Serbian Reporters Support Markevich and Mazheika :: Charter'97 :: News

The Serbian Independent Association of Journalists issued a severe protest note relating to the sentence of “Pahonia’s” journalists Mikola Markevich and Paval Mazheika. On July 10 the protest was handed to the Ambassador of the Republic of Belarus in Serbia and spread in mass media.

“Hrodna Public Prosecutor’s Office accused the journalists of libeling the president of Belarus in the Pahonia newspaper, though three expert groups, two of them being invited by the prosecutor’s office, concluded that the publication contains no libel,” – the note reads.

The initiators of the protest note was one of the largest Serbian non-state organizations “the Civil Initiatives”. Its executive director Milenka Dereta visited the editorial office of the Pahonia in the beginning of June. During his conversation with the accused editor-in-chief Mikola Markevich and reporter Paval Mazheika Mr. Dereta promised to do his best to raise a wave of protests in his Homeland against the court verdict over the Belarusian journalists.