The ruling nationalist factions in each ethnic community exercise direct or indirect control over local news broadcasting. The news media is more lively and diverse in Sarajevo and other areas of the Muslim-Croat Federation. In the Serb Republic, there are few independent publications or broadcasters. Most Bosnian Serb news outlets operate on behalf of one of the two rival centers of political power. Although the Western-backed Bosnian Serb president Biljana Plavsic serves as the duly elected leader in Banja Luka, wartime Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, an indicted war criminal, controls much of region from his base in Pale.
Newsgathering throughout the country is hampered by police harassment,
poor telecommunications, and restrictions on transit between the Serb Republic
and the Muslim-Croat Federation and between Muslim- and Croat-controlled
areas. The development of independent media has been hurt further by the
loss of the many journalists who were killed in the war,
emigrated, or left the profession for more secure employment.
The Dayton peace accords addressed the need to safeguard both the security
and independence of journalists, but those promises have not been vigilantly
enforced. In a memorandum to U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright
in May, before she traveled to Bosnia, CPJ recommended measures to secure
the safety of journalists and to aid the growth of independent media before
the fall local elections. The memorandum urged that Stabilization Force
(SFOR) troops be authorized to safeguard not only transmitters or media
offices, but also the journalists themselves—with the use of force if necessary.
CPJ called for the prosecution of police officers who attack journalists.
Because regionally differentiated license plates were used to identify
traveling reporters by their ethnicity, exposing them to local police and
paramilitary harassment, CPJ asked the Organization for Security and Cooperation
in Europe (OSCE) to offer shuttle buses to journalists covering the election
across inter-entity boundaries until the entities adopted a universal license
plate. CPJ also appealed for SFOR adjudication of broadcasting regulatory
disputes, such as the case of Radio Zid, an independent Sarajevo station
whose signal was overpowered on the same frequency by the Karadzic family’s
Radio Orthodox St. John in Pale.
In May, Albright pledged that by year’s end all Bosnians would have
access to independent television or radio reporting. She announced plans
to expand broadcasts of Radio Free Europe and the Voice of America to counter
"misinformation designed to fuel hate" by official media. The NATO powers
authorized High Representative Carlos Westendorp, the top peace envoy in
Bosnia, to take action against media deemed to be working against the peace
process. In August, the television studio in Banja Luka, controlled by
Plavsic supporters, cut links with Karadzic-backed Serb Radio and Television
(SRT) in Pale, citing its "primitive propaganda," and broadcast its own
news program. Plavsic demanded the resignation of SRT’s pro-Karadzic editorial
managers. In August, when SRT’s Pale TV intercut footage of Nazi tanks
with footage of NATO troops deployed in Bosnia, NATO deemed the programming
to be in violation of the Dayton accords. On September 1 nearly 300 U.S.
SFOR troops interceded to block armed pro-Pale Bosnian Serbs from illegally
taking control of a television transmission tower in Udrigovo that new
non-governmental broadcasters had hoped to use. After a day of Bosnia Serb
protests and mob attacks, the U.S. troops withdrew. SFOR returned the transmitter
to the Karadzic loyalists, who pledged to tone down anti-NATO editorializing
and provide an hour of prime time to rival factions. Pale TV denounced
the move, saying NATO had engaged in censorship by seizing the transmitter
and dictating the terms of its return. In a letter to Secretary Albright,
CPJ
objected to NATO’s decision to turn the Udrigovo transmitter over to
the Karadzic forces, noting that it would curtail promised opportunities
for independent broadcasters. The letter reiterated CPJ’s position that
NATO should enforce the Dayton accords’ "ample guarantees for press freedom"
and "ensure that a variety of viewpoints—including criticism of the actions
of NATO—can be expressed in the local media."
On October 1, Westendorp condemned SRT for its alleged "persistent and blatant contravention" of the Dayton accords and "insulting language and highly biased reportage," and authorized SFOR’s seizure of four transmitters used by Pale TV.
The transmitters were turned over to Plavsic’s state broadcasting service in Banja Luka. Miroslav Toholj, the general manager of Pale TV, called the seizure of transmitters "violence against freedom of the media." Journalists from the Pale studio went on strike, proclaiming themselves victims of press attacks initiated by NATO.
While CPJ took no position on the NATO seizure of the transmitters, which had been at the service not of a news organization but of the propaganda arm of an unrecognized government run by indicted war criminals, the Board of Directors voted later to oppose any NATO intervention which would reduce rather than increase the availability and diversity of published and broadcast news and opinion. CPJ urged Westendorp to ensure that the transmitters would be used for balanced, impartial news coverage. In October, former CPJ chairman Kati Marton traveled to Bosnia and Serbia with New York Times columnist and fellow board member Anthony Lewis. During their week-long visit to Sarajevo, Banja Luka, Doboj, and Belgrade, they met with Bosnian and Serbian journalists and political leaders, seeking stronger press freedom guarantees and support from the international community for independent broadcasting. They urged that any new regulatory agencies be supervised by professional journalists, not politicians.
The Bosnian Serb broadcasters were not the only ones accused of violating the Dayton agreement by airing biased and inflammatory programs. Banja Luka TV broadcast an inflammatory anti-Croatian program at year end, prompting Westendorp to announce that he would appoint a foreign "supervisor" for the Bosnian Serb station. Croatian Television Mostar, HTV, in Croat-controlled western Mostar, was warned on three separate occasions in 1997 by the OSCE media commission and NATO to stop broadcasting allegedly racist denunciations of Bosnian Muslims. The OSCE ordered HTV to apologize during their evening news broadcasts, under threat of punitive NATO action. The station acquiesced, but two general managers resigned in protest.
The print media also became a target in the Bosnian Serb power struggle,
with the bombing in September in Doboj of Alternativa, the only
pro-Plavsic newspaper in the Karadzic-controlled town. Alternativa’s
offices had been machine-gunned a month earlier at a time when its publisher
was held in custody by pro-Karadzic police. In a troubling development
for Sarajevo’s independent press, Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic attacked
Dani and other leading magazines for reporting on Muslim atrocities against
Serbs in the Bosnian capital. Izetbegovic called the journalists anti-Muslim
traitors "financed by foreign sources."