Tag: coronavirus

Moldovan Public TV Station Favours President, Study Says

Posted on by BIRD

President Igor Dodon and his Socialist Party colleagues have received favourable treatment on the main national television station in Moldova, Moldova 1, according to a study by the Centre for Independent Journalism in Moldova.

The study, conducted between March 9-15, monitored the main daily news bulletins as well as the most important political TV shows each day of the week.

The report says that President Dodon was presented in a positive context in almost all news items and that the governing Socialist Party was also favoured over the opposition parties.

The public broadcaster has adjusted its informational content to suit the agenda of the government, the central public authorities being most frequently mentioned and quoted in the news, the study said.

Opposition parties and politicians were disadvantaged by being rarely quoted, and in terms of air time about their actions in news bulletins, it added.

In the news bulletin of March 9, for example, the report said, Moldova 1 quoted a Socialist Party deputy, Corneliu Furculita, urging opposition leaders Maia Sandu, of the PAS, and Ala Nemerenco, a former health minister, to “refrain from using the COVID-19 pandemic to do more political PR”.

The study argues that Moldova 1 has deviated from the best journalistic norms and also does not give opposing views the right to reply.

It said the TV station presented the President as a kind of “National Saviour/Messiah” in the current pandemic as soon as the first case of COVID-19 infection was reported on March 7.

“Starting from the fact that Moldova 1 is a public station, not a state-owned-one, the journalists and the employees of this institution should understand that they are in the service of Moldovan citizens,” expert Victor Gotisan said.

He urged the Audiovisual Council, CCA, to take action against such practices and restore the editorial independence of the national television station.

Survey: Reporting During the Coronavirus Outbreak

Posted on by BIRD

Balkan Investigative Reporting Network is currently mapping the challenges that journalists and media workers face due to the COVID-19 outbreak in the countries of Central and Southeastern Europe.

We want to hear your views on the professional, financial and health-related issues that you’re experiencing – and about what kind of short and long-term consequences of this crisis you expect. 

Data collected in this survey will be stored safely, and will only be used for the purpose of BIRN’s article on the effects of the coronavirus pandemic on an already fragile media scene in this region. We respect our sources and will never share your data without your consent.

Take part in our survey here!

Albanian version here.

Macedonian version here.

Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian version here.

Prominent Kosovo Serb Journalist Says Intimidation Worsening with COVID-19

Posted on by BIRD

Arrested on April 11 while trying to report on the fight against COVID-19, a prominent journalist in the mainly Serb north of Kosovo says local authorities have stepped up pressure on her outlet since the onset of the pandemic.

Tatjana Lazarevic, editor-in-chief of the online news portal KosSev, was detained by police on the road from the ethnically divided town of Mitrovica/Mitrovice to nearby Zvecan, where she planned to go to the local health centre to investigate what she said were “multiple complaints” about its readiness to deal with cases of the novel coronavirus.

“It is very difficult to get official information,” Lazarevic, 50, told BIRN.

She was accused of violating a weekend curfew imposed to slow the spread of the disease, despite the fact that, under rules in Kosovo, journalists are exempt from the movement restrictions. Released after several hours without charge, Lazarevic said she suspects the episode was the latest attempt to intimidate KosSev by those who run northern Kosovo.

“I believe that there is a visible intention to create a profile picture of our media as an enemy of the state, an enemy of the people, that we are an enemy of the government,” Lazarevic told BIRN.

That state is Serbia, which continues to hold sway in northern Kosovo more than 20 years after the majority-Albanian territory broke away in war and 12 years since it declared independence with the backing of the West.

The public health system in northern Kosovo continues to function, de facto at least, as part of the Serbian health system, reflected in the fact that COVID-19 tests in the north are processed in the Serbian capital, Belgrade. Serbia does not recognise Kosovo as independent.

Pandemic brings more pressure

KosSev was formed in 2014 as an online news portal covering primarily northern Kosovo.

According to Lazarevic, who grew up in Mitrovica/Mitrovice, the site aims to provide properly-reported, impartial and objective information, not necessarily exposés. But in Kosovo, particularly the north, that is enough to invite trouble.

In its short life, KosSev and its small staff has faced cyber-attacks, threats and pressure on a regular basis. And it has recently become worse, Lazarevic said.

“This last phase of pressure has intensified since the start of the pandemic,” she told BIRN.

On Saturday, Lazarevic set out on foot for Zvecan, hoping to see “on the spot” the work of the Zvecan health clinic but also to see the extent of police security along the road during the curfew. Other people were also on the road.

A police car passed her three times. The third time, it slowed down and Lazarevic approached, believing the officers wanted to see her ID. But the car moved on.

“When I was completely alone,” she said, “a van of the [police] intervention unit suddenly appeared. Through an open window, they said, ‘Good afternoon, you have violated the medical prohibition on movement’.” Ten minutes later, Lazarevic entered the vehicle and was taken to the police station.

Lazarevic said she tried to explain to the officers that she was out conducting her work as a journalist and to show them her press credentials. She was released after a couple of hours without being given any further information.

The mainly Serb north of Kosovo is controlled by Srpska Lista, which answers to Serbia’s ruling Progressive Party.

While relations with the Kosovo government in Pristina are far from rosy, she said, the threat comes from the north. Lazarevic described them as “friendly visits” – from a torched KosSev car in 2015 to direct threats, hacks and a wall of silence among public institutions.

“Srpska Lista controls all the power or all the political life of Serbs in Kosovo,” she said.

North Macedonia Leads Region in COVID-19 Tracing App

Posted on by Ivana Jeremic

North Macedonia has become the first country in the Western Balkans to launch a contact-tracing app to tackle the spread of COVID-19, with the government at pains to stress user data will be protected.

StopKorona! went live on April 13 as a Bluetooth-based smartphone app that warns users if they have come into contact with someone who has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, based on the distance between their mobile devices.

The app, downloaded more than 5,000 times on its first day, was developed and donated to the Macedonian authorities by Skopje-based software company Nextsense.

States are increasingly looking at digital solutions to control the spread of COVID-19 as they move to open up their economies while limiting the burden on their health services. The European Union and data protection campaigners, however, have voiced concern over the threat such technology poses to individual privacy.

Presenting the app, Health Minister Venko Filipce said North Macedonia was looking to use “all tools and possibilities” to combat a disease that, as of April 15, had killed 44 people.

Information Society Minister Damjan Manchevski said all data would be securely stored.

“This data is recorded on a secure server of the Ministry of Health,” Manchevski said at the launch. “And no other user has access to mobile numbers, nor is there any data stored about the owner of the number.”

If a person tests positive for COVID-19, they can “voluntarily” submit their data to the Ministry of Health, Manchevski said, enabling the app to warn other users if they come into contact with that person.

Data privacy concerns linger


Macedonian Minister of Health Venko Filipce accompanied by Prime Minister Oliver Spasovski in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia, 2020. Photo: EPA-EFE/NAKE BATEV

China, Singapore, Israel and Russia are among a number of countries that have developed their own coronavirus mobile tracking apps, mainly using Bluetooth, GPS, cellular location tracking and QR codes. The Chinese government app colour codes citizens according to risk level.

The technology, however, has set alarm bells ringing among data protection campaigners and rights organisations concerned about the threat posed by mass surveillance and loosening of data protection laws.

Nextsense director Vasko Kronevski, however, said his firm’s StopKorona! app adhered to all legal requirements.

“This is a mobile app made by following best practices around the world in dealing with the coronavirus,” he said. “It guarantees the complete protection of users’ privacy.”

“The success will depend on the mass use of the application. It is important to emphasise that we used global experiences from different countries.”

One of those examples is Singapore’s TraceTogether app, which helped the Asian country successfully contain the COVID-19 outbreak within its borders while, unlike most countries, keeping businesses and schools open.

According to data privacy experts, the decentralized design of North Macedonia’s app guarantees that data will only be stored on those devices that run it, unless they voluntarily submit it to the ministry.

“The key part is that the citizen maintains full control over their data until the moment they decide to send it to the Ministry after being diagnosed,” said Danilo Krivokapic, director of the Serbia-based digital rights watchdog SHARE Foundation.

“Additionally, all data stored on the phone is being deleted after 14 days,” he told BIRN. “In that context, the app is in line with the legislation that covers Data Protection.”

Krivokapic stressed that once data is shared with the authorities, the Ministry and all data users are obliged to respect the legal framework regarding privacy and data protection.

EU countries warming up to digital solutions


People wearing face masks in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia, 2020. Photo: EPA-EFE/GEORGI LICOVSKI

France and Germany are reported to be working on similar contact-tracing apps, while Poland has made the biggest progress within the EU.

Polish authorities have already launched a smartphone app for those in quarantine and are now working on another, similar to StopKorona!

The first app was mandatory for people in quarantine, meaning that they had to upload selfies so the authorities could track their exact location.

According to Krzysztof Izdebski, policy director at ePanstwo Foundation, a Poland-based NGO that promotes transparency and open data, the coronavirus pandemic has already posed significant threats to privacy, with governments deploying technologies primarily created for the surveillance of their citizens.

With the second app, the Bluetooth-based ProteGO, authorities have published the app’s source code online, to get feedback and opinions from IT experts before implementing it.

So ProteGO, said Izdebski, is an example of an app that is trying to meet privacy requirements.

“The data is stored on personal devices for up to two weeks, and only if the user is sick and agrees to share data with respective authorities, they are being sent to the server – without information on the location,” Izdebski told BIRN.

And while digital solutions such as these could become a game-changer in containing the outbreak, experts note that success still depends on how many people are willing to use them.

“For the technical solution to have some results, a substantial number of citizens need to run the apps and to decide to share their data in case they are diagnosed,” said SHARE Foundation’s Krivokapic. “This way, the app can serve its purpose.”

NATO to Help North Macedonia Combat Fake News About Virus

Posted on by BIRD

The US ambassador to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, on Tuesday in Washington said North Macedonia, which joined the alliance this year, will receive similar assistance to other member countries in dealing with fake news from Russia, North Macedonia’s state-owned MIA news agency reported.

“The alliance expects more info from Skopje on setting up such a team in North Macedonia, aimed at preparing media in the country on how to deter disinformation campaigns from Russia,” MIA quoted Hutchison as saying.

She added that a lot of fake news was being spread in North Macedonia about the coronavirus and that NATO assistance was needed to deal with it.

The ambassador called on NATO allies to combat disinformation on the coronavirus coming from Russia – and also from China.

“There are false reports that they [Russia and China] are sending assistance, there are false reports that the virus emerged from Europe or the United States. This is absolutely false and we are trying to respond with facts,” she told the press briefing.

Russia has strongly opposed NATO expansion into the Balkan region. Montenegro became the 29th member state in 2017 despite open opposition from Moscow, and has since been on the receiving end of cyber attacks assumed to come from Russia. For some years it has hosted a team of American cyber experts who are helping the fight against cyber threats.

North Macedonia became NATO’s 30th member in March this year. Hutchison remarked that the country has been a target of disinformation from Russia ever since it applied for membership, adding that these threats have continued since it joined NATO.

North Macedonia Accused of Dodging Media Scrutiny in Crisis

Posted on by BIRD

After drawing flak from journalistic and media associations for employing an unsuitable register of online media to select which outlets should get permits to work during curfews and ask questions at press conferences, the Information Society Ministry says it had rectified any omissions.

This ministry, which is in charge of issuing these online permits, says media outlets are now being checked directly through the country’s central registry of firms, not through a register of online media created for a different purpose by the country’s oldest and biggest media union.

Amid complaints from the Association of Journalists of Macedonia, ZNM, that the ministry had more or less hijacked its register and misused its purpose, the ministry told BIRN that its only intention had been to prevent the spread of “fake news” in the health crisis.

However, some pro-opposition online media outlets still accuse the authorities of discrimination and “silent” censorship, saying they are put in an unequal position compared to others at virtual press conferences.

Use of media register drew flak

The dispute started in late March, when the ministry issued a statement saying that only those outlets listed on the ZNM’s register of professional online media, Promedia, would be eligible to apply for permits to work during the daily curfews.

The same rule applied to outlets wanting to ask questions at government press conferences, which were already being held without the physical presence of journalists, who were only able to ask direct questions through a video conference call, or submit them online to the government press service and wait for them to be read out by the spokesperson and answered by ministers.

The ZNM and the Council of Ethics in Media, SEMM, a self-regulatory journalistic body, accused the government of using the register to select favoured online media.

The ZNM’s executive director, Dragan Sekulovski, told BIRN that the purpose of Promedia had been misused.  The register of some 120 online media outlets “was intended to promote self-regulation and professional standards, help citizens distinguish professional online outlets from propagandists and fake news sites and incentivise businesses to advertise in professional outlets”, Sekulovski explained to BIRN.

“The OSCE, the US embassy and the European Union praised us for our efforts to put some order in the online media sphere. It was not fair of the state to interfere [with it] and use the [health] crisis as an excuse,” he said.

He noted that the register was never intended to be an all-encompassing media source. Media participate in it voluntarily; those who wish to be listed on it first apply and are then their basic professional and ethical standards are checked.

While Promedia lists 120 listed outlets, the state’s central business registry lists more than 400 online media outlets.

The Promedia registry notably does not include many pro-opposition outlets that formerly defended the ex-government of Nikola Gruevski, which fell in mid-2017, and continue to promote the standpoints of his now opposition VMRO DPMNE party.

Most of these are now grouped in the country’s other journalistic union, the Macedonian Association of Journalists, MAN, which was formed during Gruevski’s time in office and has also accused the current Social Democrat-led government of using double standards.

Ministry says it had no ill intent

Journalist, members of North Macedonia’s government and guests in the government press room. Archive photo: EPA-EFE/GEORGI LICOVSKI

After prolonged silence in the face of this criticism, the State Secretary at the Information Society Ministry, Adem Avziu, told BIRN on Friday that its intention had not been to discriminate against any particular online media but only to “prevent the spread of fake news and panic in this extraordinary situation.

“We all know we have many unregistered portals that are spreading all kinds of false info amid this crisis, so our intent was to prevent this,” Avziu said.

He claimed that any mistakes made earlier had now been fixed. “Control measures have now been significantly boosted. All media now apply and fill in forms on one address, at uslugi.gov.mk, and permits are issued after their data has been checked through the database of the central business registry,” he said.

Opposition outlets still cry foul

The enduring divisions between media in North Macedonia are a legacy of Gruevski’s authoritarian government’s decade-plus in office.

On one side are media that gravitate towards the ZNM, and are trying to restore professional standards and strengthen self-regulation in the media sphere. Some of them are now outlets that defend the Social Democrats-led government.

On the other side are Gruevski’s former megaphones, who received large sums in the form of government advertisements while he was in power and who formed the parallel journalists’ association MAN, which at the time was seeking to overshadow the ZNM. Most of these media have continued to support the VMRO DPMNE party in opposition and attack anyone that the party deems an enemy.

These media were asked to sign the journalistic code of ethics and join the media register created by the ZNM but have not done so.

Kurir is among the most prominent of such online outlets, and managed to survive Gruevski’s downfall in 2017, largely thanks to its recent takeover by Hungarian firms linked to Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s PR machinery, and the subsequent inflow of Hungarian advertisement money.

In 2018, the company Adinamic Media, owned by a Hungarian national called Agnes Adamik, acquired ownership of the Kurir and Republika website and a share of the ownership of the Netpress website.

But despite the ministry’s insistence that it has now fixed the problem with the permits, the editor-in-chief of Kurir, Ljupco Cvetanovski, said that his outlet still feels discriminated against.

Cvetanovski told BIRN that the current form of censorship was “maybe not so evident and public as was first intended with the registry [of online media], but we still feel some form of censorship”.

While conceding that his site no longer encountered any problems with getting permits to work during the curfews, he said the way press conferences are being held did not allow them to ask direct questions through video link, like some other media, while questions submitted electronically often never get answered.

“We submit several questions daily [to the government press service] but only one of our questions has ever been read out at press conferences and answered,” Cvetanovski claimed.

He added that in this way the government was elegantly dodging “tough” questions – or at least giving itself more time to prepare suitable answers in advance.

Continue reading “North Macedonia Accused of Dodging Media Scrutiny in Crisis”

Greek Govt Support for Media Comes at Expense of Transparency

Posted on by BIRD

A decision by Greek Prime Minister Kuriakos Mitsotakis’ secretary-general to commit 11 million euros from the national budget to an urgent publicity campaign that will run until the end of May to promote measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 has raised alarm among opposition MPs.

Urgent legislation was already introduced on March 11, obliging TV and radio stations to regularly broadcast short public health messages for free.

Another piece of legislation on March 30 suspended payments for six television companies of the annual fees they pay for nationwide licences to broadcast.

As each of them was due to pay 3.5 million euros in 2020, this year’s loss of income would be up to 21 million euros. The content of the legislation is vague and it remains unclear if, when and how the suspended fees will be paid in the future.

The decisions have raised criticism among opposition MPs that the government is using the COVID-19 measures to improve its relations with the media without transparency.

More concerns were raised when the contract to implement the 11-million-euro publicity campaign was directly awarded to a private company with a three per cent commission on the total amount, which amounts to 330,000 euros. The criteria for how media outlets will be chosen to carry the publicity material and what amounts of money will be distributed to the chosen media outlets have also not been made public.

On top of this, the implementation of the programme by a private company removes the responsibility to upload information on the allocation of funds to the public transparency registry, which would have been necessary if the government had decided to implement the programme without an intermediary.

“There are a number of pertinent questions around this campaign that the government will have to answer,” veteran MP Sofia Sakorafa from the Mera 25 party told BIRN.

“Why is this campaign necessary if media are already obliged to broadcast free messages and they are reporting on COVID-19 from early morning till late at night anyway? How was the implementing partner chosen, using which criteria and out of what other companies? Since we are talking about public funds, which state or independent authority will examine which allocations [are made] and under what criteria they happened? Is there going to be transparency so we all learn which media were funded and with how much?”

An urgent meeting of the Greek parliament’s Transparency Committee discussed the issues on April 10. Answering questions regarding the direct award to a private company as well as the suspension of TV licence payments, government spokesperson Stelios Petsas responded that “if we held a tender we would need at least six months” before starting the campaign, which would be completely inefficient.


Greek Parliament building in Syntagma square and the empty streets of the capital city of Athens, Greece, 2020. Photo: EPA-EFE/ANDREAS TSAKNARIDIS

He also insisted that in the end, the amounts given to media companies under the programme will be made public and that TV licenses fees would be paid in full.

But Syriza MP Nikos Voutsis, who was president of the Greek parliament from Oct 2015 to July 2019, told BIRN that the answers were less than satisfying.

“Due to past experience we know the government can bring in an urgent amendment anytime and exempt TV channels from paying these obligations. The future will prove what the intentions of the government are on this issue. Until then, this suspension is a small first gift,” Voutsis said.

But the lack of scrutiny over the 11-million-euro campaign is an even bigger problem, he argued.

“The big issue is that they are evading the obligation to publish the information on the transparency registry. The spokesperson has not taken any step back, it’s not a practical issue but a political choice, since the previous government had put in place a transparent process to distribute ten million euros of support funding to the press,” he said.

“We believe this is a process that should only take place with bipartisan cooperation and consensus based on the existing media registry [of outlets that can receive state funding],” he added.

The Greek press’s circulation has collapsed since COVID-19 lockdown measures were introduced. To contain the downward trend, owners and employees’ associations asked for newspapers to be circulated through supermarket chains – a move to which the government agreed at the end of March.


Illustration. Photo: EPA-EFE/ORESTIS PANAGIOTOU

The association of regional newspapers has asked that 30 per cent of the 11-million-euro package is committed to the regional press. It also claimed that urgent advertising bought by regional municipalities around the country “is not following any of the criteria envisaged by the law”.

According to the law, public funding should follow certain criteria based on circulation and readership as well as the income of each media outlet being funded, in order to protect pluralism and objectivity and avoid influence.

Meanwhile, according to experts, TV viewing ratings have increased by 25 per cent since the lockdown, and bymore than 60 per cent among four-to-17-year-olds, but profits are estimated to have plummeted by 30 per cent since mid-February.

Greek journalist Yannis-Orestis Papadimitriou, a member of an investigative journalists’ consortium called The Manifold, told BIRN that transparency is the key issue that must be addressed.

“Support for the media is necessary, but distributing money in a habitat like that of the Greek media, which is notorious for its lack of transparency and clientelistic relations, without making clear immediately who gets what and why, is a very serious issue,” Papadimitriou said.

He argued that without transparency, no matter how much support is given, the big issues that shape the media situation in Greece won’t be addressed.

“There is no excuse for a lack of transparency in distributing funds from the government to a media landscape that was already largely abstaining from contesting the government’s actions, even before the coronavirus crisis,” he said.

“It is even more worrying when that happens in a situation in which media, their owners, who are also involved in other sectors of the economy, and the political class have proved to be co-dependent in many ways,” he added.

Montenegro Detains Opposition Activist Over Fake News About President

Posted on by BIRD

Civic society groups in Montenegro have criticized the arrest on Thursday of an opposition Democratic Front activist for posting fake news about the President’s health.

On Thursday, authorities put Radovan Rakocevic from the town of Bijelo Polje in custody for 72 hours for the offence of spreading panic. Rakocevic had shared an article on Facebook from a Belgrade tabloid, Alo, which claimed that Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic had been infected with the coronavirus.

“The prosecutor believes that Rakocevic would be able to repeat the criminal offence if he was released and would continue to publish statements that would cause panic among citizens. So he was ordered into detention,” the prosecutor’s decision said.

While the Democratic Front called on the authorities to release Rakocevic, the head of the Civic Alliance, Boris Raonic, warned that the government cannot fight fake news with arrests. He said the authorities should be more transparent and inform the public about everything related to COVID-19.

He said a guest on the national public broadcaster had also “presented a conspiracy theory that could cause panic, but there was no reaction either from the prosecution or the [broadcasting] management. That gives us a new element to this story – selective justice,” Raonic told the daily newspaper Vijesti.

He was referring to a guest speaker on the public service prime time show “Corona stay home” who presented a theory that COVID-19 was a biological weapon. Economic analyst Predrag Drecun, considered to be close to ruling DPS party, has claimed the coronavirus was produced in the US by the Defense Ministry.

Even before the COVID-19 outbreak became more severe in Montenegro, there had been arrests for spreading panic about it. On March 13, the Basic Court ordered 30 days in custody for Milivoje Brkovic for posting a message on Facebook that said state officials were hiding the real number of people suffering from the coronavirus in Montenegro. The country confirmed its first two cases on March 17.

On March 23, a Russian citizen was put in custody for posting on Instagram that more than a thousand people had caught COVID-19 in Montenegro. To date, Montenegro has confirmed 252 coronavirus infections, two of whom have died.

Bosnia Trying to Censor Information About Pandemic, Journalists Say

Posted on by BIRD

The rights organisation Transparency International, TI, in Bosnia and Herzegovina has called on Zeljka Cvijanovic, President of the Serb-led entity, Republika Srpska, to withdraw a decree banning the spread of panic and disorder during a state of emergency, saying that the Bosnia’s constitution does not allow the entities to suspend the right to freedom of expression and opinion.

In Republika Srpska, a decree with the force of law prohibiting the spread of panic and disorder during a state of emergency came into force on Tuesday.

The decree, which follows the introduction of the state of emergency in the entity, stipulates fines of 500 to 4,500 euros for individuals and companies that spread panic and fake news through the media and social networks. Opposition parties in the RS describe the regulation as controversial.

The Board of Directors of the Association of Bosnian Journalists has meanwhile called on both Bosnian entities to ensure unhindered access to information and decisions regarding the COVID-19 epidemic in a safe and free manner, without imposing any restrictions, censorship or restrictions on journalists.

“Such an approach calls for the urgent withdrawal of decisions and regulations with legal force concerning the restriction of freedom of expression and opinion in the media and on social networks, as well as the abolition of the power of individuals, police and other security agencies to censor the media and citizens, with rapid investigations or the imposition of very high fines, as in Republika Srpska,” the Association said in a press release.

The current RS decree is almost identical to the earlier ruling banning panic and fake news that the RS government adopted on March 19. 

One of the first individuals fined for violating the decree is a medical doctor, Maja Stojic Dragojevic, who is also a member of the Presidency of the largest opposition party in the RS, the Serbian Democratic Party, SDS. She was fined for writing on Facebook that there were not enough ventilators, beds, or intensive care services in the RS, and for claiming that the RS was unprepared for what is to come.

The Association of Bosnian Journalists has also warned that the government of Bosnia’s other entity, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, through its Ministry of the Interior and cyber-crime units, had begun monitoring information on social networks, and that five criminal proceedings had since been instituted for allegedly spreading false information and panic.

“Regardless of the emergency, it is against all democratic values to impose institutional censorship and restrictions on freedom of expression and information and to give broad authority to individuals engaged in crisis staffs or police and security agencies to interpret and ‘regulate’ journalistic rights and media freedoms according to their standards,” the  association said.

The Journalists’ Association has said it will invite international organisations and European institutions for the protection of freedom of expression to respond to the censorship of information about COVID-19 in Bosnia.

The Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatovic, recently said measures to combat misinformation should not be abused to hinder media freedom. She warned that freedom of the media was being suppressed in several countries under the pretext of combating misinformation about the coronavirus.

Montenegro Medic Arrested for Publishing List of Coronavirus Patients

Posted on by BIRD

Montenegro’s Prosecutor’s Office said the medical staffer in the Health Centre in the capital Podgorica, known only by the initials M.R., had been arrested by police for the crime of unauthorized collection and use of personal information.

“As an official, he is in charge of publishing information on COVID-19 patients through the IDO system, which he forwarded via Viber to other persons who, although his colleagues, are not authorized to dispose of this information,” the Prosecution said in a press release.

After the list of names of infected people and their ID numbers was published on Friday, the Montenegrin government demanded an investigation, which the Prosecutor’s Office led.

Civil society organizations and opposition parties also agreed that publishing the names of infected patients on social media violated their basic human rights and could lead to serious consequences. “We have to respect people’s privacy and stop the stigmatization of infected citizens,” the Civic Alliance, an NGO, said.

That was not the first time patients’ rights in Montenegro were violated in this way. On March 18, the identities of coronavirus patients were published by social media users and the photos of one patient and her family were also posted online.

On March 22, the government itself published the names of people who had been ordered to self-isolate, arguing that some of them had not respected the order.

The government said it had received the consent of the Agency for Personal Data Protection for this, and had decided that the lives and health of Montenegrin citizens came first. Despite concerns voiced by opposition parties and civil society groups, the government has continued to publish such lists.

There have been 248 confirmed novel coronavirus cases in the country of some 630,000 people so far, two of whom have died.

BIRD Community

Are you a professional journalist or a media worker looking for an easily searchable and comprehensive database and interested in safely (re)connecting with more than thousands of colleagues from Southeastern and Central Europe?

We created BIRD Community, a place where you can have it all!

Join Now