PRESS RELEASE – By a decision dated December 5, 2022, notified by post on December 8, the Joint Joint Commission for Publications and Press Agencies (CPPAP) refused the renewal of the registration of FranceEvening as an online news service in its records.
As announced in our last press release, the newspaper decided to appeal this decision and therefore filed an interim suspension on December 22. The hearing was held on January 6, 2023. Through this appeal, the judge in chambers of the Administrative Court of Paris was asked to suspend the decision of the body.
The various parties to the trial were present: FranceEvening, lawyers for readers, contributors and journalists, and the Ministry of Culture. The pleadings focused on 1) a priority question of constitutionality (QPC) which raised the question of the legality of the existence of the CPPAP as a body responsible for guaranteeing media pluralism while it is attached to the ministry of culture and by the very fact to the government 2) the decision-making process adopted by the CPPAP which may not have been respected in its formalism 3) the disproportionate nature of the commission’s decision.
At this hearing, the Ministry of Culture was represented by a single person. Not having taken prior knowledge of the arguments presented by FranceEvening, the latter requested a postponement of the hearing; the chair proposed a 30-minute suspension to remedy this problem. If the request was declined, the latter pronounced after hearing the postponement of the closing to Wednesday, January 11 in order to give the Ministry of Culture the opportunity to provide its observations.
As a reminder, the CPPAP criticizes FranceEvening having “published on this website, in a regular and unequivocal manner, content that discredits the vaccines authorized by the health authorities to fight against Covid-19 and the vaccination policy implemented by the public authorities”.
It is necessary to remember that it is thanks to the press which was able to report freely and alert French citizens that health scandals were exposed: Dépakine scandal, Mediator scandal, Isoméride scandal, blood scandal contaminated, asbestos scandal…
Regarding anti-Covid vaccines, to date, the National Medicines Safety Agency has reported more than 189,000 reports of side effects, 25% of which are serious. As a reminder, the ANSM does not assign any under-reporting coefficient to these figures, whereas it is customary in pharmacovigilance to consider that only 1 victim in 10 declares side effects. Furthermore, it should be remembered that three of the four vaccines put into circulation on the European market have been withdrawn for certain age groups or are no longer used precisely because of their adverse effects (AstraZeneca, Moderna, Janssen). It should also be remembered that the phase 3 trials of Pfizer’s Comirnaty vaccine will not end until May 2023 (its therapeutic interest is still in the evaluation phase) and that it has been recognized in the media that the authorities’ communication on the effectiveness of the injection on the transmission of the virus was “sometimes misleading”.
However, according to the CPPAP, it would not be possible to criticize vaccines that have been the subject of a marketing authorization when yet a marketing authorization for a treatment, from a stronger when conditional, does not constitute a guarantee of its absence of health risk. On the contrary, in such a case, reinforced monitoring of side effects is necessary to protect public health.
Furthermore, if according to the same instance, it does not seem possible for a press organ to disseminate information which goes against “a vaccination policy” implemented by the public authorities, what then other government policies, for example in economic, energy, or social matters?
Also, sanctioning the dissemination of scientific information relating to these vaccines constitutes a serious and immediate attack on public health, but also an attack on the principle of transparency of public action. Democratic debate is an essential condition for the formation of one’s own opinion. This involves the confrontation of ideas, the principle, moreover, which underlies the scientific method. This is why without freedom of information, there can be no freedom of opinion.
In addition, remember that Laurence Franceschini, also a State Councilor, is the president of the CPPAP and the signatory of the decision. On January 11, 2022, in the report of the Bronner commission, entitled “Lights in the digital age” and submitted to the Élysée, the latter had publicly taken sides as to the sanction it wished to impose on FranceSoir. As the CPPAP should be considered a court within the meaning of Article 6 of the ECHR, a public hearing should have taken place. Also, by virtue of the principles of impartiality of the tribunal and of administrative impartiality which come together, Ms. Franceschini should have withdrawn from the case relating to the renewal of our registration.
It should also be remembered that half of the members of the CPPAP are representatives of government ministers: they are therefore not independent of their supervising minister.
How could this body then decide objectively whether or not a site deserves the quality of online press service? This dispute with our newspaper therefore raises a simple question: is the existence of the CPPAP legal? This subject, argues our lawyers, should be dealt with by way of the priority question of constitutionality.
It should also be remembered that the CPPAP told us in its letter that it had sought the opinion of the Directorate General for Health (DGS) of the Ministry of Health and Prevention as part of its decision-making process. However, while national and European judges have in turn sanctioned the adversarial nature of the administrative procedure, FranceSoir has had no access to the opinion of the DGS and has therefore not been able to respond to it. : this is a clear violation of the adversarial principle.
For these reasons, we hope that our arguments will be heard by the court and that the decision of the CPPAP will be suspended: our freedom of expression and the fundamental right to pluralism of opinions and of the press are at stake.
The decision should be made very soon.
In this ordeal, the drafting of FranceEvening particularly wishes to extend its warm thanks to its readers, contributors, donors and supporters for the help they bring us in this fight for freedom.