Compromise version of censorship law adopted in Lithuanian parliament

VILNIUS, Dec 22, BNS - The Lithuanian Seimas on Tuesday adopted amendments to the Law on the Protection of Minors against the Detrimental Effects of Public Information to replace provisions in the previous edition which were deemed homophobic.

The new bill bans information that could be seen as promoting sexual relations from reaching the country's youth. The new piece of legislation is also free from the provision in the earlier amendments that banned information that promotes "homosexual, bisexual or polygamous relations" to minors, which was subject to ardent criticism.

Some 58 MPs voted in favor of adopting the adjusted amendments, four voted against and 25 abstained.

Members of the ruling Homeland Union - Lithuanian Christian Democrat Party, the National Resurrection Party, the Liberal and Center Union factions voted in favor of the amendments, while those of another partner in the ruling bloc - the Liberal Movement - didn't take part in the vote.

The opposition also contributed support to the bill, drawing the votes of some members of the Social Democrat and the Labor parliamentary groups.

This is the second time the Seimas mulls the draft so-called censorship law. The first time around it agreed to back conservative Gintaras Songaila's proposal to deem detrimental all information that promotes the country's youth to engage in homosexual, bisexual or polygamous relations. The parliament's bid to re-enter the said provisions brought the draft piece of legislation back on the Education Science and Culture Committee desk.

The committee instead voted to back an accommodated version of the bill by including a provision proposed by Mantas Varaska of the United Lithuania faction, which bans information promoting of any kind of sexual relations if it can be accessed by the underage population. The Seimas opted to approve the trade-off version as well.

The said provision comes as less permissive option than that proposed by a task force specially appointed to amend the controversial bill by President Dalia Grybauskaite, which proposed banning promotion of underage sexual relations.

The committee also included in the bill and the Seimas backed a provision to keep from the youth information that campaigns for a different than the officially embedded concept of family.

The Seimas has been at this bill since July, when MPs opted to include an amendment banning promotion of homosexual, bisexual or polygamous relations.

This provision was deemed homophobic and slammed by human rights watchdogs, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. Former president Valdas Adamkus vetoed the bill, but the Seimas voted to override it.

In September, the EP passed a resolution, urging Lithuania to reconsider the law.

A task force set up by Grybauskaite to improve the much debated the piece of legislation proposed its own amendments to the adopted bill, which is is yet to go into force.

Vilnius newsroom, +370 5 2058514, politika@bns.lt