Press Council: Two complaints partially upheld

The Swiss Press Council has partially upheld two complaints against *Blick* and *Sonntagsblick*. In both cases, the newspapers occasionally violated the Declaration of the Duties and Rights of Journalists.
One of the cases concerned an article in the *Sonntagsblick* about the broadcast of an SF TV documentary on the Blocher brothers shortly before Christoph Blocher was voted out of the Federal Council. Specifically, the issue was the broadcast date, which was allegedly set at short notice. According to the Press Council, the newspaper omitted important information by failing to mention sources that had described the broadcast date not as «unusual» but as «in line with standard practice.».

No hearing, lack of privacy protection
In an article about a cannabis raid at a private residence, the Press Council accuses *Der Blick* of failing to hear the woman’s side of the story regarding the allegations made. It states that this is mandatory even in the case of anonymized reporting. Furthermore, by naming the woman’s employer, *Blick* accepted the risk that the employer could identify its employee based on the additional details in the article. This constituted a failure to respect the woman’s privacy.
As the Press Council further noted, neither newspaper violated the provisions of the declaration with regard to the other points criticized by the respective complainants.