Brigitte Bardot fined for inciting racial hatred
Thu 10 June, 2004 14:52
PARIS (Reuters) - French actress turned animal rights activist Brigitte Bardot has been convicted of inciting racial hatred and ordered to pay 5,000 euros (3,300 pounds) -- the fourth such fine for the former sex symbol since 1997.
The Paris court sentenced Bardot, 69, on Thursday for remarks made in her book "A Scream in the Silence", an outspoken attack on gays, immigrants and the jobless which shocked France last year.
In the book, she laments the "Islamisation of France" and the "underground and dangerous infiltration of Islam".
"Mme Bardot presents Muslims as barbaric and cruel invaders, responsible for terrorist acts and eager to dominate the French to the extent of wanting to exterminate them," the court said.
France's five million-strong Muslim community is the largest in Europe.
Bardot, who was not present at the verdict, denied the charges in a tearful court appearance last month, saying her book did not target Islam or people from North Africa.
She told the court that France was going through a period of decadence and said she opposed inter-racial marriage.
"I was born in 1934, at that time inter-racial marriage wasn't approved of," she said.
"There are many new languages in the new Europe. Mediocrity is taking over from beauty and splendour. There are many people who are filthy, badly dressed and badly shaven."
In her book, she also attacks homosexuals as "fairground freaks", condemns the presence of women in government and denounces the "scandal of unemployment benefit".
Bardot's attacks on Muslims prompted anti-racism groups to launch legal proceedings against the former star, who turned her back on cinema after 46 films to concentrate on animal welfare.
The court awarded a symbolic one euro in damages to France's anti-racism movement MRAP and to the League for Human Rights.
It also sentenced the head of Bardot's publishing house Le Rocher to a 5,000-euro fine and ordered both to pay for advertisements in two newspapers announcing their conviction.
Bardot, in her 1960s heyday the epitome of French feminine beauty, was already fined $3,250 in January 1998 for inciting racial hatred in comments about civilian massacres in Algeria.
Four months earlier, a court fined her for saying France was being overrun by sheep-slaughtering Muslims. |
