Unesco: Journalism and Whistleblowing - Reports

Taking inspiration from the context of the 2019 pandemic, the paper examines the relationship between journalism and whistleblowing as an important tool to protect human rights, fight corruption, and strengthen democracy.

European Media and Platform Policy (EuromediApp) - Stakeholders

European Media and Platform Policy (EuromediApp) is a Jean Monnet network dedicated to studying, analysing and discussing benefits and challenges of digital platforms in Europe and world-wide.

By bringing together knowledge and research capacity from all over Europe and beyond, EuromediApp provides space for national and transnational deliberation on how future digital services should and will be governed. Working papers, teaching material, workshops, conferences and dedicated schools for advanced students are our working tools.

EuromediApp operates for three years (2020 – 2023) along three modules:

1. European political democracy (inclusion and exclusion, diversity and uniformity, trust and distrust);
2. Quality of European (news) ecology, including journalism, individualised procedures of political information, populism, polarisation and depolarisation, personalisation, scandalisation, information/propaganda/misinformation; and
3. European governance models of digital media and the internet by media/platform companies and governments, utopian and dystopian views of digital media and democracy.

Albania: news outlets faced cyber attacks following reports about Mayor of Tirana - Article

Cyber-attacks on news outlets believed to be in relation to their reporting on Tirana’s Mayor Erion Veliaj and the appointment of government loyalist Endri Fuga to lead the Media and Information Agency add to existing challenges for media freedom in Albania. We call for a swift and effective investigation into these attacks and condemn the appointment of Fuga to head the newly established agency

Lithuania: investigative journalism and privacy - Article

Today, the Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) partner organisations and the Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation have written to Director Raimondas Andrijauskas and Deputy Director Danguolė Morkūnienė of the Lithuanian State Data Protection Inspectorate (SDPI)’s to express concern at their attempted obstruction of investigative project “Karštos Pėdos” (“Hot Feet”)’s journalistic activity

Greece: Concern over criminal charges against investigative reporters - Article

The criminal charges against Kostas Vaxevanis and Ioanna Papadakou are extremely serious. The nature of the charges, their connection to investigative reporting on corruption, and the potential imprisonment of two journalists in an EU Member State, raise legitimate concerns regarding press freedom. Our organisations are closely following this case, demanding judicial authorities to act with full regard for press freedom standards 

Montenegro: Impunity must end for shooting of journalist Olivera Lakić - Article

MFRR praises cross-party approval of legislation strengthening protection of journalists

SLAPPs in Europe: How the EU can protect watchdogs from abusive lawsuits - Reports

This report is the joint submission to the European Commission public consultation on EU action against SLAPPs, strategic lawsuits against public participation

SLAPP and democracy, side effects and collateral damage - Article

Strategic lawsuits against public participation heavily impact on the citizens' right to be informed - that is why society needs to be able to respond to and to prevent this kind of abuse of legal tools. Here is a series of analysis and perspectives inspired by cases involving journalists and human rights defenders in Italy

Poland: Media freedom groups urge President Duda to veto ‘Lex-TVN’ - Article

We signed a letter to President Duda urging him to apply a presidential veto to the so-called "Lex-TVN". The bill is not a principled and proportionate effort to protect the Polish information landscape, but a way to undermine one particular outlet that is part of a wider effort to “repolonise” the media

Serbia: Wave of lawsuits against investigative portal KRIK chills media freedom - Article

In recent months, KRIK’s newsroom has been targeted by ten different procedures requesting a total of 90 million dinars in damages. MFRR partners believe that these cases are a form of SLAPPs and demand urgent actions to address the growing phenomenon in the country