Compendium
“Govorna o mraza” online platform
Description: In 2013, the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights of “The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” (MHC) introduced an online web platform for mapping cases of hate speech. The platform is a user-friendly, comprehensive database of report cases of hate speech on different grounds. Anyone can report a case of hate speech noted in public space (graffiti, protests and public gatherings, on traditional media or social networks). After the case has been reported, MHC reviews the report and analyses the legal grounds for taking proceedings before national institutions. If the registered case took place online (through web portals, social media, etc.) it will be forwarded to the Ministry of Interior, the sector for computer crime and digital forensics. During the past few years, MHC has submitted two criminal complaints for hate speech by a journalist (a television chat-show host) on the basis of sexual orientation, and hate speech by a politician-mayor, again for hate speech on the basis of sexual orientation at a public event. The platform also offers statistical data introduced in a graphic manner. In this way, in the period between 2014 and 2017, the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights of ‘The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ registered 315 cases of hate speech. From the information available, the three most common grounds for hate speech are: ethnicity, sexual orientation and gender identity, and political affiliation. At the same time, the data provides references to definitions, analyses, and articles which provide information about hate speech.
Country: ‘the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’
Author(s): Helsinki Committee for Human Rights of the Republic of Macedonia.
