Police to press charges over online harassment of Maltese activist Tina Urso
The police are to charges against an individual who subjected a Maltese activist to online harassment after she attended a protest outside a gala dinner in London promoting Malta’s controversial Individual Investor Programme.
A police spokesperson has confirmed that a person will be prosecuted but no further detail has been provided as the individual has not yet been arraigned in court.
Following the protest, which also saw the campaigners engage in a debate with tenor Joseph Calleja, social media was flooded with derogatory comments directed at Tina Urso, an activist who forms part of Il-Kenniesa, with some even sharing her personal details, including her address and ID card number.
Artistic director Mario Philip Azzopardi called her a “sorry bitch” after she participated in and filmed the London demonstration. He later apologised, claiming he had ‘fallen victim’ to ‘fake news’.
A Bloomberg News feature on global state-sponsored trolling subsequently reported:
“Tina Urso went to bed on 21 April pleased with the small protest she helped organize in London around the visit of Malta’s prime minister. She wanted to call attention to the country’s unusual practice of selling passports to foreigners and the money laundering it has engendered. By the time she woke up, her Facebook feed was deluged with threats of violence and misogynist insults, including the false charge that she ran an escort service.
“Researchers concluded the attacks were coordinated through private Facebook groups administered by government employees and officials of Malta’s ruling Labour Party. Participants would eventually publish her parents’ address, as well as her confidential National ID card number.
“‘My Facebook account was flooded with notifications, people sharing everything about me, manipulating photos taken from my profile,’ Urso said. ‘It was just insane what they were able to do in just a few hours.’”
The Institute for the Future, the authors of the report, is a nonpartisan, foresight research and public policy group based in Palo Alto, California. It includes a group of global researchers who have uncovered evidence of state-sponsored trolling in seven countries, including Azerbaijan, Turkey and the United States.
At last April’s protest, Calleja was hauled over the coals by demonstrators as he made his way into the Henley & Partners event, which was also attended by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and his wife.
The tenor took time to speak to the protesters, saying that although he did not agree with “many of Daphne’s writings,” he was there to fulfil a commitment made years before.
“I am here as a professional; as a cultural ambassador,” he said. “It is not an endorsement of the passport scheme,” he insisted. He also told protesters outside the venue a number of times to “have faith.”
Later on that evening, Calleja announced he had conducted his own personal protest within the hall, taking to Facebook to say that he had closed the Henley & Partners concert by dedicating the prayer from Verdi’s Requiem Ingemisco to assassinated journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia.
He said he had also donated his fee for the night to the BOV Joseph Calleja Foundation and to the Our Lady Mother of God Carmelite Monastery. He added that Archbishop Charles Scicluna had been aware of his plans before the concert and that he would supervise the donations.
His ended his Facebook post with what can ostensibly be considered something of a taunt: #HenleyandPartners.