BELGRADE, 27.06.2017. – The Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia (IJAS) and the Independent Journalists’ Association of Vojvodina (IJAV) strongly condemn death threat sent to Marija Vucic, journalist and deputy of editor in chief of Cenzolovka via Facebook.
In her statement to IJAS legal service colleague Marija Vucic confirmed that the death threat was sent via Facebook in the night between Friday and Saturday (June 23-24), only a few hours after the text the “Threats of the Nis extremists: Now Vucic’s security will come, they know to deal with journalists” was published. The message that said “You snake, you’ll go under the sword soon” was sent from a false Facebook profile featuring a photo of Miroljub Petrovic, known for his statements that certain NGOs activists, homosexuals, atheists … should be punished by death sentences – by stoning and “by the sword“. The mentioned article is about an incident that took place in Nis when the extreme right wing groups prevented the showing of a documentary “Albanians are our Sisters”.
“I don’t have a proof that the text is the reason for the threat, but there are indications that this is the case – the article was published on Friday during the day and the threat came during the night. I do not know who is that person. The case was immediately reported to the police and the prosecutor’s office. On the following day, they informed me that they started to work on the case under urgent procedure, and I hope that they will find the person who threatened me,” said Marija Vucic and explained that threatening message was sent to a part of the inbox which receives messages from those who are not her friends on Facebook.
IJAS and IJAV expect of the Prosecution Office for High Tech Crime to investigate the case in an urgent procedure, establish the identity of the author of threat and initiate criminal proceedings against him. Journalists’ associations indicate that this case also shows how inadequate the reaction of the justice system is and that tolerance of hate speech and threats encourages violence and extremism