[DIV class=story][H1]White supremacists fined for spreading hate on the internet[/H1][SPAN class=byline]Last Updated Fri, 10 Mar 2006 21:54:22 EST[/SPAN] [DIV class=text][A href="vny!://www.cbc.ca/news/credit.html"]CBC News[/A][/DIV][DIV class=text]Two white supremacists have been fined for spreading hatred on their websites. It's believed to be the first time a Canadian internet web-hosting service has been found liable for hate messages.
The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ordered the two men to stop spreading hate messages and fined them penalties totalling $13,000. The complainant, Ottawa lawyer Richard Warman, was awarded $5,000.
In February 2002, Warman launched a complaint against Alexan Kulbashian, of Toronto, and James Richardson, of London, Ont.
The complaint was also against the Canadian Ethnic Cleansing Team, of which the two were members, Kulbashian's web-hosting service Affordable Space.com and the website www.tri-cityskins.com.
The website contained messages that included Holocaust jokes and racist jokes about blacks, Jews, Muslims and other minorities.
"The tri-cityskins.com website contains messages that are likely to expose persons who are non-Christian (namely of the Jewish and Muslim faiths) or non-Caucasian, to hatred and contempt on the basis of their race, colour, religion, or national/ethnic origin," the ruling states.
"Black persons and people of the Jewish faith are particularly laid open to ridicule, ill feelings or hostility, creating the right conditions for hatred or contempt against them to flourish."
Tribunal decision-maker Athanasios Hadjis said that according to sect. 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act, the communication of hate messages must occur "repeatedly" to constitute a discriminatory practice.
"In my view, since the hate messages could be viewed at any time by anyone using the internet, they were indeed being communicated 'repeatedly,' " Hadjis wrote.
The tribunal ordered Kulbashian pay Warman $5,000 for identifying Warman in a hate message.
Kulbashian and Richardson also have to pay $1,000 in penalties. Canadian Ethnic Cleansing Team and Affordable Space.com were each fined $3,000.
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