Andrej Bastunets: We are expecting new Internet limitations!
In the lawyer's opinion, BY.net users will have to work on themselves in order not to sink to excessive self-censorship under the influence of limitations.
The KGB head Vadzim Zaitsau has claimed recently that the criminals who committed the blast in Minsk metro had found the recipes for the explosive substances in the Internet. Human rights defenders think that this statement may be estimated as another alarm call - this may be a sign that even more thorough control over Belarusian Internet users will be established soon.
“They have been preparing the ground for Internet limitations for a long time, — a lawyer, Vice-Chairperson of the public association "Belarusian Association of Journalists" Andrej Bastunets thinks. — This ground has been actively cultivated during this year. Therefore, after statements like this, we should expect new limitations in this sphere, both legal and not legal”.
It is easy to predict what exactly Internet-users should expect this time.
Andrej Bastunets: “All the legislative norms which are in force in the country concern dissemination of information in the Internet. Apart from the law "On Mass Media". The government's suggestion in this regard has not been fully elaborated yet. I think this may be the first step - mass media legislation will cover Internet media as well. This will make their work complicated. The second step may be more thorough attention from the law-enforcement authorities to the Internet resources and subjecting the latter to responsibility in the form of official warnings and criminal articles. This is what happening to Poczobut in some aspects".
Internet media shoud rescue themselves in this situation. Professionalism of their journalists should increase. They need to realise that certain legal claims may be brought against Internet resources. There are also other means for BY.net defense.
Andrej Bastunets: “There are three possible ways of influence. The first one is political, involving our foreign colleagues, human rights defenders, international structures which could influence the Belarusian legislation in the shpere of Internet so that it would develop normally. The second way is legal work. We are already doing this - we have addressed to the House of Representatives, to the Ministry of Information with requests to discuss the mass media legislation and to make this discussion public”.
And the third way is human rights defence activity, like participation in arguments, filing complaints etc.
