“Narodnaya Volya” May Change Format :: Charter'97 :: News

Today the staff of the independent newspaper “Narodnaya Volya” prepares the tomorrow’s number. It is possible that the Saturday issue would be printed as well. Tomorrow issue is to be dedicated solely to the situation of the newspaper. The printing house “Krasnaya Zvezda” and the state distributor “Belsajuzdruk” refused to print and deliver the only independent daily newspaper of Belarus.

On September 20-21 officers of the court distrained the property of the newspaper. As a result, alienation of property under execution is prohibited; a big lot of paper is arrested, the operating account of the “Narodnaya Volya” is blocked until the full transfer of the compensation sum. The newspaper is to pay 100 mln Br to the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party Syarhei Hajdukevich as a compensation for moral damage inflicted by one of the articles about his links with Saddam Hussein regime. It is worth mentioning that the newspaper has already paid more than 70 mln rubles of fine.

In the tomorrow’s issue of the “Narodnaya Volya” the reaction of its readers and famous persons to the problems of the newspaper are to be published. Part of the transcript of the shorthand report of the court with the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Belarus and the oral pleading of the former Hajdukevich’s fellow party member Alyaksandr Rabataj is to be published as well. A. Rabataj argues that the LDPB leader had economical contacts with the regime of Saddam Hussein.

Today the editor-in-chief of the “Narodnaya Volya” Iosif Syaredzich addressed his employees. He said that the newspaper will be published whatever happens. It is possible that the form of work would be changed, or the format of the newspaper. The newspaper might be published as special issues, as the “Komsomolskaya Pravda” was issued during the putsch in the year 1991.