Newspaper in Molodechno to petition authorities over three-month ban :: Charter'97 :: News

A local newspaper in Molodechno, Minsk region, on Thursday started collecting signatures of its readers to a petition urging the authorities to annul a three-month ban. Rehiyanalnaya Hazeta was suspended for three months by a September 24 order of Information Minister Vladimir Rusakevich over two warnings issued by the ministry on the same day for alleged violations of the Media Law. In particular, the ministry accused the paper, among other things, of publishing an unregistered TV guide supplement and switching to a weekly publication schedule without notification.

Chief editor and co-founder Aleksandr Mantsevich described the ban as “politically-motivated,” saying that the true reason behind the suspension was the paper’s coverage of a dispute between parliamentary candidate Vladislav Skvernik and the district government.

As Mr. Mantsevich told BelaPAN, he was not allowed to meet with the information minister. “The most unpleasant thing is that we cannot inform our readership about what happened,” he said. According to him, a resident of a village outside Molodechno learned about the suspension from a radio report and began collecting signatures in support of the paper.

The chief editor plans to deliver the petition to information ministry officials on October 1.