BAJ Statement on the occasion of the International Day of Journalists’ Solidarity

State­ment of the pub­lic asso­ci­a­tion “Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists”

On Sep­tem­ber 8, the Inter­na­tion­al Day of Jour­nal­ists’ sol­i­dar­i­ty is marked world­wide.

This year, jour­nal­ists of Belaru­sian non-state mass media are still faced with per­se­cu­tion from the author­i­ties, with the cul­mi­na­tion of repres­sions being the so-called “BelTA case”.

The Inves­tiga­tive Com­mit­tee named ten our col­leagues as sus­pects in the case: Ulyana Babayed, Pauliuk Bykows­ki, Dzmit­ry Bobryk, Han­na Yer­ma­chonak, Mary­na Zolata­va, Han­na Kalty­hi­na, Tat­siana Kar­a­vianko­va, Iry­na Leushy­na, Hali­na Ulasik, Alyak­sei Zhukau.

In August, the jour­nal­ists went through search­es in edi­to­r­i­al offices and at home, seizure of equip­ment, unground­ed deten­tions, arrests, and now are banned from leav­ing Belarus. Many oth­er media work­ers were also searched and ques­tioned.

Also, this year, the author­i­ties staged the record judi­cial pros­e­cu­tion of jour­nal­ists who con­tribute to the TV chan­nel Bel­sat and the Belaru­sian Radio Racy­ja. Since the start of 2018, Belaru­sian jour­nal­ists, whose right to gath­er, store and dis­sem­i­nate infor­ma­tion is guar­an­teed by the Con­sti­tu­tion, got fined over 70 times for coop­er­a­tion with for­eign mass media with­out accred­i­ta­tion to the total sum of over 60 thou­sand rubles.

Despite all these cir­cum­stances, non-state mass media in Belarus keep being the source of accu­rate, time­ly and ver­i­fied infor­ma­tion. Jour­nal­ists of non-state mass media raise the most acute social issues that are hard­ly ever cov­ered in state press.

That is why today the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists express­es sol­i­dar­i­ty with our col­leagues.

We appeal to the civ­il soci­ety, polit­i­cal par­ties, the inter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty, all col­leagues and cit­i­zens who share the val­ues of truth­ful and unbi­ased jour­nal­ism to sup­port the media.

Solidarity is our strength!
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