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Serb media attacks continue

  • Andrew Wasley
    The clampdown on Serbia's independent media has reached an unprecedented high since the Milosevic regime sanctioned an all-out assault onpolitical dissent early this year.
    Since January, over 20 media organisations have fallen victim to financial reprisals with a further number harassed, closed or suspended. Dozens of journalists and media owners have been rounded up, beaten or jailed, their houses ransacked and families terrorised.
        Print media came under fire first with journalists working for publications outside the "official" circle of state newspapers being accused of spreading propaganda damaging to the state.
        Worse was to come for those working in Serbia's most vibrant broadcasting media. In May, the popular B2-92 radio station - infamously gagged during last year's crisis - was raided again along with student station Index. Despite a sustained effort to transmit via the web, B2-92 has been unable to retain full transmission schedules.
        Most disturbingly, a Serbian correspondent for London-based IWPR, AFP and Danas, Miroslav Filipovic, was jailed last month for seven years for "espionage" and "spreading false information".
    The Institute of War and Peace Reporting is an independent nonprofit organisation supporting regional media and democratic change. They provide excellent email news bulletins on the region and also produce a special weekly Tribunal Update with news from proceedings at the International War Crimes Tribunal at the Hague.
    IWPR, 33 Islington High St, London N1 9LH, Britain (tel +44 20 7713 7130; fax 7713 7140; email: info@iwpr.net;     http://www.iwpr.net ).
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