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A resolution adopted on 1 March 2002 by the Bundesrat (upper house of parliament), which represents the Bundesländer at federal level, mentions various issues that should be taken into account during the forthcoming revision of the "Television Without Frontiers" Directive. First of all, the Bundesrat suggests that the Directive should stipulate that its provisions may be transposed in conformity with Community law by means of self-regulatory mechanisms. With regard to Article 3a, various adjustments are proposed in response to past experiences with the practical enforcement of Member States'...

In a ruling of 20 February, the Bundesverwaltungsgericht (Federal Administrative Court - BVerwG) offered an explanation of the ban on the TV broadcasting of pornography set out in para. 3 of the original Rundfunkstaatsvertrag (Inter-State Agreement on Broadcasting - RStV a.F.). The aforementioned paragraph states that TV programmes are unlawful "if they are pornographic (see Penal Code Section 184)". This reference to the Strafgesetzbuch (Penal Code - StGB) formed the background of a legal dispute between a private broadcaster who had shown a series of films on pay-TV and the relevant supervisory...

The right of journalists to refuse to give evidence has been extended by an amendment to the code of criminal procedure. The Bundesrat (Upper House) has followed the Bundestag (Lower House) in accepting a compromise proposed by the mediation committee of the two houses of parliament. Under the amendment, journalists' own research will be subject to the law on the right to silence and will therefore be exempt from confiscation. Under previous legislation, this only applied to material received by journalists from third parties. Initially, exceptions to this new law would only have been granted...

The Bundesgerichtshof (Federal Supreme Court - BGH) has again ruled on the admissibility of so-called "shock advertising" under competition law. In its judgment of 6 December 2001, it prevented the defendant, a press firm, from printing an advertisement for the Benetton company, depicting a person labelled as "HIV Positive", on the grounds that it was immoral within the meaning of Article 1 of the Gesetz zum Schutz gegen den unlauteren Wettbewerb (Unfair Competition Act - UWG) and was therefore unlawful. The BGH had reached the same verdict in a previous judgment of 6 July 1995 (I ZR 180/94)....

The Landesmedienanstalten (regional media authorities), which monitor private broadcasting in Germany, have recently dealt with two cases concerning the ban on religious and political advertising. On 8 January 2002, the regional media authorities' Gemeinsame Stelle Werbung, Recht, Europa und Verwaltung (Joint Office for Advertising, Law, Europe and Administration) recommended that each of the regional media authorities, which are responsible for monitoring private broadcasters, should ban further broadcasts of advertisements for the book Kraft zum Leben ("Power for Living"), published by the American...