Ukraine's National Expert Commission on the Protection of Public Morality has ruled that the registration of daily Blik should be withdrawn and criminal proceedings brought against the newspaper.
On October 23, the commission recommended that legal sanctions be taken against Blik, which is owned by Adevarul Holding, a Romanian media company, for publishing several photographs of half-naked women and a graphic of a crucified frog. The commission asked the ministry of justice to withdraw Blik's publishing registration and recommended that the Prosecutor-General's Office consider criminal charges against the newspaper.
"Withdrawing Blik's right to publish and instigating criminal charges against it would be disproportionate to any offences that may have been committed and would be tantamount to censorship," the Paris-based World Association of Newspapers (WAN) said on the incident.
In a letter to Yulia Tymoshenko, WAN President Gavin O'Reilly, said, "Such sanctions would constitute a clear breach of the right to freedom of expression, which is guaranteed by numerous international agreements, including the European Convention on Human Rights. Article 10 provides that: 'This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.' Any derogations from this right must be 'necessary in a democratic society', which is clearly not the case in this instance."
WAN urged Tymoshenko to ensure that the registration of Blik was not withdrawn and that criminal charges were not brought against the newspaper. "We also ask you to ensure that in future the work and decisions of the Commission are carried out transparently and that it effectively consults newspaper representative organisations when drafting any recommendations related to the press," O'Reilly wrote.
