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Greek Law Criminalizing Denial of Armenian, Greek and Assyrian Genocides May Be Overturned
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The anti-racism bill passed by the Greek parliament on Tuesday criminalizing also the denial of the Holocaust and the Greek, Armenian and Assyrian genocides, committed by the Ottoman Turkey, may also be overturned by the European Court of Human Rights because of falling under freedom of expression, warned today Kiro Manoyan, a senior official of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation/ Dashnaktsutyun, reminding the case of Dogu Perincek. The new anti-racism law introduces penalties for those who incite violence or hatred on the grounds of race, religion and ethnic origin. In addition, the new law makes it illegal to deny the genocides of Jews, Armenians, Assyrians and Ottoman Greeks. Parties or associations supporting racism may be deprived of state funding for a period of one to six months and receive fines up to 100,000 euros. Individuals promoting racism may receive fines of up to 30,000 euros. Hate crimes will be punished by up to three years' imprisonment. On December 17, 2013 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that a 2007 March ruling by the Lausanne Police Court in Switzerland finding that Dogu Perincek, the chairman of Turkish Workers' Party, was guilty of racial discrimination for denying the 1915 mass killings of Armenians as "genocide," falls under freedom of expression. The ruling followed an appeal from the Turkish politician to his conviction in Switzerland after a complaint filed by the Switzerland-Armenia Association on July 15, 2005. The ECHR ruling stated that "the free exercise of the right to openly discuss questions of a sensitive and controversial nature is one of the fundamental aspects of freedom of expression and distinguishes a tolerant and pluralistic democratic society from a totalitarian or dictatorial regime." The original case emerged from Perincek's participation in a number of conferences in Switzerland in 2005, during which he publicly denied that the Ottoman Empire had perpetrated the crime of genocide against the Armenian people in 1915. Perincek appealed against the ruling at the Swiss Court of Appeals as well as at the Federal Court, however both endorsed the lower court's ruling saying that the Armenian genocide was historical fact.



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