Susan Nash reports on corruption, ethnic insults & surveillance
The applicant in Roland Dumas v France (App no 34875/07) was the minister for foreign affairs at the time of an inquiry into corruption involving French politicians. Following his acquittal for misappropriating company assets, he published a book about his trial which contained an account of some inflammatory comments he had made about the public prosecutor.
He explained in the book that these comments were made in anger, at a time when he was under immense pressure. He accepted that the comments were the result of his loss of control. Following the book’s publication, the applicant was tried and convicted of defamation of a member of the legal service. He complained that this amounted to a breach of Art 10 (freedom of expression).
Finding for the applicant, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) was not satisfied that this conviction was necessary in a democratic society. The book had merely provided the applicant with the opportunity to tell the story of his trial
