The anti-censorship group has praised the government for the measures it announced today to reform the laws dealing with pornography, saying that this is a “great victory”.

In a statement on Facebook, the group’s spokesman Ingram Bondin said that “another two of the Front's original proposals have been implemented. Namely, the articles which involved criminal prosecution for the vilification of religion have now been eliminated (!) and the pornography law used to prosecute Mark Camilleri and Alex Vella Gera has been reformed in such a way as not to make such prosecutions possible anymore.”

In 2009 author Alex Vella Gera and editor Mark Camilleri were arraigned in court for offending public morals with the publication of a sexually explicit and crude short story. They had been cleared of the charges.

“Gone are the days when the police could take the initiative and decide what was pornographic themselves, as in the aformentioned abuse of power involving Camilleri and Vella Gera. The much maligned article 208 will be replaced by a law which only controls 'extreme pornography', emulating the UK system. The law now clearly defines what is pornographic and what is extreme. For a prosecution to take place, both criteria have to be satisfied. In particular something is now pornographic if its intention is to cause sexual arousal, and it is extreme if it details necrophilia, bestiality, rape or any other act which puts in danger the life of a human being.

He said that last censorship reform which took place was related mainly to theatre, where “the censorship board lost its power to censor plays and we moved to a system of self-classification. However on that date, the Front had rightly pointed out that although plays could not be censored up front, the bulk of censorship laws (mostly of a criminal nature) were still in place and people could still be prosecuted after the play or for writing something in the spirit of 'Li Tkisser Sewwi'.”

“This is a great victory for all the Front's activists and for all our supporters. What's left now is to reform the clauses of the press act and drop the obsecene libel law which was also used against Mark Camilleri and Vella Gera. This will probably take place in a future reform of the press act,he wrote.