PROTECTING MINORITY RIGHTS – A Practical Guide to Developing Comprehensive Anti-Discrimination Legislation Under article 4, this requirement extends to propaganda promoting “discrimination in any form”. It further commits States to “undertake to adopt immediate and positive measures” in this regard, including as concerns public bodies and private entities.1141 Specifically, article 4 (a) provides that: Shall declare an offence punishable by law all dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority or hatred, incitement to racial discrimination, as well as all acts of violence or incitement to such acts against any race or group of persons of another colour or ethnic origin, and also the provision of any assistance to racist activities, including the financing thereof. Neither the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women nor the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities specifically mandates the prohibition of incitement to discrimination, violence or hostility. However, both create specific obligations in respect of combating negative social norms. For example, article 5 (a) of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women dedicates extensive attention to the positive obligations of States “to modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women, with a view to achieving the elimination of prejudices and customary and all other practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women”.1142 These matters implicate speech and other forms of expression and communication, in particular – in this context – misogynistic speech. The rights set out under article 20 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights are generally deemed to be in a complex relationship with other rights, in particular (although not exclusively) the rights set out under article 19 to hold opinions without interference and to freedom of expression. Article 19 states: 1. Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference. 2. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice. 3. The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article carries with it special duties and responsibilities. It may therefore be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary: (a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others; (b) For the protection of national security or of public order (ordre public), or of public health or morals. As concerns the rights to freedom of opinion and expression, freedom of opinion is absolute.1143 There can be no restriction – legal or otherwise – solely for holding an opinion. Freedom of expression by contrast is not absolute.1144 As a result of article 19 (3) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the right to freedom of expression is a qualified right, which can be limited on grounds of named restrictions. In interpreting the requirements of article 19 (3), the Human Rights Committee has stated that these restrictions must be construed narrowly and has held that “when a State party imposes restrictions on the exercise of freedom of expression, these may not put in jeopardy the right itself”.1145 The Committee has noted that “the relation between right and restriction and between norm and exception must not be reversed” and underlined the 176 1141 Detailed requirements in this area are set out in Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, general recommendation No. 35 (2013). 1142 The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, in its third and most recent general recommendation on genderbased violence against women, has expressed concern, inter alia, at “contemporary forms of violence occurring online and in other digital environments”. The Secretary-General has drawn direct links between misogynistic hate speech and gender-based violence against women, noting that “the use of rape and other forms of sexual violence in Kosovo (former Serbia and Montenegro) in 1999 as weapons of warfare and methods of ethnic cleansing had been preceded by official state propaganda and media accounts that stereotyped Kosovar Albanian women as sexually promiscuous and exploited Serbian fears of Albanian population growth”. See, respectively, Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, general recommendation No. 35 (2017), para. 20; and A/61/122/Add.1 and Corr.1, para. 94. 1143 Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 34 (2011), para. 9. Freedom of thought and conscience and freedom to have or adopt a religion or belief of one’s choice are also protected unconditionally, as is the right of everyone to hold opinions. See Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 22 (1993), para. 3. 1144 Human Rights Committee, general comment No. 34 (2011), para. 21. 1145 Ibid.