Appellate Court: Terrorism Act 2000, Section 7, Violates ECHR, Article 10

A British Court of Appeals has ruled that the Terrorism Act 2000, Section 7, violates Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (freedom of expression). Said the court, “In the end, the incompatibility issue has been narrowly refined to the question of whether…the Schedule 7 stop power, if used in respect of journalistic information or material, is incompatible with article 10 in that it is not “prescribed by law” as required by article 10(2). ”

The ruling came in the case of David Miranda, who was detained by police at Heathrow Airport in 2013. They subsequently examined his laptop, which contained encrypted files prepared by journalist Glenn Greenwald, who had been in contact with Edward Snowden. The UK government argued that the files contained information that was vital to national security. Mr. Miranda and the Guardian, which paid for his trip, maintained that the police examination of the files violated press freedom.  Mr. Miranda tweeted that the ruling shows that “Journalism isn’t terrorism.”

Read the ruling here.

Read the European Convention on Human Rights, Article 10, here.