Practice

Axel Springer AG v Germany (Application No 39954/08) 32 BHRC 493 did not support an absolute right of the press to have and to publish the fact of an arrest and its circumstances. At most, it supported a submission that, if the facts justified it, that right existed and the countervailing privacy rights did not. As with a large number of disputes under Convention rights, that was a question of fact and degree, and was highly fact sensitive. Since the alleged invasion of privacy or confidentiality arising out of the potentially wrongful acquisition of information remained in play in the action, because the claim was at least arguable, it was not necessary to go on and consider the separate merits of other aspects on the footing that the arrest-based claim had gone, because it had not.