French court rejects Azerbaijan's defamation suit against journalists

PanARMENIAN.Net - A French court has rejected a lawsuit by Azerbaijan’s government against two French journalists it accuses of defamation in a case described by the defendants and media freedom activists as an attempt by the South Caucasus nation's authorities to export censorship beyond the country's borders, RFE/RL reports.

Broadcast journalists Elise Lucet and Laurent Richard were accused in the lawsuit of defaming the Azerbaijani government by referring to it as a "dictatorship" two years ago, when then-French President Francois Hollande was visiting the Caspian Sea country.

The case was the first time that a foreign government had brought a defamation suit against journalists before a French court.

"The press law has been put in place to prevent political censorship," the president of the court in the Paris suburb of Nanterre said in the November 7 ruling.

Introducing an investigation program about the background to Hollande’s trip on the France 2 television channel in September 2015, Lucet described Azerbaijan as "one of the world's harshest dictatorships."

In an interview with France Info radio, Richard referred to Azerbaijan as a "dictatorship."

Richard and his cameraman were briefly detained in Baku at the end of their reporting trip in May 2014 and their equipment was seized.

"This decision was a very strong signal to the Azerbaijani government that they could not carry out their censorship outside the country," Richard told RFE/RL after the decision was announced.