Harassment of Hazeta Slonimskaya going on

08.05.2008. Tags: freedom of speech, mass media.
Source: Charter`97.

The head of the psychoneurologic department of Slonim central district hospital received a letter signed by the head of the local branch of the KGB Aliaksandr Mazalkou with an order to check the editor-in-chief of an independent newspaper Hazeta Slonimskaya Viktar Valadashchuk and his relatives, whether they are listed in databases of psychoneurologic and narcological dispensaries.

Besides, a military commissar of Slonim district Yury Trush offered Viktar Valadashchuk to sign an application in which the journalist is to agree for holding a check by state security institution against him, and in this connection he was to agree to his privacy’s temporary limitation. As said by Viktar Valadashchuk, these measures against him are directly connected with a desire of the regime to liquidate the only independent newspaper of the region, Hazeta Slonimskaya.

‘It is clear that an independent newspaper in a provincial town today worries the authorities more than productivity of land and salaries at enterprises. The matter is that we are writing about what is happening and not what should be under orders from higher authorities, the journalist said to Radio Racyja.

12 May Viktar Valadashchuk is to come to Slonim military enlistment office to take part in the reserve duty training exercise. The journalist believes that in this way the authorities are trying to block his activities in his position of the editor-in-chief, as during the same period of time tax police intends to carry out a check, while the local regional executive committee is to consider a question of extending their license for trade activities. Now Hazeta Slonimskaya has a possibility to reach readers only through a network of individual distributors, as a state-owned monopolist press distributor Belposhta had refused to distribute the newspaper and subscribe for it.