Last Thursday, the Berlin Administrative Court rejected an appeal by Junge Welt (JW), Germany’s only left-wing daily newspaper founded in 1947, against the inclusion of the newspaper in the annual report of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV).
The court ruled in favour of the spy agency, which had placed the paper under surveillance for ‘left-wing extremism’. An urgent appeal was rejected in March 2022.
The ruling is intended to provide a legal basis for the claim that the newspaper was ‘unconstitutionally’ and ‘justifiably’ under surveillance by the secret service. The banning of the far-right magazine Compact, which was banned with immediate effect on Tuesday and confiscated by the Interior Ministry, shows how far-reaching the consequences could be.
JW’s fundamental rights are already severely restricted. The inclusion of the newspaper in the annual report of the secret service has a chilling effect on interview partners and readers and generally complicates and hinders the professional practice of journalists and broadcasters.
The plaintiff had therefore requested that the newspaper’s inclusion in 23 annual reports of the secret service since 1998 be annulled.
After the ruling, Dietmar Koschmieder, managing director of JW, said that an appeal would be lodged and, if necessary, the case would be taken to the European Court of Justice.
Koschmieder, a member of the German Communist Party (DKP), accused the court in its ruling of adopting ‘crude and stupid things’ from the constitutional report.
The president of the court, Wilfried Peters, sided with the BfV from the outset. According to the World Socialist Website, he made no secret of his view that socialist and Marxist politics should be banned in Germany.
Echoing the defendant’s arguments, Peters argued that the newspaper represented a ‘class point of view’ and referred favourably to Marx and Lenin, which was already unconstitutional.
According to the president, Junge Welt could not fall within the scope of freedom of the press because it not only published, but also displayed ‘political aims’ against the ‘free democratic basic order’ by organising an annual conference against capitalism.
The court said that the newspaper had given a voice to ‘extreme left-wing authors’, had referred to organisations on the ‘extreme left-wing spectrum’ and had allegedly failed to distance itself sufficiently from political forces advocating violence in parts of its coverage.
The plaintiff’s lawyer, Heinrich, pointed out that a positive reference to Marx and Lenin is not synonymous with the ideology of ‘Marxism-Leninism’, which was declared unconstitutional in a 1956 Supreme Court ruling against the German Communist Party (KPD) for, among other things, advocating a one-party dictatorship. According to the ruling, only ‘Marxism-Leninism as interpreted by Stalin’ was unconstitutional.
In his ruling, Peters insisted that the BfV had drawn attention to the ‘extreme left-wing’ views of many JW writers and editors, and declared that Lenin, as a historical figure, had ‘fought most vigorously against the constitutional order’.
Judge Peters also set the value of the case at a staggering €115,000, including lawyers’ fees and court costs.
According to the court, there are numerous links between the editors and writers of Junge Welt and the German Communist Party (DKP), which is considered ‘extreme left-wing’.
In addition, Junge Welt does not openly declare its commitment to ‘non-violence’, and former ‘RAF terrorists’ have repeatedly been offered platforms by the newspaper.
The judge ruled that the normal amount in dispute for the BfV’s annual reports was actually 5,000 euros, but that these amounts had to be added together because there were 23 reports in total, albeit almost identical ones.
As a result, the JW broadcasters have to pay large sums of money to the court, even though the case is still ongoing and the judgement has not yet been finalised.
Sevim Dağdelen, foreign policy spokesperson for the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) in the Bundestag, criticised the ruling: ‘The decision undermines freedom of the press and democracy in Germany. Critical reporting on war and capitalism should be defended as part of the political decision-making process, not the job of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
