As a positive development Mr Bastunets acknowledged that this law has suspended development of the resolution “On regulating Internet resources,” and that approaches to registration and re-registration of mass media have been somewhat “liberalized.” Also he welcomed the restrained by the Ministry of Information in using “repression mechanisms, for which the law provides.”
Yet despite positive developments the approach to a mass media registration is difficult call exactly democratic. As Bastunets comments, in countries with the democratic regime there is no compulsory registration for publications. In Belarus this process is still a must and it takes quite a long time, for about a month. Activities of unregistered publications have been made more difficult since the law was introduced.
There are facts when public prosecutors issue warning to editorial offices of regional periodicals for not being legal entities. Whereas the law stipulates that only publication founders, who then apply for registration, have to be legal entities.
Difficulties remain with accreditations of journalists especially those who work for foreign mass media. For the past six months prosecutors have issued at least ten official warnings to journalists for exactly that reason. Meanwhile the national legislation does not prohibit preparing materials for foreign media offices and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights actually guarantees it.
Amendments to the law on state service have further worsened journalists’ work. Now a state official can only give information and address the media with a permission of his or her superiors. Now more and more officials, who have been contacted by media for comments, redirect journalists to ideologists instead.
There is an unresolved problem of independent publications access to the state owned distribution network.
Also it is worth mentioning rather harsh measures, for which the new law provides; one law violation or two warning within a year could potentially lead to a publication closure.
Experts say that in Belarus “law implementation dominates over legislation.” Siarhei Vazniak, an editor in chief of Tovarishch/Comrade, holds a similar view: “Implementation is more important than the law itself [in Belarus]. This half a year showed that the will of officials is stronger than legislation."
The words of Mr Bastunets sum up very well the mass media situation in Belarus and implementation of the new law: “The authorities still try controlling the information flow and offer to society only filtered information.”
