ONTD Political

yeats 21st-Dec-2012 06:02 am (UTC)

Press freedom declined further in 2011 as President Viktor Yanukovych continued curtailing the country’s recent democratic gains by reintroducing an authoritarian style of rule that predominated under former president Leonid Kuchma (1994–2005). Yanukovych and his ruling Party of Regions cracked down on the country’s opposition, consolidated their influence over the national broadcast media, and approved restrictive laws in the parliament that led to greater media self-censorship. A politicized court sentenced former prime minister Yuliya Tymoshenko—Yanukovych’s possible rival in the 2015 presidential election—to seven years in prison at the end of 2011 for allegedly mishandling natural gas negotiations with Russia in 2009. Amid the government’s prosecution of Tymoshenko and several of her allies, journalists continued to endure attacks, political pressure, and legal restrictions, further reducing media independence from the level enjoyed after the 2005 Orange Revolution.

The constitution and legal framework generally provide for media freedom and are among the most progressive in Eastern Europe. Libel was decriminalized in 2001, and in February 2009 the Supreme Court instructed judges to follow the civil libel standards of the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights, which granted lower levels of protection to public officials and clearly distinguished between value judgments and factual information. Nonetheless, officials continued to use libel lawsuits filed in the country’s politicized court system to deter critical news reporting. Respect for other media-related laws has diminished since the Orange Revolution, especially after Yanukovych was elected president in February 2010. The one exception to this negative trend was the parliament’s adoption of a progressive Law on Access to Information in January 2011, which was signed by Yanukovych in response to intense advocacy by civil society organizations.

[...]

The government does not restrict access to the internet, which was used by around 30.6 percent of the population in 2011. A growing number of citizens are relying on the web and social-networking sites such as Odnoklassniki and VKontakte to exchange information. The government limits the ability of bloggers and citizen journalists to report on public affairs by refusing to grant them accreditation. Although internet publications are not required to register with the authorities, under Khoroshkovsky’s leadership, the SBU has increased its monitoring of government criticism on the internet, and bloggers have been harassed for reporting on politically sensitive issues. In May 2011, three journalists from the website Novosti-N were attacked by officers of the tax police who tried to seize their cameras by force. The three had come to the tax police office after being told that some small-business owners had been taken there for questioning. Also in May, blogger Mykola Sukhomlin posted a video on Facebook of a senior Donetsk official in an expensive Mercedes, but then started receiving threats. His post was blocked in June. In July, the apartment door of Oleksiy Matsuka, editor of the Donetsk-based Novosti Donbass news website, was set on fire. The attack occurred after Novosti Donbass published several articles about the extravagant lifestyle of the local city elite, leading to several death threats. On August 19, a group of journalists with the Donetsk.ua website were detained by police in Donetsk for four hours after they tried to film Yanukovych’s motorcade traveling from the airport to a local funeral. News websites that were critical of the government also faced occasional hacking attacks.