What is ‘hate speech’ and can it be prosecuted as an international crime? In Ukraine, Russian propaganda has targeted Ukrainians as ‘Nazis’, ‘pigs’ or ‘dogs’ and it’s been used to justify crimes.
In this podcast by our partners at Asymmetrical Haircuts, Ilya Nuzov, Head of Eastern Europe & Central Asia at the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), shares some of his findings after studying 500 hours of Russian TV and radio broadcasts, social media, and other material that were the basis of a submission by FIDH to the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor to consider this propaganda as a crime against humanity for persecution. He is joined by Anna Vyshniakova, a Ukrainian expert on hate speech crimes and head of LingvaLexa, an NGO that works with Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor. They cover the historical context of the Russian campaign to vilify Ukraine, the motives behind it and the main challenges in prosecuting speech crimes in Ukraine.
Potential suspects for these alleged crimes are not only senior Russian politicians but also senior media figures. Nuzov and Vyshniakova explain how Russia’s state-run media outlets are issued temniki or talking points regularly, aimed at keeping the Russian people interested in the war and the Russian military motivated to commit atrocities.
ASYMMETRICAL HAIRCUTS
This podcast has been published as part of a partnership between JusticeInfo.net and Asymmetrical Haircuts, a podcast on international justice produced from The Hague by journalists Janet Anderson and Stephanie van den Berg, who retain full control and independence over the contents of the podcast.
