"Violence against women relativized by daily's fake writers"

"Violence against women relativized by daily's fake writers"

The statement added that they "wished to present an ordinary journalistic error as Politika's alleged desire to deceive its readers."

All this comes amid criticism over the articles in question, that are seen as seeking to relativize domestic violence and violence against women at a time when Serbia has been shaken by two brutal public murders of women and children committed by their ex-husbands and fathers.

On Wednesday, the Press Council's Complaints Commission announced it would on July 27 consider a complaint lodged by the Autonomous Women's Center, over the article "Against violence, not against men and women" - which they said relativized violence against women, while the author's identity is contentious.

The Council announced that it had been approached by a number of citizens who "felt deceived" by the article, whose stated author allegedly does not exist. The complaints also concern the content of the text, which "relativizes violence against women and insults the dignity of the victims."

Also on Wednesday, Serbia's Equality Commissioner Brankica Jankovic warned that the commentaries published by Politika in recent days are "justifying the recent murders of women, and partner and domestic violence, in an impermissible and offensive manner."

To all this, Politika's Collegium responded by saying it was true that the newspaper failed to check the identity of the authors of two articles it published - and that these authors "used electronic mail to falsely present themselves in May and June of this year."

According to the statement, Politika in this way "became the target of a criminal attack by unknown attackers, about whose real intentions and motives it can only make assumptions."

"We believe that the perpetrators of this attack are located neither in Canada, nor in America, but in Serbia, and we informed the prosecution about it," said the Collegium, adding they would "also not run away from their own blame for not checking the identity of these authors in more detail."

The statement also said that the daily was being subjected to "a relentless campaign... mostly via social networks, but also through the attacks of colleagues from whom one would expect a little more professional solidarity."

According to the Collegium, Politika is working in accordance with the laws of Serbia, "and will therefore not be put on trial nor judged against by NGOs and social networks, nor by self-proclaimed regulatory bodies for media control, that are in reality associations of citizens financed by donations coming from abroad."