This week, Bosnian police from Republika Srpska raided the Klix newsroom, a popular website that posted a recording that allegedly showed high level political corruption and bribery. Police have been attempting to figure out how the website obtained the recording, but to maintain their journalistic integrity, the site has refused to reveal their sources.
In the recording, a woman alleged to be Bosnian Serb Prime Minister Zeljka Cvijanovic, can be heard talking about two other politicians who had purchased the recent election so a political party could determine the outcome. It was said in the recording that the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, who are currently in power, paid two other high ranking politicians to support the party in recent parliamentary votes.
As expected, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats claims that the recording is a fake.
The Klix newsroom has never claimed that this recording was authentic, and representatives with the site admit that there is a chance that this is a hoax, but they have released the recording for the world to make up their own minds about it.
Borka Rudic, secretary general of the Bosnian Journalists Association, called the recent raid on Klix a “brutal attack” against the freedom of the press.
“I guess that the raid was launched because of the published audio recording. They have not given us any information, nor are they letting us in into the Klix newsroom. It is absurd that police are investigating how the media got the recording and from who, instead of investigating its authenticity and whether someone bought MPs,” Rudic told Fena news agency.
Earlier this week, we reported on another bribery scandal in a different part of the European Union, MP Pavlos Haikalis of Greece recently revealed that he was offered roughly “two or three million” Euros to vote for Greek president. Are these bribery scandals connected in some way? And are there similar deals going down throughout the Europe Union right now for any specific reason?
It is too soon to tell, but it will be interesting to watch all of these different cases develop in the weeks and months to come.
John Vibes writes for True Activist and is an author, researcher and investigative journalist who takes a special interest in the counter culture and the drug war.
