KAZAKHSTAN: DRAFT AMENDMENTS TO MEDIA LAW RAISE CONCERNS

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 ALMATY 002074

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

SIPDIS

STATE FOR SCA/CACEN (JMUDGE),SCA/PPD (JBASEDOW),EUR/ACE
(ESMITH/JMCKANE),DRL/PHD (CKUCHTA-HELBLING)

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV, PHUM, KPAO, KDEM, KZ
SUBJ: KAZAKHSTAN: DRAFT AMENDMENTS TO MEDIA LAW RAISE
CONCERNS

Ref: A) Almaty 485, B) Almaty 1750

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1. (SBU) Summary. Political parties and media defense
organizations in Kazakhstan have mounted a public campaign
opposing amendments to Kazakhstan's media law introduced to
the parliament on May 30 by Information Minister
Yermukhamet Yertysbayev. The draft amendments leave open
some legal loopholes to be exploited by opposition media
and impose other measures that could shut down defiant
outlets. The controversy highlights a public feud between
the minister, considered to be carrying out the president's
orders, and the president's eldest daughter and
parliamentarian, Dariga Nazarbayeva. Nazarbayeva has led
the Congress of Journalists in preparing their own revised
draft media law, to be presented to parliament June 14.
Neither the proposed amendments nor the draft law include
the anti-monopoly clauses or simplified registration
procedures desired by Kazakhstan's media defense advocates.
End summary.

2. (U) Following through on plans announced in April to
enforce Kazakhstan's "informational security," Information
Minister Yermukhamet Yertysbayev on May 30 submitted a
package of amendments to the Mazhilis, Kazakhstan's lower
house of parliament. The most controversial amendments
would ban anyone who had previously lost a libel judgment
from being a director of any other medium; allow media
organizations to be closed down for technical violations;
require a government license for printing houses; and
require papers to publish every three months. Media would
have to re-register upon any changes in editor, address, or
frequency of publishing or broadcasting. The amendments
would also impose a deposit of 5,000 monthly calculated
indices as indemnity against potential libel judgments.
(Note: Each MCI is 1,030 tenge; at the current rate of
exchange, 5,000 MCIs is about $39,000.)

3. (SBU) In a meeting May 19 with Helsinki Commission
Deputy Chief of Staff Dorothy Taft, Yertysbayev said the
amendments were intended to improve the quality of
journalism and ensure that only regularly publishing media
would be registered. He said that of the 6,646 currently
registered papers, only 2,438 publish, because under the
current law papers only have to publish once every six
months. He said the irregularly publishing newspapers were
opposition papers that were issued during the 2004
parliamentary and 2005 presidential elections to "slander
and offend the president." He said he wanted to change the
law so the papers publish responsibly and continually,
"like real newspapers."

Rift in Government Solidarity?
--------------

4. (U) Politically diverse parties and media organizations
have come together to publicly condemn the proposed
amendments and urge the parliament to reject them. An
appeal signed by a dozen media groups and disseminated at a
press conference June 5 described the amendments as "a step
backward toward stagnation and totalitarianism" that could
"kill freedom of speech in Kazakhstan" and "disgrace
Kazakhstan in the eyes of the world." The signatories
included the pro-government Union of Journalists, the
Congress of Journalists headed by Asar party leader Dariga
Nazarbayeva, and the media defense organization Adil Syoz
(The Just Word.) The opposition party Ak Zhol, pro-
government Asar, and the unregistered opposition party Alga
released their own statement June 6 calling the amendments
"one more bludgeon" to be used against independent and
opposition media.

5. (U) The 35 to 25 vote in parliament accepting the
amendments for consideration likewise reflected divergent
views. Showing either chutzpah or a wry sense of humor,
Yertysbayev had asked the parliament to "take pity" and
pass the amendments without discussion by June 24, because
the information ministry had had to evacuate their offices
after a fire damaged their building. However, Nazarbayeva,
Asar party member Sergey Kiselyev, and Otan party members
Dariya Klebanova and Amanageldy Taspikhov insisted on

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sending the amendments back to the government for
revisions. Addressing the parliament June 7, Nazarbayeva
said accepting the draft law for consideration would sign
"a death warrant for freedom of speech" in Kazakhstan. The
official news agency Kazakhstan Today reported that a
working group headed by Otan party member Gadilbek
Shalakhmetov would prepare comments on the draft amendments
by October 20 this year.

The Long and Winding Road to a Revised Media Law
-------------- ---

6. (U) The Congress of Journalists, the Information
Ministry, and the media defense group Adil Syoz have spent
several years trying to reach a consensus on a revised
media law. In April 2004, a draft was so widely criticized
that President Nazarbayev vetoed it, after the
Constitutional Council declared it unconstitutional.
Altynbek Sarsenbaiuly, the Information Minister at the
time, then prepared a draft that set limits on libel
claims, abolished criminal libel prosecutions of
journalists, and included significant anti-monopoly
provisions. Dariga Nazarbayeva's Congress of Journalists
submitted a version to the Information Ministry for review
in October 2005. Their draft proposed a one-year statute of
limitations for libel suits and a 5% cap on damage claims,
but lacked anti-monopoly clauses. (Note: Media report that
Nazarbayeva will submit a draft law to parliament on June
14, but it is unclear whether the draft has been changed
since October of last year.)

7. (SBU) Adil Syoz protested publicly in November 2005 that
their suggested additions to the Congress of Journalists'
draft law were ignored, including a ban on media
monopolies. Adil Syoz had also proposed that media should
only have to inform the information ministry to become
registered, and if confirmation were not received with 30
days, they should be able to begin publishing. The ministry
would thus have to respond promptly to new registration
requests and would be unable to ignore - or prevent - the
establishment of new outlets. Another omission concerned
the requirement for immobile, proprietary TV and radio
broadcast towers that can only be installed by the state
Kazteleradio corporation. Adil Syoz had asked that simpler
modular towers be allowed, to avoid mandatory installation
by Kazteleradio. In his conversation with Taft, Yertysbayev
said both the Adil Syoz and Congress of Journalist draft
media laws were good, but he said he was a pragmatist and a
realist and knew which one parliament would ultimately
approve.

Yertysbayev Sets the Free Speech Bar a Little Bit Higher
-------------- --------------

8. (SBU) Comment: Yertysbayev insists that he wants to
defend freedom of speech and the rights of journalists to
publish. It is, however, his own definition of "journalism"
that he is defending when he draws a distinction between
"truthful and objective information" and "slandering the
head of state" (Ref A). Some of the amendments, if passed,
would be used to silence media that dared to criticize
those in power. Requiring newspapers to publish every three
months rather than every six will have no appreciable
affect. Newspapers like Respublika (aka Assandi Times) and
Zhuma Times (aka DATa Nedeli, SolDAT, etc.) have managed to
keep publishing by registering names of future newspapers
to replace those that were shut down in libel suits.
However, the $39,000 deposit against potential libel
judgments is a very serious hurdle that lower budget
opposition newspapers would not be able to clear. Such
smaller, independent newspapers would be the most likely to
be found guilty of "insulting the dignity and honor of the
president" and would lose their deposit. Another amendment
would prohibit their editors from publishing again.

9. (SBU) Comment, continued: Nazarbayeva has fueled the
firestorm over the proposed amendments, most likely to
generate public sympathy for the battle ahead when
Yertysbayev tries to turn official Khabar TV, in which
supposedly she has a large investment, into Kazakhstan's

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first public television station (Ref B). Her outrage over
Yertysbayev's amendments obscures the fact that the
Congress of Journalists' draft law also leaves out key
provisions on simplified registration and anti-monopoly
clauses that media rights groups insist upon. Yertysbayev
told Taft that Kazakhstan's media have improved greatly
compared to Uzbekistan or those from Kazakhstan's days as a
Soviet republic. With such a low standard of comparison,
Kazakhstan is likely to progress slowly toward a more
democratic ideal of media independence.

Asquino