Fifth warning to journalists this year

Sviatlana Stsiapanava, an independent journalist from Vitebsk, got a warning from the prosecutor's office for contributing to the Belarusian service of Polish Radio for Foreigners.

On April 15 the journalist was summoned to the regional prosecutor's office together with the legal representative Pavel Levinau.

In a 20-minutes talk, prosecutor Pavel Zaitsau was explaining that a journalist of a foreign mass medium cannot work in Belarus without accreditation, and warned that she could be held accountable under art. 22.9, part 2 of the Administrative Code (illegal production and distribution of mass media products), Pavel Levinau told to the press service of the Belarusian Association of Journalists.

The warning had already been prepared and signed by the deputy prosecutor of the region Georgi Karanko whom the visitors met on entering the department.

Sviatlana Stsiapanava is going to appeal against the warning to the regional prosecutor.

This is the fifth warning to journalists for three and a half months, with one warning in Brest, two - in Homel and one - in Hrodna region; all under one and the same "violation" - production of informational products without accreditation. Also there is one administrative fine in Brest according to art. 22.9, part 2.

Last year the monitoring group of BAJ registered 9 warnings from prosecutor's office, most of them - for contributing to foreign mass media without accreditation.