Intimidation, threats, lawsuits – we need a law with teeth to stop legal bullies!
Dragged into court in Hamburg over Indonesia, buried in cease-and-desist threats for defending Indigenous rights in Brazil – corporate bullies will go to great lengths to silence us. Germany’s proposed anti-SLAPP law is too weak – tell the German government that activists deserve real protection.
To: Federal Minister of Justice Stefanie Hubig, members of the German Bundestag
“Close the loopholes in the draft anti-SLAPP law: ensure that it covers out-of-court actions, and make SLAPP suits prohibitively expensive for claimants.”The first email from attorney G. arrived at 4:48 p.m. on a Friday: a cease-and-desist notice together with a declaration of compliance for us to sign. Before the deadline had even passed, the lawyer followed up with three more cease-and-desist notices, demands for compliance, and threats of legal action.
Such legal bullying is meant to intimidate us. But we will not be silenced!
The dispute arose over our campaign in support of the Indigenous Ka’apor people in Brazil.
The attorney stated that she represents a Ka’apor organization and claimed that our partner organization, Conselho Tuxa Ta Pame, speaks only for a minority of the people. She asserted that Conselho Tuxa Ta Pame’s opposition to a project by the company Wildlife Works does not reflect the will of the majority of the Ka’apor. The cease-and-desist letter mainly targeted allegations made by our partner organization against Wildlife Works.
Settling the issue with a single letter would have been sufficient. Expanding it into four rounds of legal correspondence was, in our eyes, a clear sign of an attempt to bully us into submission. Companies and powerful figures often use such actions to silence critics.
The German government has just proposed a law against abusive lawsuits. It implements an EU directive against SLAPP lawsuits that we supported, but the draft has serious gaps. As this case illustrates perfectly: out-of-court actions are not covered. Often, cease-and-desist letters, compliance demands, and threats of lawsuits are enough to silence critics.
We therefore call for the law to firmly include the out-of-court sphere.
The German anti-SLAPP alliance, of which we are a member, is calling for the same.
The anti-SLAPP law must have teeth!
These are the texts that were wrongly challenged:
Petition, published on 5/5/2025
Brazil: Keep US carbon traders OUT of the Ka’apor rainforest!
Articles:
12/20/2023: Brazil: US carbon traders stoke conflict among Indigenous Ka'apor
2/20/2024: Brazil: Indigenous Ka’apor people denounce abuses by carbon traders
6/5/2025: Court halts Wildlife Works' carbon trading project in the Amazon rainforest
Why these warnings amount to a SLAPP
To understand lawsuits and out-of-court measures such as cease-and-desist notices as SLAPPs, one can look at several indicators. In this case, our lawyer summarizes it as follows:
“In my assessment, issuing four extensive cease-and-desist warnings within just a few days against an NGO organized as a nonprofit, combined with the clear economic interest of the US company Wildlife Works LLP, bears all the hallmarks of a SLAPP.”
This strategy seeks to launch several attacks at once while exploiting the imbalance between a US corporation and an association, particularly in financial terms.
In a statement on the draft bill to the Federal Ministry of Justice, Prof. Dr. Roger Mann writes:
“Practice shows that to circumvent a SLAPP accusation, suing companies no longer file cases themselves. Instead, groups appear as alleged claimants if they have agreed to do so with the suing companies. If there are several Indigenous groups and their representatives, one group may act as the plaintiff even though it is obvious that the company’s economic interests are the true driving force behind such an arrangement.”
EU and Council of Europe adopt rules against SLAPPs
Both the EU and the Council of Europe have adopted international legal instruments against intimidation lawsuits.
The EU Directive 2024/1069 was adopted on 4/16/2024. The 27 member states have until 5/7/2026 to transpose it into national law.
The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe (46 members, all European countries except Russia, Belarus, Kosovo, and the Vatican) published its Recommendation CM/Rec(2024)2 on combating SLAPPs on 4/5/2024. There is no deadline for implementation.
European Anti-SLAPP Monitor
The European Anti-SLAPP Monitor tracks how far member states of both organizations, plus Kosovo, have progressed with transposing the rules into national law. It was launched by the European coalition CASE. By summer 2025, 17 countries had started implementation, while 10 had not. Information was missing for 19. Only Malta has completed the process.
The Monitor continuously analyzes the strength of SLAPP protections in each country and links to key documents.
EU anti-SLAPP directive is also our achievement
The German government’s draft bill is also based on our work. For the EU directive against SLAPPs, Rainforest Rescue strongly advocated with the petition “Protect democracy now: stop abusive lawsuits!”. We are also active in the European CASE network and its German working group.
Together with partner organizations, we personally delivered the petition with 213,432 signatures in Brussels to then EU Commissioner Věra Jourová. The Vice-President of the European Commission played a crucial role in ensuring that this directive was adopted.
To: Federal Minister of Justice Stefanie Hubig, members of the German Bundestag
Dear Federal Minister of Justice Stefanie Hubig,
dear ministers,
dear members of the German Bundestag,
We warmly welcome the draft law to implement EU Anti-SLAPP Directive 2024/1069.
We particularly value:
- that the law is intended to cover domestic cases as well as cross-border ones,
- the requirement for expedited proceedings,
- the option for rapid dismissal of lawsuits,
- the broader rules on reimbursement of costs.
As an environmental organization, we are directly affected by SLAPPs – in 2019, we were the target of an abusive lawsuit brought by an Indonesian company before the Hamburg Regional Court.
At that time, we campaigned within the European CASE network for the adoption of an EU Anti-SLAPP Directive. Our petition with 213,432 signatures was personally submitted to the then Vice President of the European Commission, Věra Jourová.
Just as the legislative process for the German Anti-SLAPP law began, we once again became the target of a SLAPP attempt. The four cease-and-desist letters, demands for injunctions, and threats of litigation we received within one week from a lawyer demonstrate the greatest shortcoming of the current draft law:
It fails to address out-of-court actions.
Yet unjustified cease-and-desist letters, demands for injunctions, and threats of litigation are often enough to silence critics.
We therefore call for the extrajudicial sphere to be effectively integrated into the law.
Possible measures could be modeled on Section 97a of the German Copyright Act, including a 1,000-euro cap on the costs of a first cease-and-desist letter and mandatory reimbursement in cases where such letters are unfounded.
We also call for the following:
- explicit consideration of strategies such as serial or parallel proceedings,
- extending the definition of SLAPPs to those that are “partly justified,”
- making SLAPPs prohibitively costly for claimants, for example through higher fees,
- sanctions against law firms notorious for SLAPPs, and
- stronger support services for SLAPP victims.
We also endorse the statement of the German Anti-SLAPP Alliance.
The draft law is an important first step. However, it needs to be sharpened in order to provide meaningful support for SLAPP victims and to deter those who misuse the law to intimidate critics.
Yours faithfully,
A cease-and-desist notice in this context is a demand – usually sent by a lawyer by email or letter – to correct or remove a particular publication and not to repeat it. It is typically accompanied by a request to sign a declaration of compliance, together with the threat of heavy fines or legal action if the recipient fails to comply within a short deadline, usually just a few days. Such demands often concern alleged violations of personal rights through supposedly false factual claims, intrusions into privacy, or defamatory language.
The stated aim of cease-and-desist notices is to resolve disputes quickly, without lengthy court proceedings and at limited cost. This can be beneficial for both sides, particularly when a such a notice is justified.
In practice, however, cease-and-desist notices and declarations of compliance are often misused as a means of intimidation.
In three articles and a petition, we reported that a planned carbon trading project by the U.S. company Wildlife Works in the Brazilian Amazon is causing conflict among the Indigenous inhabitants. Our partner organization, the Council of the Ka’apor Tuxa Ta Pame, opposes the project.
Attorney G. claims that our articles created the impression that all Ka’apor oppose the project. She states that her client, the association “Associação Kaapor Ta hury Rio Gurupi,” represents “together with the 24 chiefs, 95 percent of the Ka’apor.” According to the attorney, these support Wildlife Works.
SLAPP stands for “strategic lawsuits against public participation”.
The German anti-SLAPP alliance, the anti-SLAPP contact point, and Prof. Dr. Roger Mann, who represented us in this case, have submitted statements on the draft law to the Federal Ministry of Justice. You can download them in a zip file here.
Please note that not all of the submissions reflect our position or correspond to our demands.
Attorney G. has posted a critical comment on the draft law on LinkedIn.