SC lets UN rapporteur comment on Ressa case

Irene Khan, United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression, gestures during a press conference in Manila on February 2, 2024. (Photo by Ted ALJIBE / AFP)

The Supreme Court has allowed United Nations Special Rapporteur Irene Khan to intervene as a “friend of the court” in the cyberlibel case of Nobel Laureate Maria Ressa.

In a resolution dated Jan. 24, the high court’s First Division allowed Khan to appear as an amicus curiae (friend of the court) as it also admitted her amicus brief, a document providing additional information or analysis, which may help it decide on Ressa’s case.

READ: UN rapporteur allowed as ‘friend of court’ in Ressa’s cyber libel case

Khan, the UN special rapporteur for freedom of expression and opinion, submitted her brief through lawyer Rodel Taton in June 2023.

In the document, the UN expert raised concerns about the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012, which served as the basis for the cyberlibel conviction of Ressa and Rappler’s former researcher Reynaldo Santos Jr. over a 2012 story on businessman Wilfredo Keng.

Ressa and Santos are appealing the Court of Appeal’s decision before the Supreme Court after the former upheld the 2020 decision of a Manila court, which found them guilty of cyberlibel.

The case became controversial because the Cybercrime Prevention Act was not enacted until September 2012, or four months after the article was published. The prosecution, however, claimed that the story was republished in February 2014, making it subject to the said law.

“Because its current cyberlibel laws effectively extend the statute of limitations for allegedly libelous content posted to the internet indefinitely, the law may impermissibly stifle the freedom of expression,” Khan said in her brief.

Citing the UN Human Rights Committee, she also noted that the country’s Revised Penal Code and Cybercrime Prevention Act were found to be “contrary to the human rights law.”

“In particular, the Cybercrime Prevention Act raises serious concerns that it limits the ability of journalists to expose, document, and address issues of important public interest, thereby violating the right to receive and impart information,” Khan said. INQ