Finally, a Dutch victory for freedom of speech

It's about time we had one after the dismal excuse for integrity Dutch film makers displayed at the Rotterdam Film Festival, where a screening of Van Gogh's Submission was canceled due to security concerns.

The Dutch Gerechtshof (court of appeals) of Amsterdam has ruled in favour of columnist Luuk Koelman, who wrote a scathing article about Gretta Duisenberg, the wife of Wim Duisenberg, former head of the European Central Bank. Mrs. Duisenberg is well known for sympathizing with Yasser Arafat. Mr. Koelman's article describes Mrs. Duisenberg taking the concept 'human shield' one step further: by crawling on top of Mr. Arafat.

A lower court initially ruled the article to be unlawful. Fortunately, there are still some sane people higher in the ranks of our judiciary, for the Gerechtshof makes it very clear that anyone with half a brain should be able to recognize that the article is meant to be ironic. Read Koelman's press release here.

10:34

permalink comment(s) (0) trackback(s) (0)

« 

 »