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Osaka passes Japan's 1st anti-hate speech ordinance

Xinhua, January 16, 2016 Adjust font size:

Japan's Osaka city assembly passed on Friday an ordinance that authorizes the government to publicly disclose names of groups engaged in hate speech.

This is the first official crackdown on verbal racism by a major city in Japan, as deliberation on a bill seeking to ban such racism is making little progress in the House of Councillors.

The ordinance defines hate speech as communication which defames and aims to exclude an individual or a group from society based on race or ethnicity, and incites hatred and a sense of discrimination towards them.

A hate speech examination committee consisting of academic and legal experts will be set up. It will look into allegations filed by Osaka residents, and if it judges a particular group is engaged in hate speech, the name of the group will be posted on the city's website.

Osaka became the international focus of hate speech in 2013 after an anti-Korean group held a rally in the city's Tsuruhashi district, home to many ethnic Koreans, and a video of the group attacking ethnic Koreans with insults and racial slurs was posted on YouTube. Enditem