Lukashenko's new gag: he will ban reporting of unauthorized protests
Western countries are preparing sanctions against Belarus and cutting their connections with the country after the Belarusian government intercepted a Ryanair plane to arrest journalist and dissident Roman Protasevich on Sunday.. From the European Union there has even been talk of 'state piracy'. But Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko is not going to stop. He has just signed a media law that completely prohibits journalists from covering demonstrations live if they have not been approved by the authorities. It is just what Protasevich was doing, who in a video recorded of him yesterday in his detention center acknowledged having played a role in organizing “mass riots” in the capital last year.
His colleagues are sure that his words are the result of coercion and mistreatment. His social media work from exile has been one of the few remaining independent pieces of content on Belarus since the massive crackdown on dissent last year.. From the hand of the channel that he founded, Nexta, the Belarusians received all the information about the protests on time.
The new rules to be imposed by Lukashenko mean that protests without legal permission, such as those promoted by opposition leader Svetlana Tijanovskaya last year, can only be publicized after they take place.
This law supposedly aims to prevent the media from “promoting or propagating” protest initiatives. In addition, the amendments prevent journalists from publicizing the calls. The new law even introduces a ban on publishing the results of opinion polls without government permission.. Prosecutors may “restrict access to publications that disseminate information intended to promote extremism”.
Cartoon of Lukashenko, in a rally in support of the arrested dissident.
Hamas denial
On the other hand, the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas said it had nothing to do with the forced landing of the Ryanair plane.. This was stated by spokesman Fawzi Barhoum. The Belarusian authorities had justified the operation by assuring that the flight was threatened in an e-mail whose authorship was claimed by the Palestinian Islamist organization Hamas.
“We do not resort to these methods, which could be the work of some suspicious parties that aim to demonize Hamas and undermine global compassion for our Palestinian people and their legitimate resistance,” the spokesman told Reuters news agency.