The Netherlands has found Geert Wilders guilty of hate speech
GEERT WILDERS, the Eurosceptic, anti-Muslim populist leader of the Party for Freedom (PVV), has spent the past decade testing the limits of the Netherlands’ tolerance for intolerance. On December 9th he discovered he had at last managed to go too far. A court in Amsterdam found Mr Wilders guilty of public insult and incitement to discrimination, over a speech in which he called for “fewer Moroccans” in the country.
Members of the Moroccan-Dutch and other ethnic minorities were pleased to see the state take their outrage seriously. But Mr Wilders vowed to appeal, and he responded to the verdict with an all-out attack on the Dutch judiciary. “The Netherlands has become a sick country,” he said in a video message. He accused the judges who sentenced him of political bias and of infringing freedom of expression, and added: “No one trusts you anymore.” He will no doubt repeat this attack incessantly during his campaign for the national elections, scheduled for March 15th. He is currently leading in the polls. Lees meer