A writer who denied the Holocaust occurred was fined Thursday $3,000 and given a four-month suspended sentence in the town of Melun, southeast of Paris, after being found guilty of slandering the dead.
The defendant, Michel Konen, was the first revisionist writer to be sentenced.
A part-time historian, he denied the existence of gas chambers and extermination camps in an article published in the small provincial newspaper, Le Pays Briard.
Its editor, Michel Vincent, who argued that the freedom of the press was being violated, was fined a similar amount.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
