06. 08. 2008

RATEL TO DECIDE ON AMENDMENTS TO THEIR RULEBOOK SOON

Belgrade, August 6th, 2008 (Beta News Agency) - RATEL is soon to decide on the possible amendments or a complete withdrawal of their Rulebook on Internet communications monitoring.

According to the Beta News Agency, Saša Janković, the Ombudsman, stated that the top officials from the Republic Telecommunications Agency told him that their Management Board would reconsider his recommendations in the following days. To remind you, RATEL's Rulebook prompted negative reactions from the general public. In the absence of the adequate laws,  the document allows for potential abuses in the field of telecommunications' monitoring by the state institutions.

Janković met RATEL Director, Milan Janković and RATEL's Management Board Chairman, Jovan Radunović today, but he was not willing to pass any comment on the specific suggestions that he had gave. The general public will be informed about the content of this meeting after RATEL has passed their decision, the ombudsman, Sasa Janković, said. On July 30, he announced that he had already started examining the potential of RATEL's Rulebook to jeopardize citizens' rights guaranteed by the Serbian Constitution in the area of Internet communications' monitoring by the state institutions.

Top people from RATEL have met today with the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance, Rodoljub Šabić, too, who stated after the meeting that his impression had been that RATEL people were ready to accept suggestions from experts and general public and to discontinue enforcement of Rulebook rules until the Personal Data Protection Act was passed.

Šabić also said that he reiterated his views that the enforcement of such a Rulebook could lead to abuses because there were no personal data protection laws in Serbia, and also because there were no operational mechanisms to protect rights to personal data secrecy.

According to Sabic, in case that implementation of Rulebook continues, citizens' rights can also be protected by inserting provisions that would not allow citizens communications' control without a court order.

The Rulebook envisages that Internet providers on their own expense provide for a system that will facilitate legally prescribed telecommunications' monitoring, and also to provide information on subscribers to the relevant state institutions, together with enabling them to intercept their communications and electronic mail messages.

Chairman of the RATEL's Management Board confirmed that they had already started internal discussion on the Rulebook, but was not willing to pass any comment on the details of the today's talks.

So far, Association of Independent Electronic Media (Asocijacija nezavisnih elektronskih medija), Independent Journalists' Association of Serbia (Nezavisno udruženje novinara Srbije) and Journalists' Association of Serbia (Udruženje novinara Srbije) have, together with some other organizations and experts, already made their comments to the RATEL's Rulebook, while the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights (Beogradski centar za ljudska prava) announced their initiative to examine whether the Rulebook is in compliance with the provisions of Serbian Constitution.

After the negative reactions, RATEL representatives stated that only the technical conditions necessary for authorized state monitoring had been prescribed in their Rulebook, and that it was all according to the Telecommunications Act, since the same Act prescribed privacy protection within the scope of jurisdiction of the Telecommunications Act.

On July 17, Serbian Government sent in the Draft Personal Data Protection Act to Serbian Parliament.

Related News:

* ANEM to Condemn RATEL's Technical Conditions Document and Way of Its Adoption (ANEM Statement, July 29th, 2008)