This article by Alistair McConnachie was published originally in the February 2007 issue of Sovereignty.

Under what is being termed a "genocide denial" law, Germany, the current holder of the EU's presidency is set to table new legislation on "racism and xenophobia" this spring. Its intention is to criminalise the "gross minimisation of genocide out of racist and xenophobic motives".

Berlin's draft EU Directive states: "Each member state shall take the measures necessary to ensure that the following intentional conduct is punishable: 'publicly condoning, denying or grossly trivialising of crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes as defined in'…the Statute of the ICC [International Criminal Court]." (Bruno Waterfield, "EU plans far-reaching 'genocide denial' law" The Daily Telegraph, 2-2-07, p.17.)

The primary purpose of this legislation, however, is to catch people who disagree with the official version of what has become known as the Holocaust -- although as the Daily Telegraph pointed out, it could also be used to entrap people like General Lewis MacKenzie, the former commander of UN peacekeepers in Bosnia who has questioned the numbers killed in Srebrenica in 1995.

There are 10 EU countries which already have "Holocaust denial" laws on their statute books: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and only recently in January of this year, Italy. Israel and Switzerland also have laws, and while Canada doesn't have a specific law on the matter, it does have a record of trying to convict people who do not have the appropriate historical opinions.

For examples on how these laws will be applied, we need only look at what has happened so far in France.

Bruno Gollnisch MEP the leader of new pro-sovereignty group in the European Parliament IDS (Sovereignty, Jan 07) is presently appealing against a 3-month suspended jail sentence and a 5,000 euro fine for merely saying, "As to the existence of gas chambers, it is up to historians to speak their minds [de se déterminer]."

That was the phrase for which he was convicted! So, what was his crime?

It was to suggest, by this phrase, that there might be something to discuss! That is, to even suggest that the matter is debatable, is enough to be convicted!

Jean Marie Le Pen MEP, leader of the Front National has also been convicted and fined because he declared that the gas chambers, specifically, were "a minor point [point de detail] in the history of the Second World War."

Here his crime was to "minimise" the matter and not treat it with sufficient attention and concern -- although in that regard he is in good company.

Talk about "grossly minimising genocide"!

For these men -- writing history for posterity, and not for the moment -- gas chambers weren't even a "detail" worth mentioning! Nothing more firmly suggests that these 3 men didn't believe the gas chamber stories themselves.

The examples from France show that "Holocaust denial" laws are used to convict people who imply only that there is another side to the question, or who are not sufficiently mindful of the official Holocaust story.

If Winston Churchill were asked to explain his omissions today, he would be convicted under this law!

ESTABLISHING SOME BASIC PREMISES
We all have a right to think, to enquire, to study, to speak, to debate, to disagree. This principle descends from, at least, the Enlightenment, back to Socrates -- the truth emerges through the clash of competing ideas.

Unfortunately, the people who promote these anti-speech laws are not "on the same page" as the rest of us.

They are not operating from the same premises.

They are keen to cast damaging accusations of "racism" and "anti-Semitism" against others, but they are not willing to answer the following questions themselves:

• Do you agree that everyone has the right to enquire into, and study, historical matters?

• Do you agree that everyone has the right to discuss and debate historical matters?

• Do you agree that everyone has the right to disagree on historical matters?

• Do you believe that we have the right to enquire, study, discuss, debate and disagree on historical matters without our motives being questioned?

• And do you agree that everyone has the right to do all this, publicly and privately, without being punished?

Unless they answer yes to each, then they are totalitarian speech-control fascists and enemies of our civil liberties.

ARGUMENTS AGAINST THIS LAW
1. History doesn't need law to enforce it. We can say this several ways: A truth which requires a law is not true! You only outlaw when you can't out-argue! The need to suppress admits the weakness of your case. You don't need police protection against historical questions! You only need the law to protect a framework of lies.

2. These laws crush alternative academic study where they exist. No academic will touch an area if he or she risks a fine, jail and the end of their academic careers.

3. A court does not have the ability -- and should not be granted the right -- to decide on complex historical matters.

4. The real people who are "minimising" and "trivialising" genocide are those who concentrate on emphasising this particular human tragedy to the exclusion, "minimisation" and "trivialisation" of all the other human tragedies in WW2. The reason that "denying" other "genocides" in Africa and the Balkans is likely to be included in this law is only to deflect accusations that its primary aim is, obviously, to protect the official Holocaust narrative.

By the way, these last two sentences would possibly get me convicted if this law were ever to come to Britain.

Lesson: We must value, use and support free speech while we still have it, because we'll miss it when it's gone.