such an example has been given by a European Union country that is usually praised for its commitment to free expression,” the press freedom organisation continued.
“The existence of a ‘media code’ in the Netherlands governing relations between the press and the royal family is a violation of freedom of information that is unacceptable in the European Union. Some media may freely choose to stick to ‘approved’ coverage of the royal family, but other media have every right to be more critical in their coverage. The system established by this code reduces the media to PR agencies.
“We are furthermore surprised to see this code – which has no legal basis and only concerns the Dutch news media – being applied to photos that were taken outside the Netherlands. Does it mean that the sovereign or president of a foreign country who is photographed without permission while in Europe will be able to sue the news media for breaking the laws or codes of his own country?”
Reporters Without Borders added: “The royal family’s privacy must clearly be protected but, at the same time, the royal family has an interest in having the media to cover its activities. The photos that were taken in the ski resort did not in any way reflect badly on any of the royal family’s members and were very similar to the many official portraits of them with their children.”

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Reporters Without Borders reiterates its support for former French journalist Florence Hartmann and hopes she will be acquitted on charges of contempt of court and divulging confidential information when the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) issues its verdict, which is expected in the next few days.

A former Yugoslavia correspondent of Le Monde who later worked as official spokesperson and Balkan adviser to ICTY chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte, Hartmann is being tried in connection with what she wrote about the court in her 2007 book “Peace and Punishment”.

“The right to free expression about cases handled by international courts depends on the ICTY’s verdict,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Only Hartmann’s acquittal will reaffirm this fundamental freedom, which is protected by the European Convention on Human Rights and which is being threatened by the ICTY’s prosecution.”

“If Hartmann is convicted, it would seriously harm the development of the international courts, which has already been seriously compromised by this case,” the press freedom organisation continued. “How can you trust a court to establish the truth about cases of war crimes and genocide if the same court is bent on covering up information about how it works?

Reporters Without Borders added: “The ICTY has it in for Hartmann above all because her book mentions the accords which some of its members reached with the Serbian authorities not reveal certain documentary evidence that had been made available to it. It is legitimate to ask whether the ICTY had a right to reach agreements to cover up documents that would help render justice.”

When contacted by Reporters Without Borders, Hartmann criticised the ICTY’s “legal fundamentalism” and its readiness to get bogged down in a superfluous trials, especially given its limited resources, instead of concentrating on its primary mission of trying and convicting war criminals. She was “very worried about the credibility and future of international criminal justice,” she said.

Her lawyer, Karim Khan, argued in his final presentation to the court that none of the prosecution’s claims had been corroborated and that “decades of jurisprudence by the European Court of Human Rights on freedom of expression would be consigned to oblivion if a journalist were condemned for raising matters of public interest.”

The prosecutor asked the court on 3 July to fine Hartmann between 7,000 and 15,000 euros. If the court complies, it will set a very disturbing precedent for both freedom of expression and international justice. Hartmann has said she will appeal if convicted.

The existence of an agreement between the ICTY and the Serbian authorities to redact documents from the archives of the Supreme Council for the Defence of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia-Montegro) implicating the Serbian government in war crimes was already known before Hartmann’s book was published.

Several newspapers, including the New York Times, had written about it but none of them was prosecuted by the ICTY.

The ICTY brought its “contempt of court” charges against Hartmann on 27 August 2008. Reporters Without Borders has posted keypassages from her book on its website.

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