Paris (AFP)

Yellow card for CNews: the CSA has put in residence the chain of information of the group Canal + to respect its obligations, in particular in terms of incitement to the hatred and the violence, after remarks of its new star Eric Zemmour on the Islam and the colonization of Algeria.

This formal notice made public Tuesday is a form of warning for the news channel.

In proceedings of the Superior council of audio-visual, such a decision can precede, in the event of repeated failures, a sanction which can go from the temporary suspension of a program to a withdrawal of the authorization of the channel, while passing by fines or deprivation of advertising screens.

The journalist, writer and polemicist became mid-October the headline of "Face the info", a daily CNews program launched shortly after the controversy sparked by his virulent speech on Islam and immigration in late September to " convention of the right ", organized by relatives of Marion Maréchal Le Pen.

And several of his interventions in the program presented by Christine Kelly (former member of the CSA) caused an uproar. In particular that of October 23, in which he had assimilated Islam and Islamism, before evoking the conquest of Algeria by France in the 1840s saying, as French, "on the side" General Bugeaud who, when he "arrives in Algeria, (...) begins to massacre Muslims and even some Jews".

- "Legitimation of violence" -

These words, which for the CSA, violate several of the obligations of the chain, resulting from the law and its convention concluded in 2005 (a text which codifies its engagements vis-à-vis the regulator).

Indeed, the gendarme of the audio-visual one considers that these remarks "could be perceived" like "a legitimization of violence committed in the past against people of muslim confession but also as an incitement with the hatred or the violence with regard to this same category of the population ".

And he considers that the footage expressed an "insistent rejection of Muslim people as a whole, tending to encourage discriminatory behavior because of religion".

In addition, the regulator believes that CNews, by broadcasting these words live "without reaction or even moderation" on the part of the presenter, has failed to maintain his control of his antenna, which is required in all circumstances .

- Repeated polemics -

Several other releases of the author of the "Destin French" in "Face the info" have been controversial this fall.

Among them, his intervention of October 15 on homosexuality (which he had described as "choice") and the homoparentality (fruit according to him of a "whim") could according to the CSA be "perceived as stigmatizing people homosexual. "

These repeated controversies prompted Canal + to broadcast "Faced with the news" from the end of October, as recommended by the group's ethics committee (a Vivendi subsidiary). A measure that aims to limit new excesses on the air.

In addition to CNews, LCI has also been reprimanded by the CSA for comments by Eric Zemmour: the regulator had "strongly warned" the TF1 news channel for broadcasting his speech at the "convention of the right" in direct, without context or contradiction on the air.

"Freedom of expression, including in controversial forms, as well as editorial freedom, can not justify the dissemination of remarks likely to incite hatred or discrimination", warned the regulator, to the attention of the set of televisions and radios.

This speech had earned the polemist to be removed from the RTL antenna and could cause him further legal troubles, even as the slayer of the "French Suicide" was finally sentenced in mid-September for "provocation to religious hatred" .

An investigation was indeed opened in early October by the Paris prosecutor's office, for "public insults" and "public provocation to discrimination, hatred or violence".

© 2019 AFP