A/HRC/55/47 human rights framework. All prohibitions must be compatible with articles 20 (2) and 19 (3) (freedom of expression), as well as articles 2 (legal recourse), 5 (destruction of rights), 17 (privacy), 18 (freedom of religion or belief) and 26 (equality before the law and equal protection) of the Covenant. Furthermore, they must not “discriminate in favour of or against one or certain religions or belief systems, or their adherents over another, or religious believers over non-believers”. In the opening of general comment No. 34 (2011), the Committee highlights article 27 of the Covenant (addressing minority rights) as being among the articles that “contain guarantees for freedom of opinion and/or expression”.57 The wider human rights normative framework also strictly curtails the overzealous application of prohibitions on speech. However, it also serves to underscore the need to prohibit in line with article 20 (2) of the Covenant and article 4 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.58 33. Substantively, the mandate holder recognizes that attacks on holy books, or indeed religious symbols, can constitute incitement, but has only once ascertained that the specific case has reached the threshold test of the Rabat Plan of Action. This is not simply a content-based consideration, although it includes that, as part of the six tests. “We cannot rely on abstractions that are either empty of content or filled with … a ‘principled’ answer. Instead, we must consider in every case what is at stake and what are the risks and gains of alternative courses of action”.59 34. While people may feel the insult, hurt and provocation that flow from acts of gratuitous provocation deeply, the whole human rights framework serves to ensure that due process and legality are followed in calibrating any response, in accordance with international norms and standards. The six-part test provides guidance by assessing the context, speaker, intent, content, extent and likelihood of harm. This includes considering the site where the destruction or desecration occurs; the person(s) who are carrying out the action and their intent, but also consideration of other matters, such as their age and condition; their mental health or disabilities; their position in society; the significance of the timing of the act; and the meaning of the act, taking changed meanings of motifs in different political contexts into account. One needs to be immersed “in the details of the case and make contextually sensitive judgments” rather than adopting an absolutist position based on abstract principles.60 35. It has also been commented that “holiness” is a quality that lies entirely outside the scope of human rights. 61 At the international level, human rights mechanisms are neither tasked with, nor equipped for, determining an exhaustive global list of holy books and religious symbols for all “thought, conscience and religion”, including allowing for diverse interpretations and intrareligious and sectarian groups. Such a task would be daunting, implausible and “inherently contradictory”, 62 considering that it would need to apply to religious or belief communities that may deny the legitimacy of the existence of the other. What can be entrusted to human rights forums is a concern “with religious doctrines only to the extent that it protects the belief of individuals in such doctrines” and the rights of individuals and groups to “undisturbed religious practice”.63 In the majority of instances, the courts would be best placed to decipher whether particular content, in the light of the facts of a specific case, and along with the other elements of the six-part test, indeed rises to the threshold of incitement. For example, in October 2023, the Linköping District Court in Sweden found a 27-year-old man who spread a video where he burned a copy of the Qur’an guilty of incitement to hatred against a population group, referring in its judgment to the 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 10 Ibid., para. 4. Ibid., paras. 50–52; see also Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, general recommendation No. 35 (2013), paras. 6–16, and Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 37 (2020), paras. 19 and 50. See https://global.oup.com/academic/product/theres-no-such-thing-as-free-speech-9780195093834, p. 111. See https://global.oup.com/academic/product/culture-citizenship-and-community-9780198297680, p. 14. See https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139600460, p. 317. Ibid. Ibid. GE.23-25950