The court rescinded the Inspector‘s penalty for Wilnoteka.lt

December 22, 2011. The Vilnius County Administrative Court revoked the penalty of an admonition imposed by the Inspector of Journalistic Ethics on a web portal Wilnoteka.lt for publishing the article “In defence of Polish schools in Lithuania”. The complaint about Wilnoteka was lodged by Kazimieras Garšva, the president of “Vilnija” association, who accused the web portal of misleading society about the actual state of Polish education in Lithuania and stirring up the national feuds. In the article Wilnoteka published the open letter and the petition submitted to Lithuanian and Polish authorities by Forum of Parents from the Polish schools in Lithuania. Wilnoteka provided the letter and the petition with their own commentary and editors’ opinion. The web portal also called for signing the open letter. The Inspector decided that Wilnoteka violated the journalistic ethics by presenting the information in a partial and superficial way as well as by omitting the arguments in support of the amendment to the educational law in Lithuania.

The Vilnius County Administrative Court agreed with the arguments of Wilnoteka’s lawyer, Tadeusz Gudziński, and decided that the Inspector’s decision was unlawful.

Court’s decision is not the first success of the European Foundation of Human Rights which defended Wilnoteka.lt within the programme of Legal Aid Centre.

European Foundation of Human Rights

Tłumaczenie Sylwia Janus w ramach praktyk w Europejskiej Fundacji Praw Człowieka, www.efhr.eu. Translated by Sylwia Janus within the framework of a traineeship programme of the European Foundation of Human Rights, www.efhr.eu