End the war “quite simply”.
Radio listeners want to have Selenskyj beheaded
08/23/2023, 8:07 p.m
Every Monday, Deutschlandfunk publishes listener statements in its program “Kontrovers”. One man’s statement now lives up to the name of the program: In order for the war to come to a quick end, the Ukrainian president should be quartered and beheaded.
A listener’s statement on Deutschlandfunk (DLF) about the Ukraine war caused a stir and outrage. As usual, the station based in Cologne had broadcast recordings of listener statements in its call program “Kontrovers” on Mondays. This time, a listener, who said he was from Bremerhaven, left on the answering machine that the Ukraine war could be ended “quite simply” by arresting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his “gang of genocides”, quartering them alive and beheading them.
The “Bild” reported on Wednesday about the broadcast statement and quoted a lawyer who wanted to file criminal charges against both the listener and the editors, for example for hate speech and aiding and abetting public incitement to commit crimes. At the request of the German Press Agency, a spokesman for the Cologne public prosecutor’s office said that his authority had not yet received any criminal charges on the matter.
A spokesman for Deutschlandfunk explained when asked by dpa: “‘Kontrovers’ is a program with live listener participation, in which pre-produced listener statements are also broadcast. These listener statements are compiled by an editorial team. An attempt is made to convey a broad range of opinions on the topics discussed. In the broadcast of August 21, a 15-second drastic listener statement was reproduced within a collage. This passage of the broadcast was removed after a renewed editorial review.”
The discussion program entitled “Ukraine – How can Russia’s war of aggression be ended?” is still available in the Deutschlandradio audio library. But: “The audio of the program was shortened by the corresponding passage on the morning of the following day,” was the explanation of a DLF spokesman.