Albania: Media must not face criminal prosecution for public interest reporting - Article

Media freedom groups raise concern over the blanket publication ban issued by Albanian prosecutorial authorities regarding a trove of hacked data. No journalist or media outlet should face criminal sanctions for publishing information in the public interest

Call for Italian political forces to take a stand against SLAPPs, a ‘slap’ in the face of freedom of information - Article

The right of citizens to be informed about matters of public interest and of journalists to write freely about them cannot and must not be hindered by SLAPPs. Civil society's appeal to the future parliament to promote measures to contrast strategic lawsuits

Also available ITA

Monitoring Report - Mapping Media Freedom January - June 2022 - Reports

The current Monitoring Report tracks media freedom violations across Europe during the first semester of 2022

Maja Sever, the first woman to lead the EFJ - Article

Quickly resolving the economic issue relating to journalists, fighting harder against SLAPPs or gag complaints, using the rule of law to improve media conditions. These are the keywords of Maja Sever, the first woman to lead the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)

by Giovanni Vale

Temporary Relocations. A toolkit - Article

This summary of issues, open questions, recommendations, and suggestions on how to implement a residency programme for journalists under pressure is the result of OBCT research consulting existing literature and conducting several interviews with managers and beneficiaries. This 10-page document goes through the main aspects of the implementation of a journalists-in-residence programme, highlighting 19 issues that are considered to be the most problematic and interesting at the same time. The toolkit is also accessible as a pdf.

Curated by Paola Rosà, May 2022

Turkey: international groups call on parliament to reject the “disinformation” bill as a tool of digital censorship - Article

Law designed to expand censorship online and criminalize free flow of information

Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2022 - Reports

Based on a survey of over 93,000 online news consumers in six continents, the Digital News Report 2022 reveals new insights about digital news consumption

Bulgaria: the media, law, and freedom of information - Legal Resources

Interview with Nelly Ognyanova, a leading Bulgarian expert on media law, by Francesco Martino, OBCT

A series of Thematic Directories. CYBERSECURITY - Article

This series of directories is aimed at helping the user navigate the database of the Resource Centre: it gives some keys of interpretation, selecting items according to a special focus or following a chronological order. This issue concerns cybersecurity and is also available as a pdf

Who is afraid of journalists? The MFRR Italy Mission Report - Article

The collection of findings and recommendations by the partners of the MFRR, in a booklet curated by OBCT.

Following the MFRR Italy Mission from 4 to 6 April, coordinated by OBCT, the conclusions about SLAPP, defamation and safety of journalists are published here