Amendments to the Criminal code related to responsibility for "extremism" on the Internet are adopted in Ukraine. AIN.ua reports about it. 239 from 450 deputies voted pro. According to the bill, it’s planned in particular to add the article “Extremist Activity” to the Criminal Code. It forbids "production, storage for a purpose of sales or distributions as well as sale or distribution of extremist materials including through mass media, Internet, social networks".
The Ukrainian media organizations addressed the president of the country Victor Yanukovych with the requirement to veto the law which can be used for restriction of freedom of speech, "Ukrainskaya Pravda" reports.
It is a question of law "About Modification of Law of Ukraine "About Judicial System and Status of Judges" and Procedural Laws about “Additional Measures of Protection of Safety of Citizens" offered by deputies Vadim Kolesnichenko and Vladimir Oleynik from "Party of Regions", accepted on Thursday, January, 16 by the Verkhovna of Rada. According to this law, the Criminal Code of Ukraine is supplemented with the article 151 "Slander". The same law enters criminal liability for "extremist" activity, for collection of data about employees of law enforcement agencies. Besides, the law significantly toughens rules of behavior of protest actions and also responsibility for their violations. Law enforcement agencies receive additional powers. The law "Kolesnichenko-Oleynik" also enters such term as "foreign agent" into the Ukrainian legislation, it will be applied in relation to non-commercial organizations with foreign financing. According to the indication of state agencies providers will be obliged to switch off "extremist" resources.
- There is an impression that after the next Maidan Ukraine decided to pass all Putin’s period of the Russian history for several days, - editor-in-chief of FORUM.msk Anatoly Baranov got surprised. – It’s separate question, whether the Ukrainian state has enough resource to cork the bottle with genie of liberal freedoms which even Putin used to screw up for quite long time. Though all set of means of suppression looks surprisingly familiar: here are "foreign agents", criminalization of the article “slander” and notorious "extremism". It looks like the Russian déjà vu, there’s such impression that every bourgeois democracy in case of moving does it obligatory towards bourgeois dictatorship. Especially in the countries where gross domestic product per capita is lower, than certain threshold level. After all it’s clear- it’s more convenient to shut up mouths with hamburgers in rich country, while in poor with punch in the teeth.
