SPANISH BILL ‘GAGS PRESS’

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31564, 29 December 1967, Page 7

SPANISH BILL ‘GAGS PRESS’

IN Z.P i MADRID, December 28. Spanish journalists have complained that the press would be gagged on matters of public interest by an Official Secrets Bill presented yesterday to Parliament.

One clause clamps iron secrecv round Cabinet meetings, forbids any political “leaks” about possible clashes inside them, restricts journalists to the official communique, and rules that Government measures cannot be reported until they have been officially announced. The bill empowers the Gov ernment to classify as official secrets any information on rational defence, public or der, and political, diplomatic, scientific, economic, financial or technical matters if—by reaching unauthorised persons—it could “damage or en danger” the security of the state, or the interests of the nation. In April, Parliament ap proved changes in the penal code under which journalists can be gaoled for up to six sears for publishing false or dangerous reports, or criticising the Government without due respect. The influential Roman Catholic daily “Ya”, in an attack on the bill, has said it “could convert itself into a great silencer of the press” and could be applied to al most all public affairs. Another leading news paper, “La Vanguardia,” oi Barcelona, said that “to ap prove this project would be equivalent to leaving thi country without a valid mech anism of information” an< that it would be worse thai the old system of censorship The Barcelona Journalists Association has protestei that the bill “extends the vei

of secrecy to ample zones of j public life in an excessive manner, curtailing the legitimate right of the citizen to be duly and timely informed, and not to be governed in secret.”