INTERNATIONAL

 

Freedom of expression in Spain is under attack. The government is targeting a whole
range of online speech – from politically controversial song lyrics to simple jokes
– under the catch-all categories of “glorifying terrorism” and “humiliating the victims
of terrorism” set out in the country’s vaguely worded counter-terrorism laws.

Social media users, journalists, lawyers
and musicians have been prosecuted
under Article 578 of the Spanish
Criminal Code, which prohibits “glorifying
terrorism” and “humiliating the victims
of terrorism”. Although this provision
was first introduced in 2000, it is only in
recent years, following its amendment
in 2015, that prosecutions and convictions
under Article 578 have sharply risen.
The result is increasing self-censorship
and a broader chilling effect on freedom
of expression in Spain.
The rise in prosecutions under Article
578 has taken place in the context of the
rapidly shrinking space for expressing
dissent in Spain. Austerity policies,
implemented following the 2008 financial
crisis, were met with mass opposition in
the form of new social movements and
waves of protests. The Spanish authorities
subsequently curtailed the rights to
freedom of expression and peaceful
assembly.

Protestors march
through central Madrid,
in opposition to Spain’s
new public security law,
7 May 2016.
© Marcos del Mazo/
Getty Images

“I don’t think the aim is to target people
individually. The objective is to create a
climate of self-censorship in the population.”
J.C.V., prosecuted for his tweets under counter-terrorism laws

In 2015, parliament amended the Law
on the Protection of Public Security –
commonly known as the “gag law”
(ley mordaza) – and introduced new
limitations on protests and administrative

PERSONS CONVICTED UNDER ARTICLE 578

fines targeting those participating in
public assemblies. The authorities then
imposed tens of thousands of fines on
protesters, human rights defenders and
journalists for conduct that is protected
by the rights to freedom of expression
and peaceful assembly.
Following terrorist attacks in Paris in
January 2015, including on the magazine
Charlie Hebdo and a kosher supermarket,
the Spanish government introduced
amendments to the Criminal Code,
broadening the scope of Article 578 to
criminalize “glorification of terrorism”
through “the distribution or public
dissemination of messages or slogans”;
making the commission of such an
offence online an aggravating factor;
and increasing the maximum penalty
from two to three years’ imprisonment.

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 WHAT’S WRONG WITH THE LAW
AGAINST “GLORIFYING TERRORISM”?
“The peaceful pursuance of a political, or
any other, agenda – even where that agenda
is different from the objectives of the
government and considered to be ‘extreme’ –
must be protected.”
Ben Emmerson, former UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human
rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism

As the cases included in this briefing
demonstrate, the authorities have used
Article 578 to target political speech,
particularly on social media, and the
creative community in Spain. This is an
especially troubling aspect of the restrictions
on freedom of expression under this law.
Political expression is essential to informed
and dynamic debate on issues of public
interest, and artists and musicians play a
crucial role in challenging the status quo
and inspiring critical thinking. The right
to freedom of expression more broadly
includes speech that offends, shocks and
disturbs. By using Article 578 in this way,
the authorities have signalled to wider
society that some forms of dissent,
questioning and alternative perspectives
will not be tolerated; indeed that they can
be interpreted as criminal actions.

Spain is a state party to a number of
binding treaties that guarantee the right
to freedom of expression – that is, the
right of every person to seek, receive
and share information and ideas. These

treaties include the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR,
Articles 19 and 20) and the European
Convention on Human Rights (Article 10).
Spain has an obligation to respect, protect
and promote these rights.
International law permits states to impose
certain limitations on the exercise of
freedom of expression. It also explicitly
requires states to prohibit advocacy of
national, racial or religious hatred that
constitutes incitement to discrimination,
hostility or violence (commonly known as
“hate speech”). But international law sets
out strict conditions that all limitations must
fulfil in order for restrictions on expression
to be lawful. Such restrictions must be set
out in law and in a clear and accessible
way. They can be imposed only for certain

A woman holds a placard
reading “censorship”
as she takes part in a
demonstration called by
the “Dignity Marches”
platform against the
new public security law,
dubbed “ley mordaza”
(gag law), in Madrid on
25 January 2015.
© DANI POZO/AFP/
Getty Images

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

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 specified legitimate purposes (such as
preserving national security, public order
or, as in the case of advocacy of hatred, to
protect the rights of others). They must be
demonstrably necessary (that is, the least
intrusive measure that will achieve the
specified purpose) and proportionate. And
they must not jeopardize the fundamental
right to expression itself.

THE LACK OF LEGITIMATE PURPOSE

Many recent prosecutions for “glorifying
terrorism” in Spain fail to meet the
requirement under international human
rights law that restrictions on freedom of
expression must be strictly necessary and
proportionate for a legitimate purpose, in
this case national security.
Most of these prosecutions relate to
statements perceived to “glorify” the
actions of domestic armed groups, such
as ETA (Basque Homeland and Liberty)
and GRAPO (First of October Anti-Fascist
Resistance Groups). While the threat of
violence from domestic armed groups in
Spain has historically been high, with over
800 lives lost in attacks by ETA, domestic
groups currently do not appear to present
an imminent threat to national security.
On 20 October 2011, ETA declared a
permanent ceasefire, which was followed
by its disarmament in 2017; GRAPO has
been inactive since 2007.
National security is not the only legitimate
purpose for which states can restrict
freedom of expression. States are also
permitted to use criminal law to repress
advocacy of national, racial or religious
hatred that amounts to incitement.
However, criminalising speech deemed to
“humiliate the victims of terrorism” does
not meet these requirements.

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TOO BROAD AND TOO VAGUE

To counter threats to national security,
states may criminalize incitement to
commit a terrorism-related offence, but
only where a statement is made with the
intention to deliberately encourage others
to commit a recognizable criminal act, with
a reasonable likelihood that they would
carry it out, and where there is a clear
causal link between the statement and
the criminal act. Incitement to commit
a terrorism-related offence is prohibited
in Spain under a different article of the
Criminal Code, Article 579.
In contrast to laws on direct incitement,
laws like Article 578 that prohibit
“glorifying” or “apology of” terrorism are
broadly defined and vague. They give
states the power to criminalize a wide

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range of expression that does not meet
the high threshold of incitement. In a
widely criticised move that broadened the
scope of the law – and the possibilities
for its misuse – even further, Spain’s
Supreme Court ruled in January 2017 that
it is possible to commit an offence under
Article 578 even if there was no intention
to glorify terrorism or to humiliate victims.

 ARTICLE 578
• Punishes any person who commits a public act that either glorifies or justifies a
terrorism-related offence, or those who committed such an offence, or any act that
discredits, disparages or humiliates victims of terrorism or their relatives.
• Penalties may include between one and three years’ imprisonment, a fine and
several years’ mandatory disqualification from the public sector (which includes
prohibitions on practising certain professions, holding public office, obtaining public
scholarships and more).
• Where the internet or other electronic media is used, this is punishable by a
penalty at the higher end of the range of possible sanctions.

THE IMPACT OF ARTICLE 578
Demonstrators calling
for the acquittal of Pablo
Hasél and Kaiet Prieto,
both charged with
“glorifying” terrorism,
in Madrid, 1 February
2018.
© absolucionhasel
via Twitter

The Spanish Ministry
of the Interior tweets
a warning that even
retweeting a message
that glorifies terrorism
can amount to a criminal
offence.

The Civil Guard conduct
online monitoring as part
of their counter-terrorism
operations.
© Private

The impact of prosecutions under Article
578 has been considerable. As with
all terrorism-related offences in Spain,
those convicted under this provision
must be subjected to a lengthy period of
disqualification from the public sector,
which means, among other restrictions,
that they are excluded from pursuing
a wide range of professions and from
running for public office. Excluding
individuals from political positions because
they have expressed alternative political
views perceived to “glorify terrorism”
is particularly troubling. The stigma
associated with charges of “glorifying
terrorism” can also have long lasting and
devastating effects on people whose aim
was to freely and lawfully express ideas
and opinions.

In addition to individual sanctions, those
investigated under the law report that they
now exercise extra caution before posting
on social media. The wider chilling effect of
these cases has reduced the online space
for people to express critical opinions.
The following cases demonstrate how a
wide range of expression – from political
satire to radical song lyrics – has been
criminalized under Article 578. None of the
cases detailed here involved statements
that could legitimately be considered
incitement to commit a terrorism-related
offence, or advocacy of hatred amounting
to incitement under international human
rights law.

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 TARGETING DISSENT:
“SPIDER OPERATIONS”
“I am pro-independence and a communist and I
have no problem in saying that. I don’t think it is
by chance that many of the people prosecuted
in the aftermath of the Spider Operations have
the same political profiles; they are proindependence, anarchist or communist.”
Arkaitz Terrón, lawyer

Since 2014, law enforcement officials have
conducted four coordinated operations
across several regions in Spain leading to
the arrests of people on suspicion of
“glorifying terrorism” or “humiliating
victims of terrorism” on social media
platforms, in particular Twitter and
Facebook. The authorities called these
actions the “Spider Operations”. During
the first such operation in April 2014, law
enforcement officers from the Civil Guard
arrested 21 people. Three other police
operations followed, the latest of which
was carried out in April 2016. Specialized
investigative units of the Civil Guard and
the National Police collected the information
on which the arrests were based, while the
National Court (Audiencia Nacional), the
judicial body responsible for dealing with
terrorism-related offences in Spain,
coordinated and supervised the operations.

shift at work and found five plain-clothes
officers waiting outside his house. He was
detained for six hours and then charged
with “glorifying terrorism” and “humiliating
victims of terrorism”. Arkaitz and J.C.V.
were two of the 14 people arrested on
13 April 2016 during the fourth Spider
Operation.

On the morning of 13 April 2016, eight
Civil Guard officers arrested Arkaitz Terrón,
a 31-year-old Basque lawyer living in
Barcelona, as he was about to leave home
for work. He was detained for a day and
charged with “glorifying terrorism” and
“humiliating victims of terrorism” on social
networks. On the same day, another man,
J.C.V. returned home in Aiguafreda (a
town 55km from Barcelona) after his night

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Cartoon used by the
online platform for those
prosecuted as part of
the Spider Operations
(@encausadosarana)
©Tasio

The Civil Guard conduct
online monitoring as
part of their counterterrorism operations.
© Private

 FOUR SPIDER OPERATIONS

I

21

detained

II

19

detained

III

19

detained

IV

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detained

The authorities prosecuted Arkaitz for
nine tweets posted between 2010 (when
he started using Twitter) and 2016. For
example, on 7 November 2014, the media
reported that the Madrid municipality
had decided to put up a commemorative
plaque to Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco,
a prime minister under the Franco
dictatorship who was killed by ETA in
1973. Arkaitz responded by tweeting:
“I don’t understand why the producers
of Cava don’t put up a plaque for Carrero.
The day ETA blew him up, lots of bottles
were opened.”
On 21 March, the National Court acquitted
Arkaitz, arguing that his messages had not
incited anyone, either directly or indirectly,
to commit a terrorism-related offence.
The prosecution appealed to the Supreme
Court, which confirmed the acquittal of
Arkaitz on 31 January 2018.
Arkaitz believes that the real aim of
the authorities goes beyond individual
convictions. He told Amnesty International
in October 2017: “In my case, they did not
achieve anything, but their target is not the
60 people prosecuted in the aftermath of
the Spider Operations. These operations
and the subsequent prosecutions attract
a lot of media attention. The authorities’

aim is to make people think twice before
expressing their opinions online, especially
those who are the most critical”.
The authorities prosecuted J.C.V. for 13
messages posted on Twitter between
2012 and 2013. The prosecutor argued
that his tweets had “glorified” several
armed groups – namely ETA, GRAPO and
Terra Lliure (Free Land) – none of which
had been active for some time and all of
which remain inactive. For example, on
30 May 2013, J.C.V. wrote: “They killed
Xabier López Peña Thierry [a former ETA
political leader] in a French prison. We will
always remember him. Soldier, the people
are with you. We will win for you.” López
Peña died on 30 March 2013 from a brain
haemorrhage in a hospital in Paris.

In January 2018 J.C.V. was convicted and
sentenced to one year in prison, and seven
years’ disqualification from the public
sector. J.C.V. had explained to Amnesty
International in October 2017: “I don’t think
the aim is to target people individually.
The objective is to create a climate of
self-censorship in the population. They
have succeeded with me. I started to be
more careful when using Twitter already
after the conviction of [the musician]
César Strawberry. Since my detention,
I am extra-cautious”.
The cases of Arkaitz and J.C.V. demonstrate
how narrow the boundaries of “acceptable”
online speech have become in Spain.

“I was treated like a terrorist, with
eight people [police officers]
waiting for me outside my house.”
Arkaitz Terrón, lawyer

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

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 ATTACKS ON
ARTISTIC FREEDOM
The shrinking space for dissenting opinions
has also stifled artistic freedom. During the
last few years, the Spanish authorities have
investigated and prosecuted several artists
for “glorifying terrorism” and “humiliating”
its victims. For example, on 5 February
2016, in one of the most infamous cases,
Alfonso Lázaro de la Fuente and Raúl García
Pérez, two professional puppeteers, were
arrested after a performance during the
Madrid Carnival because one of the puppets
had held a sign with a slogan similar to one
used by ETA. The National Court eventually
dropped the charge of “glorifying terrorism”
against them on 9 September 2016. The
charge of “incitement to hatred”, which had
been referred to an ordinary court in Madrid,
was also dropped on 5 January 2017.
In another disturbing but far less reported
case, on 4 December 2017, the National
Court convicted twelve rappers, part of a
collective called La Insurgencia, under
Article 578 and sentenced each of them
to two years and a day in prison, as well as
nine years’ disqualification from the public
sector and a 4,800 Euro fine. The rappers’
appeal against the verdict was pending at
the time of writing.
Nyto Rukeli, 23-years old, who joined
the collective in 2015, told Amnesty
International in October 2017 that the
purpose of the collective was “to provide a
platform for musicians to speak out about
political issues”. Each member of the group
worked independently but shared a YouTube
channel and a webpage.

Twelve members of the
musical collective “La
Insurgencia” appear
before National Court
judges.
© EFE

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 232$: 

 

Rapper Nyto at home
in Gijón in the Asturias
region of northern Spain,
10 February 2018.
© Amnesty International

Nyto said that his vision was to use his
music to address social and political
issues: “There are two main issues I touch
upon in my music: the capitalist system,
which I consider the main source of
today’s problems, and political prisoners,
in particular the members of the PCE-r
(Communist Party-Reconstituted) who are
still in jail”.
In October 2016, law enforcement officials
launched a coordinated operation in
several locations to arrest all 12 rappers of
La Insurgencia. Two police officers arrested
Nyto in Santiago de Compostela, where
he was living at the time. The prosecutor
charged them with “glorifying terrorism” on
the basis of their song lyrics, including the
following line in Nyto’s song “Subversive
Rhymes”: “We must fight decisively, only
the ideological line of the Communist
Party-Reconstituted will save us.”

“I haven’t, but other rappers have been
prosecuted more than once because they
haven’t stopped [rapping]… I think the
authorities prosecute us because they fear
people getting organised”.
Nyto Rukeli, rapper

The National Court ruled that the 12
rappers glorified the armed group GRAPO,
which the authorities argued is tied to
the PCE-r, and several of its members,
and, in addition, had the potential to
encourage people to commit terrorismrelated offences. In addition to the prison
sentence, Nyto fears that being sentenced
to nine years’ disqualification from the
public sector will significantly limit his
ability to find employment in his chosen
profession, care of the elderly.
Nyto told Amnesty International that even
before their convictions, the prosecution of
the collective had already had a negative
impact on its members. “Many got scared.

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The rapper César
Strawberry.
© Private

 The authorities succeeded as about half
the members have stopped singing or have
changed the messages in their songs.”
The authorities have prosecuted several
other rappers under Article 578. On
19 January 2017, the Supreme Court
sentenced the singer César Strawberry
to one year in prison, and six years and
six months’ disqualification from the
public sector for “glorifying terrorism” and
“humiliating” its victims. The conviction
related to a series of tweets he had posted
in 2013 and 2014. In December 2013,
César Strawberry tweeted “how many
more should follow the flight of Carrero
Blanco?” referring to Admiral Luis Carrero
Blanco, a prime minister during the Franco
dictatorship who was killed by ETA in a car
bomb attack in 1973.
César Strawberry previously had been
acquitted by the National Court in July
2016. However, in a landmark ruling
heavily criticized by human rights
organizations, the Supreme Court stated
that whether César Strawberry had

intended to glorify ETA and GRAPO or
humiliate the victims of terrorism in his
Twitter posts was irrelevant in establishing
his criminal liability. The Court stated that
Article 578 does not require courts to
take intention into account. At the time of
writing, his appeal was pending before the
Constitutional Court.
Rapper Pablo Hasél, who was sentenced
in 2014 to two years’ imprisonment for
“glorifying terrorism” in his songs on
YouTube, was convicted again for his lyrics
and Twitter posts on 2 March. In one of the
tweets, posted on 1 April 2016, he said:
“2 years since Isabel Arpacio [a member
of PCE-r] was exterminated for being a
communist, after the state denied her
medical care in prison”. He received a two
year prison sentence and a 24,300 Euro
fine for “insults and slander against the
Crown and other state organs”, as well as
“glorifying” terrorism.

The rapper Pablo Hasél.
© Private

be considered provocative, disturbing, or
even offensive. But shocking people by
saying or tweeting or singing offensive things
is not a crime. To apply the criminal law
to such expression is not only stigmatizing
but the severe consequences that can
follow – such as a criminal record,
imprisonment and disqualification –
are disturbingly disproportionate.

These cases reflect a growing and
dangerous intolerance for expression,
including artistic expression, that may

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

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 RESTRICTIONS ON
MEDIA FREEDOM
The journalist Boro.
© Private

right to freedom of expression. He told
Amnesty International: “I didn’t commit
any crime. In any case, in my videos I
never talked about ETA, for example. I
expressed opposition to the detention of
prisoners charged with terrorism offences”.

Article 578 has also been applied to
media workers reporting or commenting
on contentious issues. Expressing
unconventional ideas or opinions is part
and parcel of the right to journalistic
freedom. The imposition of excessive and
unnecessary restrictions on media workers
has resulted in an ever-shrinking space for
independent and critical journalism.
Alex García, a 23-year-old filmmaker,
launched a YouTube channel in 2013
called “Resistencia Film”. The authorities
are prosecuting him under Article 578 for
his feature film “Repression: A doubleedged sword” in which he interviewed
several people who themselves had been
prosecuted on charges of “glorifying
terrorism”, including Pepita Seoane, the

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mother of three GRAPO members; and the
rapper Pablo Hasél.
On 21 July 2017, police served Alex
with a subpoena; they offered no further
explanation. On 26 July, Alex and his
lawyer were given access to a 1,000-page
police investigation report that listed all the
videos on Alex’s YouTube channel, along
with photographs and audio transcripts
of the videos and biographies of some
of those interviewed. On 28 July, Alex
appeared before the National Court. He
told Amnesty International in September
2017 that most of the questions put to him
at Court related to his political opinions.
Alex believes that the opinions expressed
in his films should be protected by the

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On 13 November 2017, Alex was charged
with “glorifying terrorism”. The prosecutor
has requested a sentence of two years
and a day in prison, plus disqualification
from the public sector for nine years and a
4,800 Euro fine. At the time of writing, Alex
was waiting notice of his trial date.
The Prosecutor’s Office of the National
Court is also prosecuting Boro, a journalist,
on charges of “glorifying” ETA in several
messages he posted on his Facebook
account between April 2012 and February
2014. Since 2008, Boro has been
associated with the independent online
platform La Haine, reporting on protests,
police violence and imprisoned political
activists.
Some of the messages criticized the
detention of former ETA members. In one
of his posts, Boro wrote: “The struggle
is the only way forward”. At a hearing
before the National Court in May 2016,

 the Prosecutor asked Boro if he knew
that this sentence had been used by ETA.
According to Boro, this misses the point
as “many people use that sentence in the
Basque Country, it is not only a sentence
that has been used by ETA”.
On 19 January 2018, Boro was convicted
and sentenced to one year and six months’
imprisonment, and has said publicly that
he will appeal the decision.
It is a disturbing reflection of the state of
freedom of expression in Spain that simply
repeating a phrase used by an armed
group, as in Boro’s case, or interviewing
people who the state claims have
“glorified” an armed group, as in Alex’s
case, gives rise to criminal prosecution.

“I think they are doing this to intimidate people in
the wider context of the crisis, to divert attention
and to scare… In some cases they do succeed.
Some people think twice now before tweeting
out something because they know police are
monitoring the internet and that you may end up
in jail”.
Alex García, film-maker

23-year-old film-maker
Alex García.
© Private

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 “HUMILIATING VICTIMS
OF TERRORISM”
“I was really surprised when they
arrested me and told me it was for
humiliating victims. …Those jokes
are very well known in Spain and I did
not write those messages with any
other purpose than posting jokes.”
Cassandra Vera, student

22-year-old student
Cassandra Vera.
© Amnesty International

People beyond the ranks of activists,
journalists and musicians have also
been caught in the wide net that the
prohibition of “glorification of terrorism”
and “humiliation” of its victims casts, some
simply for posting jokes on social media.
Cassandra Vera, a 22-year-old student
from Murcia, was the victim of one such
prosecution. The Civil Guard arrested
Cassandra on 13 April 2016 for jokes and
memes she had posted on Twitter between
November 2013 and January 2016
regarding Franco-era Prime Minister Carrero
Blanco. For example, on 22 September
2015, Cassandra tweeted a photo showing
Spiderman watching a car in mid-air with
the text “Spiderman VS Carrero Blanco”.
Many people came to Cassandra’s
defense, including Lucía Carrero Blanco,
Luis Carrero Blanco’s niece. In a letter sent
to the prominent newspaper El Pais, and
included in Cassandra’s legal defence,
she expressed concern regarding the
prosecution of Cassandra Vera. She wrote:
“I am fearful of a society where freedom of

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expression, however regrettable it may be,
could lead to imprisonment”. The National
Court, however, stated that the actual impact
of the jokes published by Cassandra on the
victim’s relatives was not relevant to the
case because the jokes had the objective
potential to humiliate victims of terrorism.
On 29 March 2017, the Court sentenced
her to one year in prison and seven years’
disqualification from the public sector.
On 1 March 2018, the Supreme Court
acquitted Cassandra after a successful
appeal by the law firm representing her,
BGD Abogados. Although Cassandra’s
conviction has been overturned, her
prosecution had a seriously detrimental
impact on her life. The sentence of
disqualification from the public sector
meant that she lost a public scholarship
that covered her university fees. While
Cassandra, like many transgender
women, was no stranger to online abuse,
she began to receive a far greater number
of transphobic threats and insults over
social media when her conviction was
made public.

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The same legal provision prohibits
“glorifying terrorism” and “humiliating the
victims of terrorism”, but the authorities
distinguish between these two acts. In 2016,
the Supreme Court stated that the crime of
“humiliating victims of terrorism” is more
“personal” than that of glorifying terrorism
because it has a direct impact on the honour
of the victims of terrorism. The court has
also stated that jokes that mock the victims
of terrorism-related crimes may not only
incite hatred and justify terrorism but, most
importantly, also force victims to relive their
traumatic experiences. As in Cassandra’s
case, the courts consider whether a
message is objectively humiliating to the
victims of terrorism, rather than whether
any actual victim was affected.
While states may prohibit advocacy of
national, racial or religious hatred that
constitutes incitement to discrimination,
hostility or violence, forms of expression
that, intentionally or in their effect,
“humiliate victims of terrorism” – even
though they may be offensive and cause
distress to such individuals – do not reach
this threshold for prohibition. Such forms
of expression may give rise to a civil suit
but must not be criminalised.

 WHY IS ARTICLE 578
USED SO RARELY IN
RELATION TO FOREIGN
ARMED GROUPS?
Most of the cases under Article 578
relate to either disbanded or currently
inactive domestic armed groups, namely
ETA and GRAPO. From 2011 to 2017,
92% of those charged under Article 578
were accused of “glorifying” domestic,
rather than foreign, armed groups and
“humiliating” their victims. In the same
period, only 14, out of a total 117,
judgements were issued in relation
to the “glorification” of foreign armed
groups, such as the group that calls
itself “Islamic State” (IS).
The authorities explained to Amnesty
International in December 2017 that
Article 578 is used less frequently for
foreign armed groups because more
serious charges are brought against the
accused in such cases, such as charges
of membership of or collaboration with
a proscribed organisation, or selfindoctrination. Changes to the Criminal
Code in 2015, prompted in part by
attacks in Paris, introduced new
terrorism-related offences for
prosecuting such cases, leaving Article
578 to be used in a small minority of
cases of alleged international terrorism.

CONCLUSION
Across Europe, states are restricting
various forms of expression, including
online speech, in the name of national
security. Laws criminalizing “glorification”
or “apology” of terrorism exist in France
and the United Kingdom as well as Spain,
and have been proposed in states such as
Belgium and the Netherlands. The
European Union Directive on combating
terrorism (2017/541), which contains a
vague offence of “public provocation to
commit a terrorist offence”, provides states
with an added incentive to introduce such
laws by expressly referring to “glorification”
as an example of expression that may be
criminalised. In Spain itself, amendments
to Article 578 in 2015 only increased the
reach of this already broad and vague
provision.
By using these laws to criminalize lawful
expression, the Spanish authorities are
disregarding international human rights law
and standards. The impact of Article 578
is devastating to individuals – ranging from
hefty fines, to lengthy periods of exclusion
from the public sector, to prison sentences.

But even beyond these sanctions, such
misuse of counter-terrorism provisions leads
people to engage in self-censorship for fear
that they may be targeted. The criminalization
of such a wide range of expression has a
general chilling effect and can create an
environment where individuals are afraid of
expressing unpopular views, or even
making controversial jokes.
Such a constrained and shrinking space
for public and open debate, discussion
and criticism poses a longer-term threat to
the strength of civil society and the ability
to ensure not only the right to freedom of
expression, but the defence of a whole
range of other fundamental human rights.

A man holds a finger puppet demanding freedom of
expression during a protest calling for the release
of imprisoned puppeteers accused of “glorifying” ETA,
Madrid, 13 June 2016.
© Marcos del Mazo/Pacific Press/Getty

 A man, with his mouth taped, during a protest
against the Spanish government’s new security law
in Gijon, northern Spain, 30 June 2015.
© REUTERS/Eloy Alonso

RECOMMENDATIONS
Amnesty International urges the relevant
Spanish authorities to:
• Repeal Article 578 of the Criminal Code and
ensure that no provision of the Criminal Code
violates Spain’s obligations under international
human rights law and standards, in particular
Article 19 of the ICCPR; that is, only criminalise
expression that encourages others to commit
a recognizable criminal act with the intent to
incite them to commit such an act and with a
reasonable likelihood that they would carry

it out, and where there is a clear causal link
between the statement and the criminal act.
• Ensure that no provision of the Criminal Code
criminalises expression that does not amount to
advocacy of national, racial, or religious hatred
that constitutes incitement to discrimination,
hostility or violence, in compliance with Article
20(2) of the ICCPR.
• Ensure that no one is arrested, investigated,
charged or imprisoned under Article 578.
• Ensure that charges that have been brought
under Article 578 against anyone solely for the

peaceful exercise of their right to freedom
of expression are dropped; and ensure
the immediate and unconditional release
of all those who have been imprisoned or
detained under Article 578 solely for the
peaceful exercise of their right to freedom of
expression.
• Enable victims of terrorism, through
effective legislation and procedures (including
legal aid), to pursue civil claims against
perpetrators, their estates, their organizations
or others who assisted in the commission of
the crime.

Amnesty International is a global movement of more than 7 million people
who campaign for a world where human rights are enjoyed by all.
Our vision is for every person to enjoy all the rights enshrined in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards.
We are independent of any government, political ideology, economic interest
or religion and are funded mainly by our membership and public donations.
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Index: EUR 41/7924/2018
English, March 2018

Cover image: Demonstrators sit outside
the Spanish parliament during a protest
against the Spanish government’s new
security law in central Madrid, Spain,
1 July 2015.
© REUTERS/Juan Medina