PARLIAMENT OVERRIDES VETO TO PASS LAW THAT COULD

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 VILNIUS 000381 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PHUM PGOV LH SUBJECT: PARLIAMENT OVERRIDES VETO TO PASS LAW THAT COULD RESTRICT INFO ON HOMOSEXUALITY ¶1. SUMMARY: Lithuania's parliament overrode a presidential veto and passed amendments to a law on protecting minors from harmful effects of public information. The law has drawn complaints from Lithuanian and international human-rights organizations that said the amendments could make it illegal to present any positive information about homosexuality. The amendments define as harmful any information that promotes homosexual, bisexual or polygamous relations, or distorts family relations and scorns family values. In fact, the law provides exceptions for information that is useful in science, the arts, research or teaching, or is of public interest. But it writes into law the current system for rating TV programs, requires similar ratings on computer games, and appears to require Internet service providers to install filtering systems to prevent minors from accessing "harmful" information. We will continue to press the Lithuanian government to modify this ill-considered law. End summary. ¶2. The Lithuanian Seimas (parliament) voted July 14 to override a June 26 veto by then-President Adamkus and pass amendments to an existing law designed to protect minors from harmful effects of public information. The new additions to the law include a provision defining as harmful to minors any information that promotes homosexual, bisexual or polygamous relations. Human-rights groups in Lithuania and abroad had fought passage of the law, saying that it could prevent young people from receiving neutral, factual information about homosexuality. They also said the law amounted to censorship and violated Lithuania's commitments to the United Nations and European Union concerning freedom of expression. In vetoing the law in June, then-President Adamkus said the criteria for determining whether information was suitable for minors were too vague and abstract; he also questioned whether it violated free-speech guarantees. ¶3. Actually, the law lists exceptions for information that is useful in science, the arts, research or teaching; involves a person's political, social or religious beliefs; or is of public interest. (Judgments on value must still be made. Despite the exception for the arts, the general director of a Lithuanian TV company was fined almost 1,000 USD earlier this year for airing earlier than 11 p.m. an advertisement for a Lithuanian production of the musical "Sweeney Todd." That musical features murder, mutilation and cannibalism -- depictions of which were already prohibited under the law. The case is being appealed.) ¶4. The law says that no TV broadcasts will be prohibited on the basis of the information they contain as long as they are marked with the ratings symbol showing the age for which each program is appropriate. Lithuania has had such a ratings system in place through government regulation, but this is the first time it has been written into law. The law also requires producers and distributors of computer games to provide age-appropriate ratings, following guidelines to be set by the GOL. ¶5. Internet service providers will be required to "ensure the introduction and functioning of filtering measures" to prevent minors from accessing detrimental content via the Internet, according to the law, which also says the GOL's Information Society Development Committee will determine the rules for such filtering. ¶6. More parliamentarians voted to override the veto than had voted for the law in the first place. President Grybauskaite, who took office only on July 12, does not have the option to veto the law again, and a spokesman said she would sign it "with regret." Eligijus Masiulis, the leader of the Liberal Movement, one of four parties in the governing coalition, said his party would ask the Constitutional Court to declare the law unconstitutional as a violation of free-speech rights. He also said, "In this technological world it is impossible to prevent people from receiving information. It would be more effective to educate youth so they grow up independent, thoughtful and able to make choices." ¶7. The chairman of the Tolerant Youth Association, a Lithuanian NGO, told us the amendments ban "any positive information, or 'propaganda,' as they put it, about homosexuals." Instead, he said, the law "puts homosexuals into the same category with the display of dead or cruelly mutilated bodies and information that causes fear or horror or encourages suicide." ¶8. COMMENT: While the provision of the law prohibiting promotion of homosexual relations has drawn the most attention from human-rights supporters, the requirement that Internet service providers filter their content to prevent minors from accessing harmful material will probably create VILNIUS 00000381 002 OF 002 more difficult and unintended consequences. While people are capable of making judgments as to whether a particular piece of information falls under the law or the exceptions to it, computer filters have no capacity for reason. We will continue to press Lithuanian authorities to modify this poorly-conceived and -drafted law, which appears to violate Lithuania's international obligations as well as common sense. LEADER