The conference is organised by the Journalists Solidarity Foundation and the Polish Journalists Association (SDP).

The conference title – Freedom (of speech) it’s what I love, it’s what I understand – quotes a well-known song by the popular Polish rock band of the 1990s to highlight that freedom of speech is not just a theoretical concept. We need to cherish freedom in order to be able to stand up for it when jeopardized, whatever the dangers. This was the case in Poland and in other countries which had been subjected to Russia for several dozens of years. Communism had fallen but we believe that pitfalls still lie ahead for the freedom of speech. During the conference we will try to pinpoint and describe them.

As a part of its substantive contribution, the Polish Journalists Association will produce a report on media, freedom of speech and media independence from capital controls in countries which got rid of the shackles of communism and are now ready to embark on cooperation both in the European Union and within the framework of the Three Seas Initiative. The report will be the outcome of meetings between Polish journalists and
journalists from a dozen of countries which we have visited.

Jan Kochanowski, Polish poet of the 16th century, wrote in his epigram “To Health”:
Health, you are grand –
though none understand
how splendid you taste
until you are waste.

We believe that the same can be said about the freedom of speech.

The conference is organized by the Journalists Solidarity Foundation and the Polish Journalists Association, with the support of the Polish National Foundation as a platform to discuss precisely the taste of the freedom of speech and as a warning message against dangers and pitfalls which lie ahead for freedom.

The EFJ GS Ricardo Gutiérrez is invited to speak at the panel discussion dedicated to manipulation and disinformation (Session II on Thursday, 11:40-12:30).