August 2023 - Page 2 of 2

BIRN Wins Solar Power Investigation Case Against Kosovo Media Regulator

Posted on August 4, 2023August 17, 2023 by BIRD

Pristina Basic Court on Friday annulled a decision made by the Independent Media Commission, IMC in January 2021, which issued a warning to BIRN Kosovo’s television programme ‘Jeta ne Kosove’ over its investigation into a businessman’s monopolistic practices.

The investigation, entitled ‘Unclean Energy: The Kosovar Who Would Own the Sun’, showed how businessman Blerim Devolli was behind six companies reaping millions of euros from the sale of solar energy in violation of anti-monopoly rules.

It was aired by public broadcaster Radio Television of Kosovo, RTK, which was screening BIRN Kosovo’s ‘Jeta ne Kosove’ programme.

This prompted Devolli’s complain to the IMC, the institution responsible for the regulation, management and oversight of broadcasters in Kosovo. Devolli claimed that the programme used hate speech and violated the IMC’s code of ethics for audiovisual media providers.

The investigation carried out by Visar Prebreza and Jeta Xharra revealed a scheme in which shell companies owned by Devolli registered in Malta would have benefited from incentive tariffs for the production of solar energy, breaking anti-monopoly rules by hiding the real owner of the companies.

In the Pristina court verdict, judge Anita Nikqi-Morina concluded that the programme show was “fully in line with the code of ethics”.

The court also found that IMC’s decision “was not properly justified” and it “did not correctly establish the factual situation”.

The verdict said that the language used in the programme “does not seem to constitute an insult because the language used is sarcastic”.

The court also found that IMC’s decision to reprimand RTK and ‘Jeta ne Kosove’ contradicts guarantees of freedom of expression in Kosovo’s constitution and the practices of the European Court of Human Rights.

In 2021, BIRN filed a lawsuit at Pristina Basic Court against IMC’s decision, describing it as Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation or SLAPP and requested its annulment.

The case was taken to the court only after the IMC’s Board of Complaints rejected BIRN’s complaint and upheld the main points in the IMC board’s initial decision.

The IMC’s reprimand was one of the reasons behind RTK’s management decision to stop airing the ‘Jeta ne Kosove’ programme, ending its 15-year run on RTK.

For more details on the legal battle, read Prishtina Insight’s article here.

Kosovo Court Postpones Govt Decision to Close TV Channel

Posted on August 3, 2023August 17, 2023 by BIRD

Kosovo’s Commercial Court decided on Thursday to postpone the execution of government decision to close down privately-owned TV channel Klan Kosova by removing its business certificate until a final court decision is taken.

In its verdict, Kosovo’s Commercial Court said that Klan Kosova has fulfilled the legal criteria to continue operating.

“Since according to the certificates presented [to the court], it transpires that the plaintiff [Klan Kosova] has made the [required] changes in business registries in North Macedonia and Kosovo, the court assessed that postponing the execution of the contested decision does not conflict with the public interest,” judge Arnis Dumani said in the verdict.

The verdict also said that it would be “contrary to the public interest” and the media freedom guarantees in Kosovo’s constitution if it did not postpone the execution of the decision to suspend the channel’s business certificate.

The Association of Journalists of Kosovo, AJK, welcomed the verdict which it said allows Klan Kosova to stay on air “despite the government’s decision to shut it down”.

“The AJK will closely monitor further procedures, hoping that a swift epilogue will close this episode of the government attemptting to undermine freedom of media in Kosovo,” the AJK said.

The European Centre for Press and Media Freedom also welcomed the court’s decision, saying that “this interim decision protects media pluralism and counters the government’s attempts to undermine press freedom”.

The dispute started in June when news website Kosovanews published an investigation that suggested irregularities in Klan Kosova’s registration in Kosovo’s business registry.

The ministry then suspended Klan Kosova’s business certificate and initiated a criminal complaint against the company, its managers and officials from the Business Registration Agency on suspicion of misuse of office.

According to the decision, which was made public by the Association of Journalists of Kosovo, the ministry suspended Klan Kosova’s business certificate because the owners’ residential address is allegedly registered as “Peje-Serbia and Gjakove-Serbia… [which is] in violation with the basic principles of the constitution of the Republic of Kosovo”. Both towns are in Kosovo, not Serbia.

The Independent Media Commission, the institution responsible for the regulation, management and oversight of broadcasters in Kosovo, gave TV channel a month to correct the documentation, but on the final day, July 28, the ministry said that Klan Kosova failed to comply with the request.

Klan Kosova insisted on Monday however that it has corrected all the data in the business registry and accused the ministry of “fraudulently presenting a situation that does not exist”.

But the ministry said that its commission, which reviewed the case, acted in accordance with the law when it suspended the certificate.

“The commission decision closes this case within the ministry while the complaining entity has the right to take the case to the court,” the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry’s decision sparked angry reactions and hundreds of journalists and civil society activists marched on Monday to Pristina’s main square to protest, holding a banner with the slogan “Democracy dies in darkness”, calling the move to suspend the business certificate an attempt to curb the freedom of the media.

Anonymous Online Videos Target Serbian-Language Media in Kosovo

Posted on August 3, 2023August 3, 2023 by BIRD

The Independent Association of Serbian Journalists, NUNS on Wednesday condemned an online campaign targeting Serbian-language media operating in Kosovo.

Anonymous videos posted on a Telegram channel targeted news websites KosSev and Kosovo Online, radio stations Kontakt Plus and Kosovska Mitrovica and television station TV Most, claiming that they are pro-NATO, an intended insult.

The video posts said that the media outlets “persistently talk about how they are objective and ‘honest’”, but claimed “they have been broadcasting NATO and KFOR [NATO’s Kosovo force] commercials for years”.

The posts claimed that the media outlets’ aim was “to be financially rewarded for their ‘hard work’”.

KosSev was described as a media outlet that “defends Shiptar [derogatory term for Albanians] terrorists” and “works for the government in Pristina and for NATO”.

“NUNS points out that this is not the first case of the serious targeting and threating of journalists from the KoSSev website, and we call on the relevant authorities to investigate all the circumstances of this event and the threats that threaten the safety of all journalists in Kosovo,” NUNS said in a press release.

A separate series of anonymous videos was posted on social networks at the end of July, targeting journalists from N1, Nova and Danas, media outlets seen as critical of the Serbian government.

One video said that “their evil intention is to destroy Serbian identity, culture, tradition and religion”.

The head of the European Federation of Journalists, Maja Sever, called on the Serbian authorities on Tuesday to publicly condemn attacks on journalists.

“I have to admit that when I saw these videos, I was shocked. I can’t fathom how anyone could make something like this. Just because it’s on Tuesday in a semi-amateur way doesn’t mean it’s not very dangerous and scary,” Sever told Nova TV.

The European Union’s annual report on human rights and democracy in the world for 2022, published on Monday, said that in Serbia, “cases of threats and violence against journalists remain a concern and the overall environment for the exercise of freedom of expression without hindrance still needs to be further strengthened in practice”.

Turkish Journalists Feel Unsafe Because of Physical, Online Attacks: Report

Posted on August 2, 2023August 3, 2023 by BIRD

Turkey’s Media and Law Studies Association, MLSA told BIRN that its latest report shows that most journalists in the country do not feel safe at work.

“The report shows that, in addition to physical and judicial violence, attacks against journalists, especially women and LGBTI+ journalists, have increased on social media platforms,” Baris Altintas, co-chair of the MLSA, told BIRN.

According to the MLSA report, ‘Journalism in Turkey: I Do Not Feel Safe’, more than 80 per cent of the 57 journalists surveyed have encountered physical violence in the last five years and 79 per cent have been attacked online at least once during the same period.

“The most frequent form of violence that journalists face is insults and hate speech. This is followed by pushing and pulling and assault with tear gas, pepper spray, or other gas,” the report said.

The online medium in which journalists said they were most exposed to threats was Twitter, where 70 per cent of the respondents said they had experienced attacks.

A total of 87 per cent of the journalists surveyed said they do not feel safe while doing their jobs.

However, nearly 51 per cent said they feel very unsafe and only 1.8 per cent said they feel safe.

According to Altintas, the main reason is that the perpetrators are able to act without fear of prosecution.

“The root of the problem is impunity, as we have seen in other countries. Because the state and the judiciary encourage attacks on journalists, law enforcement agencies, security guards or online trolls see [they have] the right to do it,” Altintas said.

The report’s findings indicated that officials were involved in significant numbers of cases.

“The identity of 18.7 per cent of the perpetrators of threats and physical attacks was unknown to the survey participants. Of the perpetrators, 17.6 per cent were public officials, and 28.6 per cent were police officers,” the report said.

Altintas added that the state and the judiciary have rewarded some perpetrators instead of punishing them.

“For example, a police chief who sexually harassed an activist in front of cameras and did the similar to many journalists in the field was promoted last month,” he said.

The MLSA is a leading rights organisations working on the protection of journalists, press freedom, freedom of information and promoting the rights of oppressed groups including minorities and LGBT communities.

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