Reporters Without Borders condemned a 13,500-euro sentence against blogger Roberto Mancini in fines, damages and costs imposed by a court in Val d’Aosta, in northern Italy on 26 May 2006, after local journalists brought a defamation suit.
Mancini, 59, is suspected of creating a US-hosted blog in 2005 - Il Bolscevicostanco, which reports on local news in sarcastic and crude terms. Using the pseudonym, General Sukhov, he apparently wrote several articles directly attacking local figures.
Traditionally, in order for a written communication to be considered libelous, it must be shown to be untrue. This particular case does not seem to meet such a test:
"The columns by-lined General Sukhov are certainly written in an extreme style, but the complainants were not able to show they were untrue,” the press freedom organisation said.
The most perplexing aspect of this case is that journalists themselves initiated the suit; the last people one would expect to be party to the diminution of freedom of the written word.
The case was brought by two journalists on regional newspaper Gazzetta Matin, Luca Mercanti and Christina Porta, the press officer for the Val d’Aosta regional chamber of trade and of a local firm, Pier Maria Minuzzo, and a webmaster, Marco Camilli.
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