Silenced - Ukraine
21/09/2003
Ukraine
According to the Information Society Foundation of Ukraine
there has been an increase in the number of Ukrainian Internet users over the
last four years by as much as 70% annually. By the end of 2002 there were 2.5
million users (5.2% of total population) and 1 million of them were regular
visitors to the Internet. Up to 80% of the users live in seven regional
centers.
The freedom of speech is one of the most vulnerable rights
in Ukraine. The traditional media such as TV and broadcasting in most cases
depend on the official pro-presidential propaganda. One of the visual proofs of
political censorship in Ukraine is the practice of temniki (guidelines for the
content of news reporting) distribution among the top managers of national
television stations and newspapers by the Presidential Administration. The
censorship effectively denies access to objective information for the majority
of the Ukrainian citizens.
The national domain “.ua” was registered in December 1992
but the first Ukrainian media appeared on-line only in 1999. Since then,
electronic media activity in Ukraine has created a significant impact on the
success of the struggle for democracy, as e-media is the only independent media
in the country. Nevertheless the significant increase of popularity of the
Ukrainian e-media does not rival television, as this is still the most widely
utilized form of mass media.
There is a lack of understanding among the majority of
Ukrainian policy makers about the nature of the Internet as a global medium.
This situation explains in part the unqualified interventions and efforts to
control the Internet by implementation of legal restrictions. The official
position of President Kuchma towards Internet freedoms is negative.
In June 2001 at the Summit of Central European heads of
states in Verbania, Italy, President Kuchma delivered a speech stating that
freedom of speech on the Internet results in the “dissemination by certain
European websites of ultra-national propaganda, instructions for terrorists,
pornography and other things of such kind” constituting “the direct threats to
the democracy, people and peoples, and moral health of nation.”
The chief of Security Service Yuri Radchenko said on July
14, 2001 that the SBU “has no plans to control the Internet in Ukraine but
rather it would like to register all users of Internet in Ukraine.”
In December 2001, the government adopted the Decision of the
Council of National Security and Defence of Ukraine enacted by the Ukase of
President on “The Measures for the Improvement of National Information Policy
and Safeguards of Information Security” of Ukraine of December 6, 2001 (No.
1193/2001). The Ukase obliges the Cabinet of Ministers to elaborate and
introduce draft laws creating an obligation on Internet providers and e-media
to apply for licenses. Laws will also mandate the monitoring of
Internet-traffic and storage of Internet-traffic data for six months. The
Cabinet of Ministers has not yet submitted the bills to the Parliament. A
previous attempt to do so was rejected by the Parliament in 1999.
The idea to consider the Internet as a form of mass-media
and to treat online editions in the same way as digitally-printed press is
widespread not only among Ukrainian officials but representatives of e-media as
well. Oficials would like to register e-media in order to gain some device of
influence; e-media would like to do so in order to obtain the rights and
privileges of the offline press which is provided by the legislation in force.
This includes provisions for professional and social rights for journalists.
Such issues were actively discussed by policy makers in 2001
with regard to the idea of public registration of e-mass media. The grounds for
it resided in the Article 1 of the Statute on Printed Mass Communication Media
(Press) in Ukraine of November 16, 1992.
Fortunately no serous attempts have been made to force
e-mass media to register so far, but the regulatory situation is vulnerable. The
uncertainty of the legal status of e-media in Ukraine caused an incident when
the representatives of the on-line newspaper “Ukraiynska Pravda” were refused
accreditation by the General Prosecutor Office on December 5, 2002
The legislation in Ukraine foresees the liability of printed
mass-media (press) for the publishing of defamatory material. The Internet is
not considered by the courts as the printed source of information and offline
reprinting of online defamatory information thus constitutes a violation of the
law. The majority of Ukrainian e-media journalists would like to have the same
rights as their colleagues working for the offline press. But they do not wish
to be liable for on-line defamation. Such dilemmas of e-media legal status and
liability for on-line defamation were used as formal ground for the act of
self-censorship.
Recognising these problems, the members of the Committee on
Journalist’s Ethics (an independent professional body) drafted the Declaration
on a Clear Internet. The representatives of the most popular Ukrainian e-media
discussed the draft at the workshop organized by the CJE on January 29, 2002
and rejected it.
It is likely that amendments to the legislation aimed at
giving the journalists of e-media the same professional and socials rights are
to be introduced in the Parliament soon.
Following Parliamentary hearings on “Society, Mass Media,
Authority: Freedom of Speech and Censorship in Ukraine” held on December 12,
2002, the Statute on Amendments to Several Laws was adopted on April 3, 2003 by
252 votes of the members of Parliament. The Amendment clarifies the term
“censorship”, facilitates the access to the information held by public bodies,
and limits the possibilities of suppression of mass-media through the device of
court penalties arising from defamation action.
Even in the absence of legislation, there have been numerous
assaults against electronic media. In June 2001 the private apartment of Mr.
Yeltsov, the editor-in-chief of e-media “Ukraina Kriminalna” (Criminal Ukraine)
was searched by the SBU. This action took place following the on-line
publication of secret documents and an article titled “From the Life of
Derkatch’s Family” on the activity of former chief of SBU Leonid Derkatch and
his son, a member of Ukrainian Parliament, which described their business
relations with Ukraine’s oligarchy.
In February 2002 the premises of the on-line political
newspaper “Obkom” were searched and computer equipment and archives were seized
by tax administration officials even though they only had a warrant to search a
bank located on the floor below. Although the tax authority said later the
search had been done “by accident,” the computers were never returned. The
on-line publication recommenced nearly a year after the incident. The Kyiv City
Regional Prosecutor Office refused to initiate criminal proceedings against
officials due to the “lack of legal grounds”.
In October 2002 the editorial premises of the on-line
newspaper of the Regional Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs
“Antiterror” (Lviv City) was searched and PCs were seized by police because it
had published the text of the indictment against President Kuchma issued by the
judge of the Kyiv Appeal Court. The contracts with all editorial staff were terminated
a few days later.
References
E-Ukraine: report, Version 5.0 (February 4, 2003) of the
report of the Information Society of Ukraine Foundation
www.isu.org.ua
Negotiating the News: Informal State Censorship of Ukrainian
Television. - Human Rights Watch. - March 2003, Vol. 15, No. 2 (D)
www.hrw.org/reports/2003/ukraine0303/
Information Policy of Ukraine:
Access, Transparency, E-governance’ at
http://www.internetrights.org.ua/index.php?page=news&date=2003-08-09
UNIAN, January 8, 2003
www.unian.net/ukr/news/news-31369.html
The list of regulations on the activity of mass-media in
Ukraine is available at
en.imi.org.ua/elements/law.shtml
Translation of the Institute of
Mass Information
en.imi.org.ua/articles/1023209329668/
Article 19 Pages on the Ukraine
http://www.article19.org.ua/indexe.html
Article XIX, Statement on the draft Law of Ukraine on the
Insertion of Changes to Certain Laws of Ukraine as a Result of the
Parliamentary Hearings “Society, Mass Media, Authorities: Freedom of Expression
and Censorship in Ukraine”, April 2003
http://www.article19.org.ua/laws/april2003e.html
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