On 24 February 2023, it will be one year since Russia invaded Ukraine. The International and European Federations of Journalists (IFJ/EFJ) are launching a new fundraising campaign to support Ukrainian journalists on the ground. Ukraine became the deadliest country for journalists in 2022 with 12 colleagues killed in the course of their work, according to the IFJ’s Killed List, and the needs are immense. The war still rages, and affects all dimensions of journalists’ lives from increasing insecurity, to the need for protection equipment and safety training and humanitarian aid for those forced to flee. As a response to the emergency situation,…

On 3 February, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) and its partners co-signed the following letter to the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti (VV), following the appointment of a ruling party activist as director of the public television RTK. Dear Albin Kurti, President of Vetevendosje Movement (VV) and Prime Minister of Kosovo, Our international press freedom and journalists’ organisations are writing to you to share our shared concerns about the recent appointment process for the new director of television at Radio Television of Kosovo (RTK) Mr. Rilind Gërvalla. Ahead of the voting by the Board of RTK on Tuesday…

The MFRR Summit is back! This year, the conference titled “Press Freedom on the Line” will take place online from 29 – 31 March 2023. Reflecting the MFRR’s core campaign areas, the online conference will host in-depth discussions on journalist safety, media capture, the rule of law, and SLAPPs. Hosted on Zoom for interactive participation, and simultaneously livestreamed on the MFRR YouTube channel, the conference will play host to a range of panel discussions, live interviews, and keynote speeches with journalists, media freedom experts, policy-makers, and other stakeholders all working to defend press freedom. Take a look at the daily breakdown…

A Russian court on 1st February sentenced in absentia veteran journalist Alexander Nevzorov to eight years in prison for spreading so-called “false information” about Russia’s war on Ukraine. The European and International Federations of Journalism (EFJ-IFJ) join their Russian affiliate JMWU in condemning this criminalisation of journalism and call on the Russian authorities to review the ruling. Nevzorov came under pressure from authorities for alleging that Russian forces deliberately shelled a maternity hospital in Mariupol, in southern Ukraine. “Journalist Alexander Glebovich Nevzorov was found guilty (…) and sentenced to imprisonment for a period of eight years,” the press service for…

Wage increases are key for working people to maintain a decent standard of living through the cost-of-living crisis. Yet, following years of stagnating wages, the UK government is now attempting to push through legislation to curtail strikes for legitimate pay demands. European trade union federations (ETUFs), including the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), regret the UK government’s conflictual approach and support Britain’s striking workers and their trade unions. The UK government claims it is aligning its laws with those of other Western European countries. The reality is that British strike laws are already amongst the most restrictive of comparable countries…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) fully supports the call by the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, to impose a moratorium on the use of highly intrusive spyware by governments. The EFJ recalls that many journalists have been victims of this abusive surveillance, notably in Hungary, Greece, Spain, France, Belgium and Azerbaijan. In 2021, the Pegasus Project, one of the most ambitious transnational investigative journalism projects, coordinated by Forbidden Stories and assisted by Amnesty International’s forensic lab, exposed the use of spyware to surreptitiously penetrate journalists’ communications. In Hungary, investigations continued into the use of Pegasus…

A new Centre for the Safety of Journalists and Media Workers has been established in Thessaloniki (Greece). The centre, whose opening was delayed by two years due to Covid-19 restrictions, will deal with issues related to the safety of journalists and media workers in war and crisis zones, as well as in daily work. It is supported by the Journalists’ Union of Macedonia and Thrace (ESIEMTH) and is under the scientific responsibility of the Peace Journalism Laboratory of the School of Journalism and Mass Media Studies in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. The Centre will offer a 29-hour course on…

The European Trade Union Federations (ETUFs) representing tens of millions of workers across all countries and sectors in the EU and beyond in Europe strongly condemn the UK government’s draft legislation on minimum service. It needs to be withdrawn. The UK Conservative government created a mess by refusing to negotiate with workers. Workers demand recognition and decent pay and conditions and a response to the cost-of-living crisis. Instead of serious attempts to negotiate settlements to the current disputes about pay and staffing levels for public service workers, the Conservative government is pushing through a new bill that will impose minimum…

The Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) and the Safe Journalists Network today condemn the shocking physical attack on Albanian journalist Elvis Hila and his wife in Lezhë and urge state law enforcement authorities to swiftly detain the suspected perpetrators and ensure that all those responsible face justice. The violent attack took place at around 4.40pm on Wednesday 25 January, one day after Hila had reported for shqiptarja.com and Report TV about a local court case in Lezhë in which a defendant had been sentenced to a year in prison for forgery of a court document. Soon after publication, Hila said…

Russia’s General Prosecutor’s Office announced on 26 January that it has added the independent news outlet Meduza to the country’s list of “undesirable” organizations. This sanction is intended to force the targeted entities to dissolve. It puts media staff and financial donors at risk of criminal prosecution, including a significant prison sentence. The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) strongly condemns this censorship of one of the main sources of independent information in Russia. Russia has been banning “undesirable organizations” since 2015, when lawmakers granted the Prosecutor General’s Office the power to assign this status to any foreign or international non-governmental…

The European Federation of Journalists welcomes the initiative of the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia (IJAS) to launch a new platform for the online safety of journalists, “On The Line“. The platform is based on a protocol written by the International Press Institute (IPI) and gathers resources and tools designed to help newsrooms and journalists deal with online threats. It was created following the increasing number of online hate speech in the country. Two sections refer specifically to online menaces and attacks on female journalists and on freelance journalists. The protocol is based on the importance of peer support and cooperation, the…

President of the Republic of Srpska Milorad Dodik has requested to re-introduce defamation and insults as “criminal offences” in the Criminal Code of the Republic of Srpska, one of the two entities in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The BH Journalists Association (BH Novinari) raises the alarm in the face of the increasing threat that would cause the impending criminalisation of defamation, which has been a civil wrong in the country since 1999. The European and International Federation of Journalists join their affiliate, the BH Novinari, in warning of the dangers of criminalising defamation and ask for the European Commission and the…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) sent on Friday its contribution to the Commission’s Rule of Law report, which reviews every year four key areas: justice systems, the anti-corruption framework, media pluralism and freedom, and checks and balances. The issues found in most of the countries surveyed are all related to media concentration and the increasing number of SLAPPs. The objective of this consultation – jointly carried out with the EFJ affiliates – is to feed the assessment of the Commission with factual information from the ground in each Member States. Read more of the EFJ’s contribution:   EFJ Contribution…

Is there a story in your local town, somewhere in Europe, that you think is worth sharing with the rest of the world? If the answer is yes, but you lack resources, we may have the solution for you: a grant to support local investigative journalists and/or local news media outlets from several European countries who want to do investigative reporting at the local level in resonance with the European level. Why local? In every nook and cranny of the world, there are many stories waiting to be told. This grant programme aims to tackle the shortage of local journalists and…

In a new survey launched by the Federation of Journalists’ Unions in Spain (FeSP), 52% of journalists say that their professional and working situation has deteriorated, 45% point to a greater workload with the same income and 39% of freelancers say they have fewer assignments. The Federation of Journalists’ Unions-FeSP has launched a survey in October-November 2022 to find out the impact of the pandemic on the professional situation of women journalists and freelancers at the national level, as well as to identify possible training needs, mainly regarding ICT tools, that could help improve their employability and adaptation to the…

Ukrainian journalists’ organizations are sounding the alarm. The new Media Law signed by President Zelensky threatens media freedom. The International and European Federations of Journalists (IFJ-EFJ) call on the European Commission and the Council of Europe to convince the Ukrainian authorities to review the law, in consultation with journalists’ organizations and the media. The representative trade unions of Ukrainian journalists, NUJU and IMTUU, denounce multiple problematic provisions, starting with the political dependence of the state regulator and the widening of the spectrum of extrajudicial sanctions against the media. On 29 December, president Volodymyr Zelensky signed into law a controversial bill…