BRITISH IDEAS ON FREE PRESS

Grey River Argus, 1 April 1948, Page 3

BRITISH IDEAS ON FREE PRESS

GENEVA, March 29. It is understood that the main points of tne proposed British draft treaty on freedom of expression and information are:—

(1) Each State to grant its own nationals and the nationals of other States the freedom to send and receive information without Government interference.

(2) No State to impose restrictions on the flow of information only .to prevent disorder or violence designed to overthrow the Government or on the grounds of libel and obscenity. (4) The State to retain the right to refuse entry to any particular persons. (5) The printer or publisher of a defamatory • expression. ■ might be obliged to publish a reply. (6) Disputes to he referred to the International Court, of Justice. It is also understood that the British plan offered “certain difficulties” for the Americans, but may be acceptable to the French. Mr Harry Martin, president of the American Newspaper Guild, read out to the conference the entire statute in the control of the press in Russia promulgated in 19.31, which : placed full control over all newspapers, periodicals, broadcasts, lectures, exhibitions and films in the hands of the People’s Commissariat of Education and forbade the publication of works containing agitations, and propaganda against Soviet authority and dictatorship of the proletariat.