Prosecutor General of Belarus classified Internet as media on model of USA

• 26.06.2008, 8:16

“I am convinced that the Internet is a mass media source with all that it implies,” Prosecutor General of Belarus Ryhor Vasilevich said. According to him, he came to this conclusion after learning the international experience.

Vasilevich gave the USA as an example, where the Supreme Court considers the Internet to be a mass media source.

It would be good if the Prosecutor General became interested not only in US legal practice, but also in acting laws on media. And having known that registration of printed media and, moreover, of information Internet resources is not needed in the US, the General Prosecutor Office cancelled the acting law on media in Belarus and adopted a new one, the Agency of Financial News (AFN) writes.

However, Vasilevich needn’t to trouble himself with learning of American laws. It will be enough to read the first (!!!) amendment to the Constitution of the country, saying the activity of mass media can’t be restricted by any laws. So the Supreme Court of the United States has made a step towards the liberalisation of the Internet, not towards its regulation.

By the way, opinion of the Prosecutor General varies from the one of Natallya Pyatkevich, deputy head of the Presidential Administration, who was likely to have a hand in working out of the new law on media. Last week Pyatkevich repeatedly tried to persuade the public the new law on media didn’t apply to the Internet.

The Belarusian parliament adopted the new Law on Mass Media in the second reading on 24 June.