Covid-19: freedom of expression subject to “unprecedented” obstacles, according to Amnesty – LCI

Obstacles “unprecedented” freedom of expression. Many governments around the world have taken advantage of the coronavirus pandemic to silence critics, denounces the NGO Amnesty International in a report published on Tuesday, October 19. Combined with a wave of disinformation, these repressive measures have often prevented populations from having direct access to exact information on the virus, which is essential to enable them to deal with it from the emergence of the pandemic in early 2020, a highlighted the human rights organization, founded in 1961.

“Throughout the pandemic, governments have launched an unprecedented attack on free speech”Amnesty official Rajat Khosla said in a statement. “Channels of communication have been targeted, social networks censored and media outlets shut down”, he added, and “journalists and health professionals have been silenced and jailed”. Lack of information has been a “factor” worsening the toll of the pandemic, according to the NGO.

Amnesty International cites in particular the case of China, where more than 5,000 criminal investigations had been opened as of February 2020 against people accused of “to fabricate and willfully disseminate false and harmful information” on the nature and extent of the epidemic. In Tanzania, the government of former President John Magufuli, which has consistently downplayed the impact of the coronavirus and refused to take action to stem the pandemic, has resorted to laws banning and punishing “fake news” in particular to restrict media activity.

In Nicaragua, legislation aimed at combating cybercrime actually makes it possible to “punish those who criticize government policies” and of “repress freedom of expression”. In Russia, a law severely punishing the dissemination of false information relating to Covid is likely to remain in place once the pandemic is over, Amnesty International has warned.

“It is clear that restrictions on freedom of expression are not just extraordinary time-bound measures to deal with a one-off crisis.”, Judge Rajat Khosla, Director of Research, Advocacy and Policy at Amnesty. “They are part of the human rights offensive that we have seen at work around the world in recent years – governments having found a new excuse to step up their attack on civil society.”

Besides governments, the London-based NGO criticized digital platforms, which are not doing enough to fight disinformation. All of this “makes it more and more difficult for people to form a fully informed opinion and make informed choices about their health”, she underlined in her report. An exact information is however “crucial”, according to her, for “to limit misinformation-induced vaccine reluctance.”