HAMBURG, Germany, May 15 (Reuters) - A German court on Tuesday rejected Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan's appeal to ban outright a satirical poem recited by a comedian on German television, which had soured already-strained ties between Berlin and Ankara. The higher regional court of Hamburg confirmed the ruling of the district court of Hamburg that parts of the poem could be banned because they contained degradations of an intimate and sexual nature for which there was no evidence. The continuation of the partial ban was a defeat for both Erdogan, who had demanded the entire poem be censored, and for Böhmermann, who had called for the partial banned to be lifted. Judge Andreas Buske also expressed doubt that Böhmermann's poem fell under the constitutional classification of art and was therefore subject to corresponding protections. “If satire is not art, it is protected by the freedom of opinion.”

It decided that in view of developments in Turkey under Erdoğan’s leadership, criticism, including severe criticism, is admissible and that Erdoğan must accept that.
A Hamburg court upholds a 2017 ban on passages of Jan Böhmermann's poem Schmähkritik.