s' management department in the region that had been allocated a timber purchasing quota of 3,000 cubic metres for construction of a new courthouse. On the other hand, the applicants had failed to show that the inclusion of the department in the number of forest operators had given rise to "irregularities". The court held that the disseminated information could not have been the applicants' opinion or value judgment because they had disseminated it without verifying its truthfulness.
14. The court rejected the applicants' defence that they had quoted from an official statement which did not require additional verification under section 57 §§ 3 and 4 of the Mass-Media Act. In the court's view, the Press Development Institute that had circulated the letter was an "autonomous non-commercial organisation" rather than a "public association", as provided in section 57 § 3, and the head of the municipal council who had signed the letter was a municipal employee rather than an official of a State authority, as required by the same section.
15. The court ordered the applicants to publish a refutation and each of them to pay 10,000 Russian roubles to Mr Shulga.
16. On 28 August 2002 the Primorskiy Regional Court upheld, on an appeal by the applicants, the judgment of 14 June 2002.
D. Judgments in the department's defamation action
17. On 11 October 2002 the Arsenyev Town Court granted the defamation action lodged by the courts' management department. The court held that the contested information had originated from a letter approved by the participants in a regional roundtable (panel) held in the Press Development Institute, which was not a State authority, organisation or a public association. Therefore, in the court's opinion, it was incumbent on the applicants to verify the truthfulness of the information before publishing it. Since the applicants had failed to do so and had also failed to prove before the court that the information had been true, they were at fault for the dissemination of information damaging the reputation of the courts' management department.
18. The court ordered the applicants to publish a refutation and each of them to pay 15,000 Russian roubles to the department and also bear the legal costs and expenses.
19. On 15 January 2003 the Primorskiy Regional Court upheld, on an appeal by the applicants, the judgment of 11 October 2002.
II. Relevant domestic law
A. Constitution of the Russian Federation
20. Article 29 guarantees freedom of thought and expression, together with freedom of the mass media.
B. Civil Code of the Russian Federation
21. Article 152 provides that an individual may apply to a court with a request for the rectification of statements (svedeniya) that are damaging to his or her honour, dignity or professional reputation if the person who disseminated such statements does not prove their truthfulness. The aggrieved person may also claim compensation for losses and non-pecuniary damage sustained as a result of the dissemination of such statements. The same rules are applicable in cases where the plaintiff is a legal entity.
C. Resolution of the Plenary Supreme Court
of the Russian Federation, No. 11 of 18 August 1992
(amended on 25 April 1995)
22. The Resolution (in force at the material time) provided that, in order to be considered damaging, statements had to be untrue and contain allegations of a breach of laws or moral principles (commission of a dishonest act, improper behaviour at the workplace or in everyday life, etc.). Dissemination of statements was understood as the publication of statements or their broadcasting (section 2). The burden of proof was on the defendant to show that the disseminat
> 1 2 3 ... 15 16 17 ... 23 24 25
Zaki.ru законы и право
поиск по сайту
каталог документов
добавить сайт Zaki.ru в избранное
Правовые акты международные
Правовые акты Российской Федерации
