Vladimir Voronin presented today for examination to the Parliament the bill with the title of initiative legislation which asks the modification of the passage (8) of the article 16 from the Civil code of the Republic of Moldova nr. 1107-XV from 6 June 2002. According to a communique of the Presidency the bill proposed with the aim of assuring the exercise of the right of free expression aims at the limitation of the responsibility of mass media in the case in which the fact of offence of honour and professional reputation will be concluded through a definitive judicial decision.

According to the Presidency „ the freedom of expression is a fundamental right, written in the constitution, the state having the obligation to assure the necessary conditions for its realization. On the other hand guiding ourselves by the constitutional stipulations the state has to assure other fundamental rights as well, including the one of a private life. Thus the state despite the positive obligations which flow from the European Convention for the protection of the human rights and fundamental liberties has to insure the judicial regulations materialized in legislative acts, equilibrium between free expression on one side and the right for the protection of honour, and professional reputation on the other side.”

The president of the Republic of Moldova says that in the judicial practice there are cases when the granted sums with the title of compensation are excessively big in comparison to the real value of the effective prejudice caused. Thus it is said in the communique that the appreciation given by the legislator to courts can cause and really cause abuses in the application of the stipulations of the art. 16 of the Civil Code.

Judging from these reasons in order to assure a good protection of the right for free expression the President Vladimir Voronin proposes to exclude the words „and moral” from the first sentence of the passage (8) of the article 16 of the Civil Code as well as the second sentence from the same passage. Thus the simple fact of a publication of a contradiction will represent for the claimer a moral prejudice caused to the latter.

It also is mentioned in the communique of the Presidency from Chisinau that this modification is according to the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights.// DECA-Press


Publication date: 13 June 2008   

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