Filipovic (and Media Freedom) with No Defenders in the Greek Media

AIM Athens, July 28, 2000

Miroslav Filipovic was convicted by a military court in Nis (Serbia), on 26 July 2000, to seven years in prison for spying and disseminating false information. An eyewitness trial report of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), based in New York mentioned that, according to the court decision, Filipovic was found guilty of "deliberately collecting, processing, and sending sensitive military material to foreign organisations---namely the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) in London and Agence France Presse (AFP) in Paris." Presiding Judge Col. Radenko Miladinovic added that Filipovic had written about alleged Yugoslav Army atrocities against ethnic Albanians in Kosovo during last year's NATO air strikes in Yugoslavia, and that he had described Yugoslav military strategy as "the tactics of killing and burning." Filipovic specifically alleged that army and Serbian police forces had looted deserted Albanian villages and killed Albanian women and children, Judge Miladinovic said. Twenty-four hours later, the whole international freedom of expression community condemned the verdict and the persistent violation of freedom of expression in Yugoslavia.

All this may be by now well known in Yugoslavia proper, the other Balkan countries and the rest of Europe, where most sensible people will share in the indignation for this unprecedented conviction of a journalist for reporting the truth. But hardly any Greek would have noticed. Worse, if s/he did so, s/he would have gotten the impression that there was perhaps some truth to the charges as the rare references to the issue were "neutral" and lacked any mention of the media community reactions.

Characteristic was the initial coverage in the English edition of "Kathimerini," inserted daily in the "International Herald Tribune"'s Athens edition (http://www.k-english.com/content.asp?id=41502&ekd=y). One of its "Balkan Briefs" on 27 July was "Yugoslav court jails Serb reporter for 7 years." It read: "NIS - A Yugoslav military court sentenced a Serb journalist who reported allegations of army atrocities in Kosovo last year to seven years in prison yesterday for espionage and spreading false information. Miroslav Filipovic, who has been in military detention for more than two months, worked for the Belgrade-based independent daily Danas, the French news agency Agence France-Presse and the London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Judge Radenko Miladinovic read out the verdict after a two-day trial in the Serbian town of Nis. He said Filipovic, 49, received five years 'because from mid-June 1999 to May 2000 he obtained secret military data with the intention of forwarding them to the foreign organizations IWPR and the AFP news agency.' 'This court has concluded beyond any doubt that you have obtained secret military data,' he told the defendant."

The two dailies, usually sensitive to human rights issues, "Avghi" and "Eleftherotypia" had no more than short references in their general articles on the announcement of the Yugoslav elections, in their 28 July editions. The latter wrote nothing on 27 July, while the former carried a short story similar to the "Kathimerini" one. With two exceptions, Greece's other main dailies had no reference at all on 28 July, despite the considerable number of statements by the main freedom of the media inter- and non-governmental organizations, as well as by the EU. "To Vima," "Kathimerini" (in both its Greek and English editions), "Rizospastis," "Exousia," "Apogevmatini," "Eleftheros Typos," "Ethnos" were silent. "Ta Nea," in a column known to publish international stories that not seen elsewhere in the Greek press, ran the only Greek-language separate and somewhat comprehensive article, in which Filipovic's Internet award and the Amnesty International statement before the trial (but none other NGO statement after it) were mentioned. The only correct coverage was that of the other English-language daily "Athens News" (http://athensnews.dolnet.gr/athweb/nathens.print_unique?e=C&f=12711&m=A04&a a=2&eidos=S) under the meaningful title "Verdict against Serbian journalist denounced" with the emphasis on the international reactions.

This attitude of the Greek press was in sharp contrast to the other recent "journalists or spies?" case, that of the Turkish-Cypriot editor and photographer of "Avrupa," arrested in early July 2000, charged with "espionage" but released in mid-July. Their persecution by the Denktash regime, that uses similar methods with those of the Milosevic one, was also condemned by the usual international freedom of expression NGOs. Here, the whole Greek press played up the story and the condemnations were amply mentioned. Just as the regular condemnations of freedom of expression violations in Turkey are always covered by the Greek media, which, however, hardly ever make any reference to the even more abundant similar violations in Serbia.

Regrettably, once more, the Greek press confirms that its pretense of interest in the defense of the freedom of expression is dependent on the political identity of the violator and the medium of the victim of the violation. Critical journalists in countries with regimes that have many friends in the Greek media (like Russia and Yugoslavia) will not find many defenders of their journalistic freedom in the Greek press. If, on top of that, they are correspondents of Western media, usually accused in Greece of anti-Greek, anti-Serb, anti-Russian, etc. attitude, they stand no chance of having their problem even mentioned in Greek newspapers. After all, in recent years, some Western media correspondents in Greece have been the target of nasty attacks by Greek media and the government, and hardly anyone voiced their disagreement.

Panayote Dimitras