Juso lawsuit: proceedings against Weltwoche publisher Köppel dropped
Roger Köppel will not have to answer for violating the criminal law on racism after all. The Zurich-Limmat public prosecutor's office has dropped the case after the Juso accused the head of Weltwoche of discriminating against Muslims.
Köppel made comments on Islam, Muslims and the minaret initiative in the program TalkTäglich and in several articles in Weltwoche. In the eyes of the Young Socialists (Juso), he made racist statements and systematically disparaged and slandered Muslims. The Young Party therefore filed charges against Köppel in December 2009 for violating the anti-racism penal norm.
The Zurich-Limmat public prosecutor's office has now dropped the case, as the JUSO announced on Friday. The public prosecutor responsible, Lino Esseiva, confirmed the closure to the SDA news agency. In the discontinuation order, which is available to SDA, the public prosecutor's office justifies the decision by stating, among other things, that Köppel had not denied any Muslim equal rights or equal value as a human being. There was no evidence of a criminal offense. This was because there was no intensity or inflammatory element. It must be permissible to establish a relationship between Islam and Islamism or Islamism and terror.
The Juso are disappointed. Catch the little ones, let the big ones go, they write in their press release. Köppel can apparently afford a whole army of lawyers to protect him from the law. It remains to be seen whether the party will take the case further.
