IFEX
23 October 2014
Belarusian Association of Journalists
The following summary of free expression cases, written and compiled
by The Belarusian Association of Journalists, documents the period from
25 August - 21 September 2014.
Journalists penalized for cooperation with foreign media
Within the reporting period of 25 August - 21 September, authorities
continued with the administrative prosecution of freelance journalists
for cooperating with foreign mass media without accreditation. A blatant
precedent occurred in Mahilow when law enforcement agencies searched a
journalist's flat, as well as that of his parents, only on the basis of
his online publications on a foreign mass media website.
On 26 August, the central district court of Homel was supposed to
consider the appeal of Mikola Bianko, who had complained about a warning
issued by the first prosecutor's deputy of the Homel region. The
journalist was accused of violating the law by producing material for
Poland-based Radio Racyja without accreditation.
The journalist argued that the official's actions violated his
constitutional rights and lawful interests. The judge rejected the
appeal, claiming that the one-month period for appealing the
prosecutor's decision had expired. The warning was issued to Mikola
Bianko and his wife Yuliya Sivets on 5 March. He first complained
against the warning to the regional and the general prosecutor's office.
The regional prosecutor's office replied on 25 March and the general
prosecutor's office replied on 25 May; both appeals were dismissed. The
appeal to court was filed on May 29, which was within appeal terms, says
Leanid Sudalenka, the lawyer of BAJ from Homel. The judge did not seem
friendly, as she refused to hold the hearing in the Belarusian language,
what the plaintiff had motioned for, and forbade Leanid Sudalenka to
speak on the journalist's behalf, although he is able to be a
representative of a BAJ member by law. The judge also forbade taking
pictures.
Restrictions on arts reporting
On 27 August, an employee of the ideological department of the
Hlybokaye District Executive Committee prevented a local journalist, BAJ
member Zmitser Lupach, from working at a festival of Christian movies, Magnificat.
The journalist had requested and got accreditation from the organizer
of the festival. However, he was not allowed to enter the journalists'
bus heading for the venue; the official representative claimed than the
journalist did not have accreditation and could not go along with the
other journalists.
Censorship of "extremist" literature
On 29 August, an anarchist movement activist, Raman Khlalilau, was
summoned by police, who presented an administrative report against, him
according to article 17.1 of the Administrative Code – “production,
distributions and (or) storing extremist materials”. On 27 August, the
activist was released from the first 10 days of his initial arrest – for
resisting police officers. The same day, police came to his dormitory
and confiscated his books, newspapers and leaflets. On 29 August, judge
Artiom Biaskishski considered the case and concluded that the print
materials confiscated from the activist were extremist. He then
sentenced Khlalilau to 10 days of administrative arrest.
“From all the materials confiscated, only one leaflet was attached
to the case materials; as for the rest, only their titles were written
in the report; there is literature which does not even relate to
politics – history books etc. At the trial, all titles were read aloud,
and the judge said all of them belonged to extremist materials. And I
stored them for distribution, so to say, for which I was arrested,” says
Raman Khalilau. “The Art of War” by Sun Tzu, “Social Anarchism or
Lifestyle Anarchism”, leaflets “Nuclear station: all truth about danger.
Anti-atom resistance”, “How to make a strike”, “Aims of anarchism in
strategic plan”, newspaper Nasha Prauda (Our Truth), the book “Chernobyl
Lessons” - these are some of the “extremist materials” mentioned in the
report. Also, there was “a leaflet in German”.
Lawyer Pavel Sapielka says that the Law on Counteracting Extremism
definitely explains what extremism, extremist actions and materials
mean, and stipulates the procedure for how to assess print materials in
respect to extremist content. The lawyer claims that the judge violated
national legislation. The judge claimed by himself that the confiscated
materials were extremist only by reading out titles in a 20-minute
trial. He unjustly rejected the motion where the defendant said he
wasn't going to distribute the materials. Besides, the punishment was
the harshest in this case, which testifies to the biased attitude of the
judge. Lawyer Pavel Sapielka is filing the appeal and he is sure it
will be upheld by the Minsk City Court.
Reporters detained for covering civil society initiative
On 3 September, a group of TV journalists were detained near a metro
station in Minsk at around 6:30 pm. They were producing a TV episode
about an action by the organizational committee of the Belarusian
Christian Democracy Party. The people were collecting signatures for a
petition to stop Russian TV channels being broadcast in Belarus. The
activists and the journalists were taken to the police department of the
Frunzenski district. The journalists, among them freelancer Viachaslau
Piashko, were set free after interrogation, approximately three hours
later. No administrative reports were drawn up.
Accreditation denied
At the 111th session, held from 7-25 July, the Human Rights
Committee of the United Nations considered the case of "Maryna Koktysh
against Belarus" (№1985/2010) referring to the obstacles that journalist
Maryna Koktysh, of the independent newspaper Narodnaya Volya in getting accreditation to the House of Representatives of the National Assembly (lower chamber of the Belarusian parliament).
In the autumn of 2007, Maryna Koktysh, who had previously been
accredited at the House of Representatives of the National Assembly, was
denied accreditation for the first time. The refusal was explained by a
decision of the Presidential Security Service. From then on, the
newspaper and the journalist tried to appeal against the refusal in
courts of different levels, but to no avail.
Considering this case, the Human Rights Committee concluded that –
by creating obstacles to the journalist in obtaining information – the
government violated Article 19 (2) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (the freedom to seek, receive and impart information).
Arrested for interviewing activist
On 16 September, BAJ members and freelancers Natallia Valakaida and
Ales Barasenka, as well as BelaPAN correspondent Siarhei Satsiuk, were
detained for three hours after conducting an interview with Homel
activist Yury Rubtsow, before his administrative trial over insulting a
judge. The detention was performed by plain-clothed police, according to
one of the detainees. They wanted to verify if the journalists were
accredited. The journalists were set free three hours later, without any
protocols.
Search and seizure
On the morning of 16 September, police approached Aliaksandr
Burakow, an independent journalist from Mahilow, and announced they were
going to search his flat.
Five police officers and two witnesses entered Burakow's flat without
waiting for an invitation. The process lasted for around an hour and was
recorded with a video camera. The searches were sanctioned by the
prosecutor's office of Mahilow city. The searches followed three
publications on the website dw.de authored by Aliaksandr Burakow. As a
result, the police seized two laptops belonging to the journalist's wife
and two flashcards, ignoring the argument that the computers were not
used by the journalist. Aliaksandr Burakow refused to sign the search
report.
On the same day, the journalist was questioned by police; the
questioning lasted around an hour and a half and was recorded with a
video camera. Burakow was accused of violating article 22.9 of the
Administrative Code – unlawful production and distribution of mass media
products, and of violating article 35, part 4 of the Law on Mass Media –
working for foreign mass media without accreditation. The journalist
filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office against the police, over
the seizure of four computers (two from his flat and the other two from
his parents' flat).