14. 06. 2013

ANEM WELCOMED THE DECISION OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

Belgrade, June 14, 2013 (B92) - The Media Coalition - consisting of the media and journalists associations (ANEM, NUNS, UNS, NDNV and Local Press) - has welcomed the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Serbia to pronounce unconstitutional certain legal provisions of the Law on Electronic Communications related to the access to retained data, which had already proved controversial during the procedure of adoption of the Law.

The retained data is information about the caller's number, the called number, time of the beginning and end of the telephone call, duration of the telephone call, the device that is used in communication (the type of mobile phone), as well as the geographic location of the telephones used in communication.

The disputed provisions were violating the procedural guarantees stipulated by the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia, which states that any deviation from the inviolability of secrecy of letters and other forms of communication is allowed only for a certain time and on the basis of a court decision, if necessary for the purpose of criminal proceedings or protection of security of the Republic of Serbia, in accordance with law.

The Media Coalition called on the Constitutional Court to also pronounce unconstitutional the disputed provisions of the Law on Criminal Proceedings, so that the principle of procedural guarantees from the Article 41 of the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia would be consistently applied in all laws that regulate the access to retained data.