Domain names of two independent media outlets are seized by authorities

The web­sites reform.by and media-polesye.by were tak­en down on April 15. These are the first cas­es of appli­ca­tion of the new order of the Exec­u­tive and Ana­lyt­i­cal Cen­ter of April 4, 2024, which pro­vides for the can­cel­la­tion of domain names of online pub­li­ca­tions includ­ed in the Repub­li­can List of Extrem­ist Mate­ri­als

The order to can­cel domain names with the .by exten­sion used by online media rec­og­nized by Belaru­sian courts as “extrem­ist mate­ri­als” was pub­lished on April 9. On April 15, the edi­tors of Reform.by and Media-Polesye received let­ters from the Exec­u­tive and Ana­lyt­i­cal Cen­ter under the Pres­i­dent of the Repub­lic of Belarus con­firm­ing the can­cel­la­tion.

“The edi­to­r­i­al board of Reform.by views such actions as cen­sor­ship and open manip­u­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al oblig­a­tions of Belarus by the EAC, the nation­al admin­is­tra­tor of the .by domain exten­sion,” accord­ing to infor­ma­tion on the publication’s web­site.

“We were aware of this devel­op­ment and have been oper­at­ing as Media-Polesye.com since today. Our work will con­tin­ue. We hope that our read­ers will under­stand the sit­u­a­tion and sup­port us at this time,” says Svi­at­lana Har­da, edi­tor-in-chief of Media-Polesye.

Both pub­li­ca­tions have tak­en the nec­es­sary pre­cau­tions in advance and have migrat­ed to reform.news and Media-Polesye.com.

“It is evi­dent that the tech­ni­cal issues will have an impact on traf­fic flow. How­ev­er, there are no alter­na­tive solu­tions avail­able at this time. This can moti­vate us to increase user traf­fic by seek­ing out new and inter­est­ing top­ics, both for read­ers and nation­al-lev­el media out­lets. At present, there are no cor­re­spon­dents in the regions, so any unique news is like­ly to be dis­sem­i­nat­ed out­side the pub­li­ca­tion,” states Svi­at­lana Har­da.

The edi­to­r­i­al board of reform.by has also indi­cat­ed its inten­tion to “apply for pro­tec­tion to inter­na­tion­al orga­ni­za­tions that gov­ern the Inter­net.”

Once a deci­sion has been made to can­cel a domain name, it is entered into a spe­cial list in the nation­al domain name data­base. As long as the infor­ma­tion resource is on the “extrem­ist mate­ri­als” list, the domain name will not be avail­able for reg­is­tra­tion. How­ev­er, the order states that using such domain names is per­mit­ted “in the inter­est of nation­al secu­ri­ty”.

Last year, author­i­ties began prac­tic­ing out-of-court revo­ca­tion of domain names. In April 2023 the domain name of the inde­pen­dent Barysau pub­li­ca­tion Ex-Press.by was tak­en away, and in Decem­ber 2023 the domain name of the TUT.by media out­let was can­celed. In Jan­u­ary this year, the author­i­ties also deprived the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists of its domain name and e‑mail address. The orga­ni­za­tion called it a gross vio­la­tion of the right to prop­er­ty and anoth­er attack on free speech.

The web­sites of Reform.by and Media-Polesye were blocked back in the sum­mer of 2021. The Reform.by team left Belarus around the same peri­od. The web­site was only added to the list of extrem­ist mate­ri­als on March 21, 2024.

In 2021, the offices and homes of Media-Polesye jour­nal­ists were searched. In 2022, a crim­i­nal case was filed against the media man­age­ment for alleged­ly abus­ing their pow­er (pay­ing enve­lope salaries). That year, the publication’s web­site and social media were list­ed as extrem­ist mate­ri­als.