A man who wrote that pro-choice activists should be shot “in the head one by one” has been reported to the police.

The Facebook comment, posted by a user beneath a TVM article about a demonstration in Valletta, said activists carrying pro-abortion banners deserved to be killed.

Activists from Moviment Graffitti and Voice for Choice held up signs reading "my body, my life, my choice" and urged authorities to "trust women".

Lawyer and activist Lara Dimitrijevic highlighted the comment on her Facebook wall and said she would be reporting the person to the police.

“Right to peaceful protest is a right as much as is freedom of speech,” she wrote.

She subsequently told Times of Malta that she had filed a report about the comment with the police on Sunday afternoon. 

Hate speech and incitement to violence are both crimes under Maltese law. A 2018 Eurobarometer survey found that Malta has the highest rate of online hate speech across the EU.

Dr Dimitrijevic is no stranger to reading hate speech or death threats: her work as director of the Women’s Rights Foundation makes her a prime target for abuse and threatening language, as she told Times of Malta last February.