On Thursday, a decide within the UK dominated in favor of Iceland’s largest fishing firm, Samherji, after it sued an Icelandic artist who, posing as the corporate, apologized for its alleged position within the so-called Fishrot scandal.
The choice comes after a listening to in London in September, when Samherji accused the artist – Oddur Eysteinn Friðriksson, referred to as ODEE – of mental copyright and malicious falsehood, amongst different costs. Samherji was additionally in search of damages and demanded a abstract judgement to determine the result and not using a trial, which the decide has now accepted.
The Fishrot scandal takes its identify from a cache of over 30,000 paperwork leaked by a former Samherij worker in Namibia and printed by Wikileaks in November 2019. The information element e-mail correspondence between Samherji’s workers suggesting that the corporate paid hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in bribes to high-ranking politicians and officers in Namibia to accumulate the southern African nation’s fishing quota.
Samherji had strongly denied allegations of bribery and the ten accused Namibian officers have protested their innocence amid detention for greater than 4 years. The case reached Namibia’s excessive court docket on the finish of 2023 and is ongoing.
In 2023 ODEE created an paintings titled We’re Sorry, a pretend UK-registered web site replicating Samherji’s official web site, however with the paintings’s title plastered in massive font throughout the homepage. As a part of the paintings, ODDE additionally painted the phrases “WE’RE SORRY” on a wall at Iceland’s Reykjavík Artwork Museum. The third ingredient of the paintings was a press launch titled “Samherji Apologizes, Pledges Restitution and Cooperation with Authorities” that ODEE despatched to 100 international media retailers in 20 completely different nations.
“We at Samherji want to difficulty a proper apology for our involvement associated to the Fishrot scandal,” the pretend press launch reads. “We acknowledge the severity of the allegations in opposition to us, which embody corruption, bribery, and neocolonialism. These actions have undermined Namibia’s governance and disadvantaged the nation of important revenues for well being and schooling.”
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It continued: “We admit to utilizing facilitation charges to allow corrupt monetary transactions, extracting income from Namibia, and paying minimal taxes.”
A UK excessive court docket decide accepted an interim injunction final Might to take down the web site.
ODEE, who’s represented by Andra Matei, a free-speech lawyer primarily based in Paris, instructed ARTnews that he was not shocked by Thursday’s judgment. He has not but determined if he’ll attraction. “This isn’t the tip,” he mentioned. “The aim of the paintings apologizing was to place a highlight on company accountability – and in addition to spotlight freedom of expression for artists. Whatever the final result of the trial, the aim of the paintings has been served and elevated by Samherji and this case.”
After the decide’s choice on Thursday, Samherji’s CEO, Thorsteinn Már Baldvinsson, mentioned he was “happy” with the end result.
“We have been pressured to take authorized motion to guard our trademark when all different lenient resolutions have been rejected,” he mentioned in a press release. “The ruling clearly distinguishes between reliable creative expression and the misuse of a registered trademark. This judgment should be a matter of great consideration for the educational establishments that gave their blessing to apparent trademark violations below the guise of creative expression.”
Concerning the damages that Samherji is in search of from ODEE, the decide mentioned it’s more likely to be a “small sum.”
ODEE’s lawyer, Andra Matei, instructed ARTnews that they’re “swimming in opposition to the tide.”
“We by no means anticipated this to be simple or easy,” she mentioned. “We’re up in opposition to firms with hundreds of thousands and hundreds of thousands of {dollars} and authorized programs which have traditionally not paid consideration to the essential position that artists, similar to ODEE, play within the strengthening of democracies. For this reason – whereas we’re disenchanted – this choice has solely furthered out resolve to take this combat all the best way to the very finish.”
Earlier this week, the London-based Institute of Public Coverage Analysis (IPPR) urged Samherji to difficulty an apology for its involvement within the Fishrot scandal. The IPPR’s director, Graham Hopwood, mentioned 5 years after the scandal was uncovered, Namibians impacted by the scandal are but to obtain sufficient redress for the losses they’ve suffered.
“In consequence, the IPPR requires Samherji to make full redress to immediately affected and impacted people and communities for the disruption and devastation inflicted on their lives because of Fishrot,” he mentioned in a press release.