The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled unanimously on Tuesday that Romania violated Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights, on freedom of expression, in the case of Opera journalist Alexandru Patrascu.
The Romanian state was ordered to pay owner of DespreOpera.com 16,800 euros compensation after Romanian courts prosecuted him over Facebook posts and comments of third party users on the posts.
The ECHR decision said the national courts did not provide sufficient justification to convict Alexandru Pătrașcu and they also held him responsible for comments posted by other users, without a clear legal basis.
“You argue with those you love” – said Alexandru Pătrașcu after the decision was pronounced. “I decided to go to court with my country not to defeat it, but to make it better, as much as I could.”
The case started during a scandal at the Bucharest National Opera in 2016, when Danish choreographer Johan Kobborg and several ballet dancers, including the famous Alina Cojocaru quit the opera amid accusations of xenophobia and discriminatory management.
Alexandru Pătrașcu reported the conflict on his blog and on social media and was , critical of the Opera’s management and their supporters’ conduct, including the conductor Tiberiu Soare and soprano Irina Iordăchescu.
The pair sued Mr. Pătrașcu, demanding compensation of 420,000 lei for alleged moral damages caused by his posts. Romanian courts initially ruled in their favor, forcing the blogger to pay damages and be made responsible for third-party comments on his posts.
ECHR arguments
The ECHR found that the Romanian courts did not sufficiently consider the context of the story. The Court considered that Alexandru Pătrașcu’s statements contributed to a subject of public interest, a scandal at the National Opera which made national and international headlines, and that the penalties imposed by Romanians courts did not correspond to a “pressing social need”.
The Court also pointed out that making the blogger liable for the comments made by third parties did not have a legal base which interfered with Alexandru Pătrașcu’s right to freedom of expression.
The scandal at the National Opera
The Opera saga of 2016 was one of the biggest the biggest public scandals in Romanian culture of recent years. Interim director Tiberiu Soare decided to eliminate the position of the ballet’s artistic director, a move to get rid of Johan Kobborg which led to protests. During the conflict, several Opera House employees shouted “Get out of the country!”, to the foreign ballet dancers, a gesture considered xenophobic by Romanian and international journalists.
Alexandru Pătrașcu, an opera enthusiast and contributor to Opera Magazine, has extensively documented the events, criticizing nationalist attitudes and management decisions.
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