A French newspaper has been sanctioned for climate denial

It's the first time this has happened.CNews, a French newspaper that hosts denialist theses, was fined for failing to provide cross-examination.

The French television station CNews, of the Canal+ group owned by Vincent Bolloré, was sanctioned for the dissemination of climate denialist content.In particular, during a broadcast a guest denied that i climate changes are caused by man, a thesis dear to global warming deniers but denied by thousands of scientific studies.The sanction was imposed since the program did not foresee any cross-examination:the Arcom supervisory body he fined CNews for a sum of 60 thousand euros.This represents a historic victory for those who fight climate skepticism in the world of information.

The first time internationally

On August 8, 2023, the collective filed a complaint with Arcom regarding a sequence of the show Punchline Eté, dedicated to the month of July 2023, the hottest on record.During this broadcast, the economist Philippe Herlin, supporter of Eric Zemmour during the 2022 presidential campaign and promoter of an anti-energy transition list for the 2024 European elections, he expressed skeptical theses on the climate without any contradiction.

“Anthropogenic global warming is a lie, a scam.(…) It's not man-made, that's a conspiracy, and why does it have so much weight?Because it justifies the intervention of the State in our lives and exempts it from having to reduce public spending.(…) It is a form of totalitarianism,” said Philippe Herlin after a long speech which never provoked the reaction of the other people on the set.

“It is the first time, in France and internationally, that Arcom or another regulatory authority issues a financial penalty for a violation related to an environmental issue,” underlines QuotaClimat, an organization that works to give more space to ecology, climate and biodiversity in the media.

Cnews is the French FoxNews

For his promotion of the ideas ofFrench far right and the spread of fake news and conspiracy theories, the channel has been compared to a French version of Fox News.And this is just the latest a long series of sanctions:among these, it is worth mentioning the one received in May 2022, when Arcom imposed a fine of 200 thousand euros for not having respected "the obligation of honesty and rigor in the presentation and treatment of news", following extremist statements by Éric Zemmour, among the channel's regular guests.

Furthermore, following a reminder by the Council of State for failure to respect journalistic standards and diversity, presented by the organization Reporters Without Borders, CNews launched a campaign of hatred and disinformation against the same organization, supported by fake news sites created specifically to discredit it.

Justice is done, then?It's still too early to tell.What is certain is that the CNews' broadcast licenses will expire in 2025, and it will be Arcom to decide whether to renew them or not.Continued sanctions and recalls could weigh on this decision.