"It is clear to me that editorial control and editorial suppression has been exercised. And that journalists have been prevented from properly reporting and honestly matters of very great concern. That also is intolerable." Sir Roger Gale said in an address to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).
On Thursday, PACE is debating the recent attacks against women in a number of European cities and the need for a comprehensive response.
Gale drew attention to paragraph 5 of the draft resolution discussed in PACE, which says the media "should not, in order to pursue political correctness, hide the truth from the German public."
"We have to be open, we have to be honest, we have to recognise when there are problems," the lawmaker said.
Hundreds of women in the German city of Cologne have filed police complaints of sexual assault or rape allegedly committed by groups of men of North African and Arab appearance on New Year's Eve. Following the attacks, police and state media were accused of making efforts to suppress information about the perpetrators to avoid stoking tensions amid massive migration to the country from war-torn Middle Eastern countries.
