As reported by the Newspaper Society: The General Assembly of European Newspaper Publishers’ Association (ENPA), meeting in Belgrade on Friday (24 May), adopted a Resolution calling on the EU and national Governments to recognise press self-regulation as the main guarantee of freedom of expression and press freedom.
This Resolution comes at a time of increasing pressure for new legislation and monitoring of media pluralism at EU level. A High Level Group, appointed by the European Commission, recently recommended more EU competence in this area. Meanwhile an own-initiative report by MEP Renate Weber, ‘EU Charter – Standard settings for media freedom across the EU,’ was adopted in the European Parliament last week. This Report calls, among other things, for the EU to implement media monitoring.
ENPA President, Ivar Rusdal, said: “The very idea that EU legislators should - or could - define ethical or other standards for a sector whose purpose is to hold the legislators themselves to account, is totally counterproductive.
“Newspapers should be allowed to decide voluntarily about their editorial content and business structures and be limited solely by national legal frameworks. An independent press should never be subject to EU monitoring,” he added.
Imogen Hadden, NPA representative and Chair of the Copyright Committee, gave an overview of ENPA’s successful work on EU measures and future priorities to the General Assembly and Santha Rasaiah, NS participated in the Press Under Fire seminar preceding the Assembly.
