Newspapers in Slovakia protest media legislation

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BRATISLAVA, Slovakia: Slovakia's leading newspapers published identical protests on otherwise blank front pages Thursday to condemn legislation that they said would undermine press freedom.

The six main dailies left their front pages empty except for a list of "seven sins" in the legislation, which would require them to print responses by people or institutions to any news article even if the published information were true.

"There is a serious risk for newspapers that their content will not be decided by the newsrooms but by politicians and their press departments demanding the right of reply after every critical sentence," wrote Dag Danis, chief columnist at Pravda, Slovakia's largest broadsheet daily.

The issue has blocked Slovak ratification of a European Union treaty that would overhaul EU institutions, because the political opposition refuses to back the treaty unless the government dilutes the proposed media law.

The governing coalition of Prime Minister Robert Fico has a comfortable majority to pass the legislation, which is scheduled for debate next week, and says it will not make any further concessions. But it needs opposition support for the three-fifths majority needed to approve the EU treaty.

The newspapers' protest is the first such action since the mid-1990s, when attacks against the news media by Vladimir Meciar as prime minister were among the reasons the EU and NATO initially left Slovakia out of integration talks. It has since joined both of them.

Fico, who was elected in 2006 with promises to better care for the poor, stop sales of state assets and withdraw troops from Iraq, has repeatedly clashed with the press because most private news outlets are critical of his welfare measures.

He has called the news media his only real opposition, has accused journalists of taking bribes and once ended a press briefing by wishing newspapers a decline in their readership.

The government has said that the proposed media law conforms to standards in EU countries and that it would not abuse the right of reply. Fico offered last week to omit a clause allowing the government to fine a news outlet if it found that its reports promoted socially harmful behavior, like racial hatred or war.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE, welcomed the proposed change but said the legislation would still "grant politicians limitless access to publicity over the heads of editors" and seriously restrict editorial autonomy.

"It is disappointing that recommendations regarding the right of reply were not implemented," said Miklos Haraszti, the media freedom representative for the OSCE.

"As it stands now, the law would still fail to comply with Slovakia's OSCE commitments to protect media freedom," Haraszti said.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/27/business/smedia.php

Newspapers in Slovakia protest media legislation

Newspapers in Slovakia protest media legislation

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