A/HRC/46/58 expression, and through international collaboration and an analysis of existing international, regional, and national laws and norms on hate speech. 37. States should develop and implement a comprehensive regulatory and policy framework for the range of differentiated and complementary strategies needed to effectively combat all types of hate speech in all its manifestations. The framework should comprise civil or administrative measures and, exceptionally, criminal law measures. 38. States should only use prosecution as a last resort in relation to hate speech, and only in relation to the most severe forms of hate speech. Prosecution should therefore be specifically reserved for (a) incitement to genocide and (b) advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence (art. 20 (2) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights), with a view to ensuring that the rights to freedom of expression and access to information are not undermined. 39. States and tech companies should implement and expressly reference the Rabat Plan of Action in addressing incitement to hostility, discrimination or violence as part of their strategies to deal with hate speech, including hate speech targeting minorities, at the global level. The Rabat six-part threshold test provides the criteria and conditions under which content that constitutes incitement should be criminalized in national law, and the standards specifying when content should be removed from social media platforms. These criteria are context, the speaker, intent, content and form, extent of the speech, and likelihood of the incitement. 40. States should ensure that hate speech laws or regulations are not used to suppress minorities, whether national or ethnic, religious or linguistic. Nor should those laws or regulations be used for censorship or to stifle freedom of opinion and expression. The threshold for defining restrictions on freedom of expression and incitement to hatred, and for the application of article 20 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, must be very high. States should distinguish between what constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility and violence as opposed to other forms of hate speech, in order to refrain from adopting measures that hinder the rights of minorities to dissent and to speak out. 41. States should develop clear domestic legislative and institutional frameworks to guarantee accountability for hate speech, promote equality and respect freedom of speech and expression. States should have clear, coherent and identifiable norms, institutions and policies dealing with these issues, particularly in light of the challenges posed by an expanding concept. The framework should include suitable preventive measures to tackle intolerance, hatred and other contributory causes of hate speech, and should also include remedial and, where necessary, punitive measures to redress actual instances of hate speech. 42. States should establish the duties of social media companies and a code of conduct for social networking service providers, and clarify key terms and best practices in regulating intermediary liability. 43. States should consider regulating contexts that could be prone to hate speech, such as political campaigning, electoral processes and crisis management. 44. States should adopt a multi-stakeholder approach for the effective design and implementation of a comprehensive regulatory and policy framework, and should include international and regional organizations, national human rights organizations, regulatory bodies, tech and social media companies, civil society organizations and minority representatives in the process. They should also ensure adequate resources and the proper administrative and institutional support in order to facilitate the effective implementation of such legislation. 45. A mechanism should be established for the reception of complaints and data pertaining to hate speech and violence against minorities at both the regional and national levels, in order to better understand the patterns, targets and impacts of hate speech against minorities. 6