MINSK, 2 April (BelTA) – Members of the seventh-convocation House of Representatives of the National Assembly of Belarus have given the first reading to the bill on amending the law on mass events in Belarus, BelTA has learned.
Belarusian Minister of Internal Affairs Ivan Kubrakov said that the bill is designed to ensure national security and protect public order.
The bill scraps the notification-based procedure for organizing mass events in permanent locations. All the mass events will have to be authorized by municipal authorities. The authorities will be granted the right to pick recommended locations for mass events. Organizers of mass events and other persons are forbidden to publicly call for organizing mass events, including specifying the date, place, and time of the event through mass media, through the Internet or other information networks. Organizers and other persons are forbidden to make and distribute leaflets, posters, and other materials for these purposes before the permission to organize the mass event is granted.
It is forbidden to cover mass events, which are improperly organized, in mass media, in the Internet, and other information networks in real time for the sake of popularizing them. The bill clarifies the legal status of people, who are present at a mass event as mass media reporters. Such people are ordered to observe public order as well as organizers and participants of mass events. Reporters, who are present at a mass event, must not perform administrative functions regarding the organization of the mass event. Other people cannot be authorized to perform similar functions, Ivan Kubrakov stressed.
Apart from that, political parties and public associations will bear responsibility for their members, who publicly call for organizing unauthorized mass events on behalf of these organizations, for the members, who make and distribute leaflets, posters, and other materials for these purposes.
