LINGENS v. AUSTRIA JUGDMENT 3 There appeared before the Court: - for the Government Mr. H. TÜRK, Legal Adviser, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Agent, Mr. W. OKRESEK, Federal Chancellery, Mr. G. FELSENSTEIN, Ministry of Justice, Advisers; - for the Commission Mr. H.G. SCHERMERS, Delegate; - for the applicant Mr. W. MASSER, Rechtsanwalt, Counsel, Mr. P.M. LINGENS, Applicant. The Court heard addresses by Mr. Türk and Mr. Okresek for the Government, by Mr. Schermers for the Commission and by Mr. Masser for the applicant and Mr. Lingens himself, as well as their replies to its questions. On 6 December 1985 and 17 March 1986, Mr. Masser, complying with a request by the President, filed with the registry several documents giving further particulars of the applicant’s claims for just satisfaction. The Government replied on 18 March 1986. AS TO THE FACTS 8. Mr. Lingens, an Austrian journalist born in 1931, resides in Vienna and is editor of the magazine Profil. I. THE APPLICANT’S ARTICLES AND THEIR BACKGROUND 9. On 9 October 1975, four days after the Austrian general elections, in the course of a television interview, Mr. Simon Wiesenthal, President of the Jewish Documentation Centre, accused Mr. Friedrich Peter, the President of the Austrian Liberal Party (Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs) of having served in the first SS infantry brigade during the Second World War. This unit had on several occasions massacred civilians behind the German lines in Russia. Mr. Peter did not deny that he was a member of the unit, but stated that he was never involved in the atrocities it committed. Mr. Wiesenthal then said that he had not alleged anything of the sort. 10. The following day, Mr. Bruno Kreisky, the retiring Chancellor and President of the Austrian Socialist Party (Sozialistische Partei Österreichs), was questioned on television about these accusations. Immediately before the television interview, he had met Mr. Peter at the Federal Chancellery. Their meeting was one of the normal consultations between heads of parties with a view to forming a new government; it had