Communicated on 4 September 2017
THIRD SECTION
Application no. 10257/17
Maksim Sergeyevich REBECHENKO
against Russia
lodged on 30 December 2016
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns defamation proceedings initiated against the applicant for his video uploaded to YouTube. The main issue of this case is a strikingly laconic reasoning of the domestic court’s judgments which failed to cite and analyse the allegedly defamatory fragments of the video. The Court has held that the need for restrictions on freedom of expression must be convincingly established and that the reasons given by the domestic authorities to justify them must appear “relevant and sufficient” (see Terentyev v. Russia, no. 25147/09, §§ 19-25, 26 January 2017, Perinçek v. Switzerland [GC], no. 27510/08, § 196, 15 October 2015, Schweizerische Radio- und Fernsehgesellschaft SRG v. Switzerland, no. 34124/06, § 65, 21 June 2012, see also Dichand and Others v. Austria, no. 29271/95, § 38, 26 February 2002, with further references).
QUESTIONS tO THE PARTIES
Was there a violation of Article 10 of the Convention as regards the finding of the applicant’s liability in defamation in connection with his YouTube video? In particular, did the national courts carry out a proper analysis of allegedly defamatory fragments of the video, arguments, and evidence put forward by the parties, and did they apply standards which were in conformity with the principles embodied in Article 10 (see Perinçek v. Switzerland [GC], no. 27510/08, § 196, 15 October 2015, and, in the Russian context, OOO Ivpress and Others v. Russia, nos. 33501/04, 38608/04, 35258/05 and 35618/05, §§ 71-79, 22 January 2013)?
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