Nine people are expected to be charged in court in Malta for wearing religious vestments during the recent carnival, the police said. The nine people aged between 20 and 35 years will be marched to court after Maltese bishops raised concerns about the behaviour of certain individuals and the costumes worn during this year's carnival in the small island of Gozo.

It is customary for some young people to dress up as priests and nuns during the rowdy carnival in the staunchly Catholic island.

The accused will face charges under a section of the Criminal Code which bars people from dressing up as priests or donning Church vestments or naval/military uniforms without a permit.

A spokesman for the Justice Ministry said photographs published in the media demonstrated that the behaviour was not simply a case of people dressing up as Christ or the saints but more a question of public indecency and offending religious sentiment.

Maltese Archbishop Paul Cremona and Gozo Bishop Mario Grech said in a statement: It is good for society to defend the rights of minorities who have different views from the majority of the public. But no one should have the right to ridicule the belief of others in this way.

The bishops condemned what had taken place at the carnival and said those involved needed to recognize and respect religious and civil rights. The bishops said that if no action was taken, the authorities would be endorsing and approving such illegal behaviour. They also said that this should not be allowed to happen again.

A Council of Europe (CoE) study on freedom of expression and freedom of religion, argues that it is no longer desirable for European democracies to criminalise blasphemy, and calls for the abolishment of such laws.

Malta is one of the few European states that penalises the public vilification of the Roman Catholic religion with a maximum term of sixth months' imprisonment – and three months for other religions.

Only Greece contemplates a higher term – two years' imprisonment – for malicious blasphemy.

The debate on so-called religious insult was brought to the fore by the Board of Film and Stage Classification's decision to ban the play Stitching, for reasons that included blasphemy.

And adding to the dose of ecclesiastical umbrage, only this week seven revellers at the Nadur carnival were arraigned for dressing up as priests – much to the outrage of the bishops. It seems Malta has reverted back to 1959.

The report on European laws on religious insult and incitement to hatred in all the European nations, was prepared by the Venice Commission, an advisory body of the Council of Europe composed of experts of constitutional law.

In their two-year study, the experts concluded that it is neither necessary nor desirable to create an offence of religious insult, that is insult to religious feelings, without the element of incitement to hatred as an essential component.

The Commission argues that pluralism, tolerance and broadmindedness means that freedom of expression should not be limited to protect an individual's belief from criticism.
The right to freedom of expression implies that it should be allowed to scrutinise, openly debate, and criticise, even harshly and unreasonably, belief systems… as long as this does not amount to advocating hatred.

The Commission argues that the offence of blasphemy should be abolished” and that democratic societies must not become hostage to the excessive sensitivities of certain individuals… the level of tolerance of these individuals who would feel offended by the right to freedom of expression should be raised. A democracy must not fear debate, even on the most shocking or anti-democratic ideas… persuasion, as opposed to ban or repression, is the most democratic means of preserving fundamental values.

Criminal procedures were initiated against 162 Maltese people for blaspheming in public in the first three months of this year, Home Affairs Minister Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici said.

Replying to a parliamentary question by Labour MP Evarist Bartolo the minister said that similar proceedings were taken against 621 people last year.

Malta boasts a religious law so oppressive it might put the Taliban to shame.

Last week, six young people narrowly escaped a prison sentence because they dressed up as nuns at a carnival. They had been charged under Articles 163-164 of the Malta Criminal Code, which provides that:

163. Whosoever by words, gestures, written matter, whether printed or not, or pictures or by some other visible means, publicly vilifies the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religion which is the religion of Malta, or gives offence to the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religion by vilifying those who profess such religion or its ministers, or anything which forms the object of, or is consecrated to, or is necessarily destined for Roman Catholic worship, shall, on conviction, be liable to imprisonment for a term from one to six months.

164. Whosoever commits any of the acts referred to in the last preceding article against any cult tolerated by law, shall, on conviction, be liable to imprisonment for a term from one to three months.

The Magistrate who heard the original case against the carnival-goers said the youngsters were not wearing crosses and the costumes did not constitute a sacred garment and therefore the law didn't apply. However, the Attorney General didn't agree and appealed the Magistrate's decision to the Court of Criminal Appeal, which ruled:

The mere fact of dressing up as nun, even if for carnival, but without wearing any religious symbol, cannot reasonably be considered as amounting to public vilification of the Roman Catholic Religion, or of those belonging to such religion, or of its ministers, or of anything which forms the object of, or is consecrated to, or is necessarily destined for Roman Catholic worship. However, if the wearing of such a habit were accompanied with such circumstances of fact, words or gestures which objectively amount to vilification, then there would be an offence in terms of article 163.

How did this nasty legislation get missed when allowing Malta to join the EU+ Especially with all rights abusing easy extradition treaty that could be applied to EU wide internet publishing.