On April 23, Latvia-based independent newspaper Meduza and PASMI, a Russia-based news medium reporting on corruption, were both declared a “foreign agent” by the Russian state. The decision by Russia’s Justice Ministry made the two publications the latest in a string of independent media to be added to the list of co-called “foreign agents”, throwing […]

In July 2020 the editor-in-chief of Index.hu, Hungary’s largest and most influential independent news website, was fired after going public over concerns about political meddling in the newspaper. In the wake of the sacking, the outlet’s entire editorial board and some 80 other journalists resigned in protest, saying a red line had been crossed. The […]

Fake news is a booming business in the Baltics — though it’s not always about making money. That’s a conclusion reached by Ieva Ivanauskaitė, head of business development at Lithuanian news portal Delfi, as she led an investigation into the region’s thriving disinformation scene. Supported by a €33,000 grant from the International Press Institute’s IJ4EU […]

The Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) welcomes the idea of a European Media Freedom Act, advanced by European Commissioners Thierry Breton and Věra Jourová. In recent years, we have witnessed the staggering politicisation of the media in a small but growing number of member states where governments have abused regulatory, economic and legislative powers to […]