On 26 May 2005, police seized all the copies of the independent
weekly “Den” when it made a new attempt to publish. The paper has been off newsstands for one year according to Reporters Sanse Frontiers (RSF)(06-JUNE-05).

“Press freedom is still being completely trampled on in President Alexander
Lukashenko´s country. He has clearly made no effort to remedy the steep
deterioration in the working conditions of journalists who are not in thrall
to the government”, said RSF. “He does not appear ready to give up his place
on the organisation´s list of ´predators´ of press freedom.”

On 26 May, police seized 1,990 copies of the Grodno-based “Den”, in the town
of Dubrownya, about 30 kilometres from the Russian border, as a truck loaded
with the papers was making the journey from its printers in Smolensk,
Russia. The police said they needed to verify that the newspaper had been
printed legally.

“Den” editor-in-chief Mikalai Markevich told RSF´s correspondent that a
“reliable source” had said the seizure had been orchestrated by the Grodno
department of the State Security Committee (KGB), to prevent the weekly from
reappearing for the first time since 2 June 2004.

Four days earlier, the management of the Smolensk printing house received a
letter from Deputy Information Minister Liliya Ananich, instructing them
that the paper should not be printed, on the pretext that the authorities
had not been notified of its new address. The editor had then tried
unsuccessfully to meet the minister. She asked him to give his reasons in an
official letter.

The deputy minister´s letter forced the printing house to break its contract
with the weekly until she decided to lift the ban. The editor described the
injunction as “state terrorism” against press freedom.

Under the law, a newspaper has to register its new address with the
Information Ministry once it has been registered with the local authorities.

“Den” recently changed its Minsk address and asked the town´s executive
committee to register it on 18 April 2005, but the authorities deliberately
held it up.

Markevich lodged a request with the Information Ministry in which he
described the police seizure of copies of his weekly as “an unacceptable
obstacle to the legal process of regularising his newspaper” and asked the
minister to reverse the printing ban.

“Den” was regularly persecuted by the authorities during 2004, until
publication was finally halted on 2 June of that year.

In one instance, in May 2004, KGB officers seized four of its computers on
the pretext that the weekly had printed “insulting passages” about President
Lukashenko.

“Den” is published by the former editorial team of “Pahonya”, a weekly the
authorities closed in 2001. Markevich, who was also editor of that paper,
was sentenced to 18 months of hard labour for publishing an article in which
he accused the president of involvement in the disappearance of political
opponents. Pavel Mazheika, another member of the “Pahonya” team, was
sentenced to one year of hard labour for “insulting” President Lukashenko.

In another development, RSF condemned a decree issued by President Alexander
Lukashenko on 21 May 2005, banning all privately-owned news media from using
the words “national” or “Belarus” in their names. The decree, which does not
apply to the state media, gives newspapers three months to comply by
registering under a new name.

“This is a bit too obvious,” RSF said. “The sole aim of this presidential
decree is to sabotage the few remaining independent news media in Belarus.
Day after day, the government continues to find new ways to curb press
freedom and harass news media that are not subservient to President
Lukashenko. In clearly choosing to discriminate against the privately-owned
media, Lukashenko seems to have abandoned any concern for legal subtleties
and has taken an undemocratic decision with the sole aim of crushing press
diversity,” RSF added.

The newspapers that will be forced to change their names include
“Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta”, “Belorussky Rynok”, “Belorusskaya Gazeta”
and “Natsionalnaya Ekomicheskaya Gazeta”. Not only will they have to spend
money to re-register, but they will also have to deal with the technical
difficulties of changing their logo and layout, and their banking details.
They could also lose readers who fail to recognise the papers by their new
names.

For further information, contact Benjamin Joyeux at RSF, 5, rue Geoffroy
Marie, Paris 75009, France, tel: +33 1 44 83 84 65, fax: +33 1 45 23 11 51,
e-mail: europe2@rsf.org, Internet: http://www.rsf.org