25. 07. 2010

ASSOCIATIONS AND JOURNALISTS CONDEMNED ATTACK ON TEOFIL PANCIC

Belgrade, July 25, 2010 (B92) - Media associations strongly condemned the attack on Teofil Pancic.

President of IJAS (NUNS) Vukasin Obradovic said that he was sorry, but he was not surprised that another journalist had been brutally assaulted.

He said that this was a consequence of the general atmosphere in the society, in which journalists had become free targets and recalled that none of the attackers on journalists had been identified and prosecuted, from the murderers of Slavko Curuvija to the attackers on Brankica Stankovic and Bosko Brankovic.

NUNS seeks urgent meeting with ministers, police and justice on this brutal attack, and would urge them to produce more effective measures to protect journalists than police escorts.

Association of Journalists of Serbia (UNS) has urged witnesses to contact police and help them discover the bullies and punish them.

UNS said it was convinced that this attack "had to do with the work of journalist Teofil Pancic and called the prosecution to comply with the revised Criminal Code, which provides for stricter penalties for attacks on journalists".

Independent Association of Journalists of Vojvodina (NDNV) has called on the authorities to urgently find attackers on the journalist, saying that it would be otherwise considered that the state supported violence against journalists.

NDNV reminded that none of the murders, and almost none of the assaults on journalists in Serbia had ever been solved, adding that Serbia once again created a climate in which it was allowed to attack "the enemies of the state", that is, all those who wrote critically about negative phenomena in the society.

Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM) also strongly protested against the brutal attack on Teofil Pancic.

ANEM is expecting immediate reaction from the competent state bodies, to urgently and effectively find and prosecute the perpetrators of this attack, stated this organization.

ANEM believes that the absence of appropriate response of the state and creation of an atmosphere of fear, further encourage potential attackers.

The Association of Media also condemned beating of Teofil Pancic, saying that the attack was apparently planned.

"The Association requests from the Serbian Ministry of Internal Affairs to find the perpetrators and to bring the investigation to the end, unlike in the case of bomb attack on journalists of the weekly "Vreme" Dejan Anastasijevic. The state must put an end to intimidation and beatings of journalists", said in the statement.

The attack on the journalist of the weekly "Vreme" Teofil Pancic was strongly condemned by the B92 Editor-in-chief Veran Matic:

"This is a threat to anyone who disagrees, who uses his/her head, who wants to correct the injustice, who fights against the ghosts of the past to rule again... This is yet another reminder that we must not get used to the police protecting our best journalists and that this is the way to "solve the problem", to refrain from establishing the responsibility for all the violence that is done, not only to journalists but also to all the activists who belong to "minority groups". For this, a much broader and more effective solidarity is needed than the one associated only with the journalistic profession", Matic said.