BRATISLAVA (Slovakia): No one burned embassies and flags when a newspaper cartoonist poked fun at a Supreme Court judge in Slovakia. But a recent court ruling against one of Bratislava's top dailies exposed the risks of satirising through editorial cartoons.
On a day when Muslims around the world were protesting Danish newspaper caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, a Slovak regional court slapped the Pravda newspaper with a $95,000 dollars (3 million koruna) fine for three cartoons and commentaries published in 2002.
In a decision that could not be appealed, Pravda was found guilty of slandering Justice Stefan Harabin.
Two of the three cartoons depicted a gruff and thick-jowled Harabin justifying his opposition to an electronic filing system for assigning cases to the Supreme Court, where he was chief justice at the time.
"Statements" in the cartoon balloons suggested Harabin personally profited from the court's old system of record keeping by hand.
The court agreed with Harabin's argument that the nation's press freedom law does not protect newspapers from publishing "unauthorised and untrue labels and assertions", even in editorial cartoons.
The decision mirrored a 2004 case in which the smaller Bratislava daily Sme was ordered to pay the same amount for commentaries about another Supreme Court justice, Harald Stiffel.
Both papers have objected to the trials' outcomes and won support from a former justice minister as well as the Slovak Syndicate of Journalists (SSN), which noted the fines' chilling effect on free speech.
If Slovak courts continue imposing fines for cartoons and commentaries, SSN chairperson Zuzana Krutka said "newspapers will have no chance to survive".
"This is dangerous," she said.
