European Federation of Journalists

Media Freedom Rapid Response

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) is a partner of Media Freedom Rapid Response project (MFRR) aiming to promote an independent, pluralistic media landscape, to safeguard media workers, especially harassed female media workers and to protect the rights of journalists. The RRM helps to mitigate the consequences of the recently observed deterioration of media freedom in several European Union, Member States and Candidate Countries.

Overall Objective

The overall objective of this project is to provide practical support for journalists to improve media freedom in Europe.

The Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) is designed to detect, answer and prevent violations of press and media freedom. It consists of three layers: monitoring, categorisation, responses.

Specific objectives

1. Mapping Media Freedom (MMF) in Europe (EU & Candidate Countries): Media violations are on the rise especially under the current coronavirus crisis. One of the key components of the project is to monitor and document a wide range of media violations conducted by any actors, whether individuals, state actors or business, so that actions can be taken rapidly to address the violations.

2. Practical supports: Based on the media violations reported, the project offers a wide range of immediate to long-term, practical support ranging from legal help, safety advice and training, safe house for journalists, advocacy and mission, and online resources. You could find more information about the legal support here and more details about safe house for journalists here.

3. Advocacy & Trial Monitoring: Joint media advocacy will also be carried out by the project including joint statements, national missions (in Czech Republic, Hungry, Spain, Serbia), roundtable advocacy meetings with EU policy-makers. The EFJ will involve the relevant national members when carrying out such national missions. Trial Monitoring especially for Turkey, Malta (for the case of Daphne Caruana Galizia) and Slovakia (for the case of Ján Kuciak) will be carried out and participated by the project partners to help find justice for journalists who are put in jails or murdered.

Anyone can submit and report a media violation to the MMF platform online.

Actions

MFRR Monitoring Report – 756 media freedom alerts in first six months of 2024

The partners from the Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) consortium today publish the latest edition of its Monitoring Report which documents and analyses all press freedom violations recorded on its platform Mapping Media Freedom in European Member States and candidate countries from January to June 2024. The report was produced by the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF), the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), and the International Press Institute (IPI). The latest Monitoring Report explores in detail the 756 media freedom violations recorded by the MFRR partners in the first half of 2024. These violations affected 1,212 media-related…

Romania: Court reopens investigation into smear campaign against journalist Emilia Șercan

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joined its Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) partners in welcoming the 5 September ruling reopening the investigation into the crimes against journalist Emilia Șercan. This is a positive step towards addressing the harassment and intimidation she has faced for the last two years. This ruling comes after a long legal battle by Șercan to hold accountable those responsible for smear campaigns against her and leaking her private photos, following her reports on high-profile cases of plagiarism, including the President of the Romanian Senate, and former Prime Minister, Nicolae Ciucă.  The initial investigation produced a…

Croatia: International mission to assess media freedom challenges

On 9 September, the Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) will begin a press freedom mission to Croatia. The delegation will meet with government representatives, journalists and journalistic associations, civil society, and renowned media experts to discuss the most pressing challenges to media freedom and pluralism in the country. Between 9 and 20 September 2024, the MFRR partners will conduct an online fact-finding mission to Croatia with a special focus on the safety of journalists, the long-overdue and much-needed media law reforms, transparency in media ownership and state advertising, the use of strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) and other legal threats (including criminal…

Turkey: Press freedom and freedom of expression groups condemn court decision upholding prison sentence for journalist Bülent Mumay

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joins the International Press Institute (IPI) and the undersigned freedom of the press and expression organisations in denouncing the decision by the Turkish appeals court to uphold the 20-month prison sentence against renowned journalist Bülent Mumay. This verdict represents a severe assault on press freedom and freedom of expression in Turkey, further eroding the foundations of democratic discourse in the country. We urgently call on Turkish authorities to end their harassment of critical journalists. Mumay’s case is emblematic of the systematic repression of independent journalism in Turkey. Mumay’s only legal recourse is to file…

Spain: Media freedom coalition calls for an end to repressive “Gag Law” 

The undersigned Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) organizations call on the Spanish government to fully repeal the so-called “Gag Law” as part of its announced “democratic regeneration” efforts. While we welcome the initial proposed changes to the law, these fall short of the full repeal necessary to protect free expression in Spain. In Spain, despite an overall positive assessment of media freedom by the European Commission in its latest rule of law report, a problematic decade-old law still hinders journalists’ ability to perform their work duties.  In July, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced his intention to pass a “democratic regeneration”…

Georgia: MFRR partners demand release of Azerbaijani journalist sentenced to extradition detention, urging Georgian authorities not to extradite him to Azerbaijan

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joins its Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) partners in calling on the authorities in Georgia not to extradite journalist Afgan Sadygov to Azerbaijan and to release him from extradition detention. Additionally, authorities should allow Sadygov to freely leave Georgia for a third country. Georgian authorities arrested Sadygov on 3 August according to the journalist’s wife, who posted footage of him being escorted into a car by law enforcement. The following day, a court in Tbilisi ordered Sadygov to be held in extradition detention. Authorities in Azerbaijan have charged Sadygov with “threatening to spread offensive…