Mary Lou McDonald defends defamation case against RTÉ

Sinn Féin president Mary Lou McDonald has said there is no binary choice between freedom of the press and an individual’s right to defend their reputation, when asked about her defamation proceedings against broadcaster RTÉ.

The lawsuit was flagged to the Council of Europe as a threat to press freedom last week by media freedom watchdogs, which described it as a strategic lawsuit against public participation, or Slapp.

“Freedom of the press is a very important value. It’s a cornerstone of democracy and it needs to be defended. And I don’t regard that and the right of an individual to defend their reputation as a zero-sum game,” Ms McDonald said.

“I don’t think it’s one or the other. And beyond that, I will not stray because it is now a matter for the courts.”

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She made the remarks when asked to comment on the Council of Europe alert at a press conference in Brussels, where she had travelled with deputy leader and first minister designate Michelle O’Neill for talks with MEPs and the European Commission’s Maros Sefcovic about the Northern Ireland protocol.

The defamation case is in relation to an interview broadcast on RTÉ radio in February in which a journalist made a reference to Sinn Féin and the IRA’s historic handling of abuse allegations, according to the alert, which said it was the third time Ms McDonald had taken High Court defamation proceedings since 2014.

Jessica Ní Mhainín, a policy and campaigns manager at Index on Censorship, which filed the alert along with the International Federation of Journalists, said the organisation was “alarmed at the legal action” by Ms McDonald.

It was “characteristic” of a Slapp, she said, which involve “powerful people making legal threats or taking legal actions against public watchdogs – such as media outlets – in response to public-interest speech that may be inconvenient to them or their interests”.

The Council of Europe’s Safety of Journalists platform tracks threats to press freedoms, and Ireland will be required to respond to the alert and explain what steps it is taking on press freedom.