The European Court of Human Rights reproves Spain for convicting Pablo Fragoso of concern. He considers that his proper to freedom of expression was violated by punishing him for insulting the Spanish flag. completely different”, expresses
“It was an unfair sentence.” These are the phrases of the Galician commerce unionist Pablo Fragoso Dacosta after studying that Spain must compensate him for having sentenced him for insulting the Spanish flag.
This has been ordered by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). This physique, primarily based in Strasbourg, considers that the suitable to freedom of expression of this consultant of the Galician Inter-Union Confederation (CIG) was violated.
For this motive, in a sentence issued this week, he orders the Spanish State to revoke his sentence and pay him 6,000 euros as compensation. “We believed that we have been proper and Europe has now given it to us”, he feedback to NIUS.
Pablo was sentenced for occasions that occurred on October 30, 2014 throughout a protest in entrance of the Ferrol Military Arsenal amenities. He, as a commerce unionist, supported 54 cleaners who labored there and claimed their proper to obtain their wage after months with out being paid by the contractor firm.
“We had been on strike for a number of days and the day earlier than we had acquired a letter from the admiral during which he informed us that he was not going to obtain us and that the one factor he requested us was to stay silent throughout the elevating of the flag,” recollects Fragoso.
That day, throughout the elevating of the banner, Pablo picked up the megaphone and mentioned two phrases: “Here tedes o silencio da puta bandeira” (“Here you might have the silence of the fucking flag”) and “hai que prenderlle lume á puta bandeira” (“You need to set fireplace to the fucking flag”).
Convicted of against the law of concern
For these occasions, in 2017 Pablo Fragoso was convicted of against the law of concern. They imposed a monetary high quality of 1,260 euros on him and disqualified him for ten years from any public workplace.
That sentence was confirmed in 2018 by the Provincial Court of A Coruña and in 2020 by the Constitutional Court, though with an enormous division of the magistrates.
“In a democracy it is unnecessary to sentence anybody for saying what I mentioned, and even much less within the context during which I mentioned it,” Pablo causes.
For this motive, with the help of the CIG, he determined to go to Europe, claiming that his statements have been directed towards an emblem, not an individual, and that he didn’t incite violence or trigger public dysfunction along with his phrases.
“I used to be sentenced for insulting the symbols of the State. That, at the moment, in a contemporary democracy just like the one we dwell in, doesn’t make a lot sense. It is unnecessary to be condemned for having a distinct opinion or for not believing within the nationwide symbols”, defends Pablo.
Now the Strasbourg sentence obliges Spain to return the 1,260 euros that it needed to pay and to pay 6,000 extra as compensation.
The ECtHR took into consideration that the appellant was a union consultant who made the statements throughout a protest, which demonstrates a common curiosity for working folks that justifies “a sure diploma of exaggeration and even provocation” within the expressions used.
Criticism of article 543 of the Penal Code
For the CIG, the bulk union in Galicia, this sentence questions “the existence of ensures for the train of the suitable to democratic protest within the Spanish State, the place folks and organizations that query the official narrative about Spanish unity proceed to be criminally punished.” and its symbols inherited from the Franco dictatorship”.
Pablo additionally exhibits article 543 of the Penal Code, which the judges utilized to convict him. That article says that “the offenses or insults of phrase, writing or deed to Spain, its autonomous communities or its symbols or emblems, carried out with publicity, will likely be punished with a high quality of seven to 12 months.”
“It is an archaic article and it’s out of date. It can’t be that in a democracy everybody who thinks in a different way from the official model is punished”, he explains, on the identical time that he’s keen to proceed the battle to get that article “repealed or modified”.
Pablo nonetheless has authorized procedures to beat. “This would not finish right here,” he says. He will now need to file an enchantment for evaluation within the Supreme Court to have his sentence definitively annulled.
Topics