Surge in SLAPPs Hits Serbia’s Independent Media Hard

These were all examples of SLAPPs, Strategic Lawsuits against Public participation, intended to intimidate and silence critics and often used by the wealthy and powerful against media outlets and others with less financial resources to fight such lawsuits.

The Coalition Against SLAPPs in Europe, CASE, the International Federation of Journalists and its local affiliate, the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia last month condemned judge Djordjevic’s case against KRIK.

According to the National Working Group for Fighting SLAPPs in Serbia, which involves the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia, the Slavko Curuvija Foundation and various civil rights groups, there are currently 15 more active lawsuits against KRIK that can be classified as SLAPPs.

In 2023, Serbia was ranked 10th in Europe in terms of the number of SLAPPs, according to CASE, a network of organisations combating SLAPP lawsuits in Europe. A CASE Coalition report revealed over 250 such cases in Serbia that year.

Among the plaintiffs were officials, companies close to the government and influential individuals.

The London-based media freedom group Article 19 urged judges to “refrain from abusive lawsuits, as such practices have a dangerous chilling effect on journalists and media outlets in Serbia”. They also called on the Serbian government to swiftly implement the EU anti-SLAPP directive.

These cases could also encourage others to file similar lawsuits in an attempt to enforce censorship, experts say. “It’s becoming more frequent. The people we write about have changed their strategy,” said Bojana Pavlovic, one of KRIK journalists listed in the Djordjevic lawsuit.

“Initially, the pressures on our newsroom were physical; there were break-ins and constant campaigns. Then, at some point, they switched to a more sophisticated form of pressure,” she said.

The use of lawsuits was a more subtle form of pressure, Pavlovic explained. “The physical attacks and campaigns were very noisy and noticeable. They attracted the attention of international organisations,” she said.

Sued merely for reporting lawsuits

The lawsuits against KRIK followed its publication of judge Djordjevic and her husband’s assets on the investigative website’s ‘Judge Who Judges’ database in January 2024. Launched in 2021, the database lists the assets of members of Serbia’s judiciary.

After the database was updated with information about Judge Djordjevic and her husband, KRIK was notified of lawsuits alleging data protection violations. One of the judge’s lawsuits is criminal, based on the Criminal Code, while the other is civil, governed by the Law on Contracts and Torts.

In June this year, meanwhile, the Belgrade Court of Appeal confirmed a verdict convicting KRIK of publishing a news article in December 2021 simply stating that the commander of the police’s Witness Protection Unit, Goran Zivkovic, and two of his associates, had filed a lawsuit against its editorial office.

“We can no longer even publicly complain about the fact we are being sued because we then get sued for that, too, and lose in court,” KRIK’s editor-in-chief, Stevan Dojcinovic, said.

“The worst part is being found liable for something we never published, for sentences that don’t exist in our article and were invented by the judges,” he added.

KRIK is now required to pay 3,500 euros in damages and trial costs to the police officers. Including other expenses, the trial will cost the outlet about 6,000 euros. For independent, donor-funded media, this amount is significant.

In the KRIK newsroom, however, lawsuits have become routine, “something we expect”, Pavlovic said.

“Despite our efforts to adhere to all ethical standards, it no longer even matters. Lawsuits arrive for reasons we would never have anticipated. A man sued us just because an article said that he had been accused. They don’t even claim that anything in our text is inaccurate or offensive,” she added.

Pavlovic believes the lawsuits’ main intention is not to win compensation but to make it harder to produce quality journalism.

“These proceedings last so long that they become a goal in themselves. It’s no longer a question of whether we will come out as winners, as the very fact that we are participating makes us lose time. We have an obligation to appear at hearings and to respond to every lawsuit. And in the end, there’s also the financial aspect,” she said.

In the latest legal action against KRIK, Judge Djordjevic alleges that, by publishing her name, position and properties, journalists violated her privacy and endangered her safety, helping criminals to locate her.

KRIK argues that the data it published was publicly available.

“All the data is from public databases. There is no secret data or confidential documents. These are public registers that any citizen can access. We compiled it in one place and published it, to give citizens better insight,” Pavlovic said.

“We aimed to make the work of judges as transparent as possible, their accountability, and, to some extent, the assets they hold,” she added.

‘A continuation of the persecution of Curuvija’

When the panel with judge Djordjevic overturned the verdicts for the murder of Curuvija, it was a shock to everyone at the foundation that bears his name.

“The truth about my father’s murder is too difficult for our political reality. It is easier to threaten me and forbid me from knowing the truth,” Jelena Curuvija, Curuvija’s daughter, said after the ruling.

“My father has been gone for 25 years. It seems we are compelled to adopt such phrasing. To say ‘he is no longer here’, as if he had simply vanished on his own, is to avoid reiterating that he was murdered, executed or liquidated.”

The foundation is now facing the challenge of being sued by those believed for years to be the murderers.

“We experienced this as a continuation of the persecution of Slavko Curuvija, whose legacy we preserve a quarter of a century after his murder, which remains unresolved. Our mission remains the same: to insist on justice for murdered journalists and everyone in the media who suffers pressure, threats and violence,” Danica Djokic, a researcher at the foundation, said.

Serbian courts have recently been making “quite problematic decisions for the media community”, Djokic added.

She believes that SLAPPs are designed specifically to prevent criticism, by draining media of resources.

“The situation with critical media, especially domestic media in Serbia, is fragile. Newsrooms often have limited capacities, both financial and human. Exhaustion through SLAPPs can significantly weaken them. Journalists who are the targets of SLAPPs spend more time in courtrooms than doing their job,” she said.

Djokic does not believe SLAPPs are filed “on the instructions” of the authorities, but does think the government plays a role “in creating an atmosphere in which such a phenomenon can seriously take root in a short period of time”.

“This is fertile ground for growing intolerance towards the media, where new ways of silencing and intimidating sprout up every day, and where SLAPPs have recently begun to flourish,” she said.

In April, the Council of Europe adopted a recommendation on countering SLAPPs through strengthening legislative and political frameworks. The European Federation of Journalists supports these efforts, saying that the early dismissal of such lawsuits is “a key element of any effective anti-SLAPP legislation”.

But in Serbia, there is little optimism. “In Serbia, there are absolutely no mechanisms to fight against SLAPPs. Our legislation simply does not recognise such a thing,” Veljko Milic, a media law expert, said.

“The only possible response is some sort of solidarity, providing expert legal assistance, or alerting the public. In cases of excessive costs, funds can be established to help those exposed to navigate through the process more easily. Recently, journalists and civic activists have been expressing a need for some form of psychological support as well,” Milic added.

SLAPPs usually reveal an imbalance of power and involve delaying tactics, to drag cases out, he noted. “They are most often characterised by enormously high demands that are not in line with judicial practice,” he said.

“Often, plaintiffs latch onto some journalist’s minor mistake, ignoring the essence of the text. Sometimes they do not show up for trials to prolong the legal process as much as possible, exposing those being sued to more stress. Sometimes the lawsuits are obviously unfounded,” he added.

He noted also that there is no uniformity in court practices.

“There are also very good examples where judges – even though they cannot formally recognise a SLAPP because they lack the legal mechanism to do so – provide very well-reasoned judgments dismissing the claims. So it cannot be said that it is a practice for lawsuits to be automatically accepted. However, there are [also] negative examples,” he said.

BIRN asked the Serbian government and the Ministry of Justice if any measures have been taken to curb the use of SLAPPs in line with the Council of Europe recommendations. No response was received by the time of publication.