The leading German television consortium ARD, through its broadcaster Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR), will not appeal a German court’s decision to prohibit the dissemination of allegations about a “referee bribery system” within the International Fencing Federation (FIE).

On August 4, 2024, ARD broadcast a report that contained a number of slanderous and untrue statements about fencing with regard to an alleged “system of bribing referees” in the FIE.

FIE President-elect Alisher Usmanov, who voluntarily suspended his duties in March 2022 due to EU sanctions and was named in the report as the “creator” of this “system”, filed a claim with the Hamburg Regional Court seeking an injunction against WDR, a member of the ARD consortium, which had disseminated the slanderous allegations. In September 2024, the statements were banned by a decision of this Court, which found them to be “inadmissible suspicion-based reporting”. As a consequence of the ruling, the broadcaster may no longer reproduce or disseminate these statements.

Earlier, the statements had also been removed by several other media outlets following pretrial proceedings.

On October 23, WDR issued a written conclusive statement “on recognizing the Hamburg [Court’s injunction]” and “waiving all rights to challenge it”. The scandalous report has since been removed.

FIE Interim President Emmanuel Katsiadakis stated, “We welcome the decision made by WDR and ARD. Although the information in the report was knowingly false and speculative, acknowledging their wrongdoing does credit to any news organisation. I hope and trust that they will be strong and work through their mistakes. After all, there should be no place for defamation and fabricated stories in journalism.”