Compact judgment: Prohibition procedure strengthens right-wing extremists | Stern.de

There is freedom of expression in Germany. And so the “Compact” magazine can confidently be referred to as disgusting hate sheet. It rushes against foreigners, Jews and other minorities, against parties and politicians and of course against other media.

Nevertheless, the magazine, including its numerous secondary portals and shops, can continue. The ban that the then SPD Federal Minister of the Interior Nancy Faeser had spoken about a year ago was finally lifted on Monday.

The decision of the Federal Administrative Court is not just legally plausible. It is also good news for the press and freedom of expression in this country. And it is an apprenticeship for those who are too research on a prohibition procedure against the AfD.

To the judgment: The court stated that the state can also apply association law for media companies. A ban does not mean “preliminary censorship”. This can be seen as a success for the Federal Ministry of the Interior.

But the highest German administrative court also decided that a ban must not make the freedom of expression and press stipulated in the Basic Law. And this freedom is guaranteed “even the enemies of freedom”.

Therefore, the judges ruled that a ban was only proportionate, “if the unconstitutional activities for the association proved to be formative”. However, this cannot be determined with “Compact” “” in the overall assessment “. Because anti -migration, conspiracy theories or history revisionist considerations also enjoy the protection of the Basic Law.

The Federal Administrative Court thus confirms not only its rush decision from last year, but also the ongoing case law of the Federal Constitutional Court. Even if the judgment does not explicitly strengthen the freedom of the press, especially since it confirms the prohibition on the right of the association, the judges reaffirm this existential fundamental right.

The fact that this decision was provoked by a right -wing extremist media company has its own irony. You just have to look at Hungary to see how press freedom is restricted by an increasingly authoritarian and illiberal government. And Hungary is again the explained model of the AfD – which in turn is more than just close “Compact”.

In general, the AfD. “Compact” editor Jürgen Elsässer cheered: “If it is impossible to forbid Compact, it is also not possible to ban the AfD, which is accused of.”

That is twice wrong. Firstly, the Federal Administrative Court ruled that a medium could be banned through the right to association, only in the case of “Compact” the evidence of the constitutional xenophobia was not sufficient. Second, a party ban procedure is a legally different and significantly larger construction site.

But what is true: The “Compact” procedure concerns at least indirectly the current AfD ban debate. The Federal Ministry of the Interior in the magazine acted against a association as a “secured right -wing extremist” association. The ban was justified with a collection of radical and agitation, but also with the fact that the magazine spread an ethnic understanding of the people, ie a distinction between traditional German and alleged “pass German”.

At least these parallels to a potential ban procedure against the AfD are obvious. They should not be ignored – nor is the sales success that “Compact” celebrates thanks to the state -generated attention. Elsässer never had more reach to agitate against minorities and the state. The sad summary of the failed ban is therefore: it did not make the right -wing extremists weaker, but made stronger.