BAJ has sent to each Member of Parliament their comments and suggestions on the Law on Mass Media

Each mem­ber of the Belaru­sian par­lia­ment has also received by e‑mail the state­ment adopt­ed by the BAJ Con­gress. The state­ment says that on 19 April, the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Nation­al Assem­bly passed in its first read­ing a draft law pro­vid­ing for intro­duc­tion of major changes in the media leg­is­la­tion.

Com­ments and sug­ges­tions of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists have not been tak­en into account dur­ing the con­sid­er­a­tion of this draft law. Sug­ges­tions of oth­er rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the media sec­tor have also not been heard. No inter­na­tion­al exam­i­na­tion of the draft has been car­ried out.

In this regard, BAJ has called upon the Belaru­sian author­i­ties to:

·        dis­cuss the pro­posed changes to the media leg­is­la­tion with the par­tic­i­pa­tion of Belaru­sian and inter­na­tion­al experts, rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the media sec­tor, busi­ness and soci­ety;

·        revise the draft law in its sec­ond read­ing tak­ing into account all the opin­ions (includ­ing the com­ments and sug­ges­tions of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists, which were sub­mit­ted to the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives);

·        recog­nise the right of free­lancers to col­lect and dis­sem­i­nate infor­ma­tion in domes­tic and for­eign media.

In addi­tion, each Mem­ber of Par­lia­ment has received pro­pos­als from the Belaru­sian media com­mu­ni­ty.

We shall remind that last week, the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives passed amend­ments to the Law on Mass Media in their first read­ing. Pri­or to that, the Per­ma­nent Com­mis­sion on Human Rights, Nation­al Rela­tions and Mass Media asked the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists to make their com­ments and sug­ges­tions on the draft law.

BAJ sent their com­ments and sug­ges­tions sent to the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives on 9 April; how­ev­er, the appro­pri­ate com­mis­sion has failed to review the doc­u­ment so far.