The director of the publication will have to pay a symbolic euro to the SNCF "in compensation for his moral prejudice".

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JP PARIENTE

The magazine

VSD

was condemned Wednesday for "public insult" against the SNCF for having compared the strikes in the railway company to the practices of the jihadist organization Islamic State.

Georges Ghosn, publication director of the magazine, was condemned by the 17th chamber of the Paris judicial tribunal to pay a symbolic euro to the SNCF "in compensation for its moral damage".

Georges Ghosn was also ordered to pay the sum of 2,000 euros to SNCF for "irrecoverable costs".

In an editorial published in November 2019, Georges Ghosn denounced the strikes of the railway workers, which, according to him, are taking “families hostage” and “workers”.

"They use employees in France as Daesh uses women and children as human shields in Syria", wrote Georges Ghosn.

The Discord Title

This reference to the organization of the Islamic State was taken up prominently, in red and in capitals, in a section of the magazine.

The practice is this time attributed to "SNCF" as a whole.

It is this heading which had been the subject of a complaint by the SNCF, the railway company seeing in it "an invective against it".

The fault was aggravated by the fact that the author of the incriminated editorial was "the director of the publication himself and that the magazine does not have excess or caricature as its editorial line."

A simple "mood ticket"

The magazine's defense had explained that it was a “mood ticket”.

“The comparison between a strike and a hostage-taking is a widely held opinion,” the defense argued.

The words pursued contain "an invective" towards the SNCF by comparing it to "a terrorist organization whose name is commonly associated with the massive murderous actions carried out throughout the world and in particular in France", estimated the court.

“The crude attack they contain (...) does not allow us to consider that these remarks fall within the scope of freedom of expression.

In these conditions, it should be considered that the public insult towards an individual is constituted here ”, ruled the court.

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  • Daesh

  • Strike

  • SNCF

  • Justice