(CPJ/IFEX) – Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic’s assault on independent journalists continued and intensified this weekend. CPJ has documented several alarming new developments that it became aware of on Saturday, 3 April, and early Sunday, 4 April 1999. **Updates IFEX alerts of 2 April, 1 April, 29 March, 25 March and 24 March 1999** Thursday, 1 […]
(CPJ/IFEX) – Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic’s assault on
independent
journalists continued and intensified this weekend. CPJ has documented
several alarming new developments that it became aware of on Saturday,
3
April, and early Sunday, 4 April 1999.
**Updates IFEX alerts of 2 April, 1 April, 29 March, 25 March and 24
March
1999**
Thursday, 1 April
Radio Jasenica in Smederevska Palanka was shut down. Radio Jasenica is
a
member of the Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM),
whose
flagship station B92 was shut down on 2 April.
Friday, 2 April
At 9:00 a.m. local time, Serbian officials entered ANEM’s offices and
expelled all the employees from the building. The police entered
without a
warrant to enter the premises. As CPJ reported on 2 April, radio
station
B92, a founding member of ANEM, was shut down in the same way at
exactly the
same time.
Radio Senta, a Hungarian language radio station in Kikinda, and the
Serbian
language radio station Velika Kikinda, also in Kikinda, were shut
down.
Both stations are members of ANEM and are owned by Zoran Malesevic.
Serbian
officials confiscated a transmitter and other vital radio equipment.
Independent Television Station Cacak in Cacak was shut down. TV Cacak
is a
member of ANEM.
The leadership of independent Radio Ozon has decided to shut down its
facilities in an effort to protect their equipment from seizure by the
Serbian officials. The radio station has been under the threat of
closure
for the last week and decided to stop broadcasting as a last resort.
Radio
Ozon is a member of ANEM.
Two Spanish foreign correspondents, Jon Sistiaga Escudero and Bernabe
Dominguez Lopez of Telecinco television station, and a Dutch freelance
photographer, Arie Kievit of “Algemeen Dagblad”, were detained.
According
to Telecinco and “Algemeen Dagblad”, the reporters were in Macedonia
interviewing refugees arriving by train from Kosovo. The train was
stopped
on the border at the Macedonian town of Jankovic, with one part of the
train
in Macedonia and the other in Kosovo. The reporters entered the train
on the
Macedonian side and unwittingly crossed over into Kosovo. They were
confronted by the Serbian police and arrested for illegal entry into
the
country. Arie Kievit was held in jail for twenty-four hours and taken
to a
hotel in Pristina, where he was placed under house arrest. The status
of the
Spanish reporters is unknown; CPJ is seeking further information.
For background information on the media crackdown in Yugoslavia, visit
CPJ’s
website at http://www.cpj.org or call Paul LeGendre at (212) 465-1004
x101
or Elina Yuffa at (212) 465-1004, x115.
