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OPINEWS

Free Speech closed by prosecutor's decision, journalist awaiting… editorial approval from SPAK

Politiko 2025-04-11 18:13:53

Free Speech closed by prosecutor's decision, journalist awaiting…

By Flamur Vezaj

Journalists, since the early days of the profession, have sought confirmation from prosecutors for news – not permission to publish it. Because permission to publish has never been a professional standard of journalism, but a habit of servile people. Real journalists do not seek “consent”, but pursue the truth – even when it does not suit the next rulers.
But when SPAK decides to behave like a judge, prosecutor, policeman and… responsible news editor, then we have a serious problem. And this is no longer a problem for one journalist, but for the entire system.
Altin Dumani, Doloresa Musabelliu and Behar Dibra kept themselves under investigation for 8 months, under the pretext of “revealing investigative secrets”, while they were in a clear conflict of interest – where every novice lawyer knows that in such cases, the investigative file should be transferred to another prosecutor’s office. But no. Not only did they not pass it on to another prosecutor's office, but after 8 months they handed it over to their "colleagues", again within SPAK. "Respecting the violation" of the law in style.
And what happened? Even after 16 months of investigation, still no measures against themselves, against the judicial police officers, or against the prosecutors who had the file in their hands. No attempt to uncover the "informant" of journalist Elton Qyno! And the funniest thing? No one knows who extracted the information from SPAK that Qyno published! Or maybe everyone knows, but no one is saying.
Meanwhile, SPAK itself claims that it was "looking for the source" of the information leak in the journalist's work tools. But instead of finding the source, the materials "discovered" on journalist Qyno's phones were included in another investigative file! Not to investigate the leak, but to punish the journalist. An unprecedented case!
So what did Qyno do to deserve all this punishment? He published conversations obtained through SKY ECC, yes, by SPAK itself – conversations that exposed the lies of Nuredin Dumani, the so-called “golden penitent”. What he had stated to prosecutors did not match what he had said himself in SKY communications. In any normal country, this would spark an investigation for false witness. In Albania? No, here the journalist who exposed it is punished. So, Qyno published the truth – and this was unacceptable to the prosecutors.
And how did they take revenge? They put Qyno in SPAK for 8 hours, with a body search, apartment, car, office, phone, work computer… they even searched the children's toys. They confiscated everything in the name of “searching for the source”, but the goal was clear: to shut him up.
Meanwhile, the journalists’ associations – which are inundated with letters for projects and funds, chose to remain silent loudly. The only exception was Aleksandër Çipa, who appeared before the Constitutional Court. While the rest of the associations and journalists, filled with honorary degrees and sterile activities, hid behind the armchair of political correctness or the “professional secret” of individual and institutional silence.
Let’s make a small comparison. Here in the US, when group conversations were discovered where military attacks, plans and types of weapons were discussed – and among the participants was a reporter – no one dared to investigate the journalist. His phone was not seized, he was not kept in isolation, he was not publicly demonized. Because here they understand that the journalist is not an enemy of the state, but a key link in the functioning of democracy.
The fourth power does not need permission from SPAK. At the end of the day, this process in the Constitutional Court is not simply a procedural matter. It is the test that will show whether Albanian justice is mature enough to understand its limits. SPAK is not the third power. Nor a power in itself. And it is certainly not the editorial office that decides what is published and what is not.
The media is the fourth power. And free speech is not a luxury that a prosecutor grants when he has a good time. It is a constitutional right, which does not depend on anyone's wishes - neither on SPAK, nor on Altin Dumani and his "experts"!

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