BAJ urges to bring to book those guilty of illegal “Glos znad Niemna” issue :: Charter'97 :: News

June 23, the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) addressed a range of state institutions asking them to take measures on ceasing the wrongful acts of illegal issue and distribution of the “Glos znad Niemna” newspaper and on bringing the guilty to book. The BAJ appeal was sent to Minister of Information Uladzimir Rusakievich, Minister of Communication Services Uladzimir Gancharenka, head of the State Control Committee Anatol Tozik, Attorney General Piotar Miklashevich and also to the Public Prosecutor of Grodna Region, chairperson of the Grodna Office of RUE (Republican Unitarian Enterprise) “Belposhta” and the head of the Grodna publishing house.

The successive appearance of two issues of the newspaper “Glos znad Niemna” of June 10 and 17, that were printed and distributed without permission of the editor-in-chief and without knowledge of the founder of the Union of Poles in Belarus, stipulated the initiative to compose the appeal. This is a breach of part 7 of article 25 of the law “Of the press and other Mass Media”, the BAJ claims. The fact that the edition was published without the proper juridical, technological, bookkeeping documentation being drawn up, “is a rough violation of the polygraphic processes fulfillment demands… and the activity in the scope of communication”, as it is out in the appeal.

The BAJ reminds that the illegal distribution of the Mass Media production without permission to be published is recognized as a breach of the Mass Media legislature according to article 50 of the law “Of the press and other Mass Media” and implies disciplinary, administrative, criminal and other types of responsibility in compliance with the legislature of the Republic of Belarus. “Nevertheless, the appeals of the executive workers of the publishing house and the founder of the newspaper to the state institutions calling to stop the violations of the law have led to nothing so far,” - the BAJ states.