BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

Tuesday, 21 June 2005

Another Fake Issue Of Polish Weekly Appears In Belarus

Prague, 21 June 2005 (RFE/RL) -- A printing plant in Hrodna on 18 June printed the second fake issue of the Polish-language weekly "Glos znad Niemna," prompting the editor to appeal to the Belarusian Association of Journalists and the police over the illegal use of the newspaper's nameplate, RFE/RL's Belarus Service and Belapan reported on 20 June.

Like the first disputed issue, the second one contains accusations against the new leadership of the Union of Poles in Belarus (SPB), which is a founder of the weekly.

"Glos zand Niemna" editor Andrzej Pisalnik said he knows none of the second bogus issue's contributors, except for Tadeusz Kruczkowski, who was replaced as SPB leader by Andzelika Borys at a March convention that was later invalidated by the Justice Ministry for alleged irregularities in the nomination of delegates.

"It is a de facto nationalization of an independent publication," Andrzej Poczobut, another Polish minority journalist in Belarus, told RFE/RL. "If you ask my opinion about who's behind this, I'm sure it is the KGB."

Source:

http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2005/06/f4ac7904-f268-48e1-bdcd-b2a8835c1b6b.html