What Do the European Commission’s Recommendations for Initiating the EU Accession Negotiations Stipulate in the Sphere of Media?
The European Commission affirms that, in the next year, the state should make efforts to protect journalists against intimidation and attacks more efficiently, including by means of thorough investigations by the law enforcement authorities, expand its transparency requirements applied to print and online media ownership, and improve the self-regulation mechanisms for the press. These conclusions are provided in the report published in early November, and, in this context, the institution recommended the European Council to initiate the accession negotiations with the Republic of Moldova.
The Commission’s report contains a detailed assessment of the current state of affairs and the progress made by Moldova on its way to accession to the European Union. In particular, the document is focused on the progress in implementing the key reforms and provides the guidelines for the future priorities of the reforms. According to the European Commission, “accession is and will remain a merit-based process, fully dependent on the objective progress achieved by each country.”
The report mentions that “Moldova has a pluralistic media environment and has some level of preparation in freedom of expression. The country made some progress during the reporting period, in particular on the issue of ownership concentration. Legislation contains provisions to prevent concentration of media and ensure transparency of media ownership. The Audiovisual Council needs to boost efforts to implement these rules. To ensure compliance with the European Media Freedom Act, the Audiovisual Media Services Code must address political bias in state media. The government is taking steps to address disinformation in media, which remains a challenge, especially disinformation spread online.”
It is specified that the legislation regulating audiovisual media services is not aligned with the Audiovisual Media Services Directive and the regulatory standards of the Council of Europe, and a reference is made to the amendments of November 2022, when sanctions for media institutions were introduced, and to the fact that the rejection of the Broadcasting Council’s annual activity report by the Parliament may result in legal dismissal of the BC members. “However, the law does not provide evaluation criteria on which to base the rejection of the Council’s annual report. The fact that the AVC members can be easily dismissed has been criticised as a way of politicising its members. (…) The Code needs to be amended to clarify the appointment procedures to ensure the best candidates are selected and avoid early termination on performance grounds”, according to the source.
In addition, on June 2, 2022, the Parliament amended the Code including the concept of “disinformation” in it. According to the Commission, “The prohibitions in the law on broadcast or retransmission of programmes with informative analytical, military and political content are not in line with the EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive.”
The Commission also refers to the recently adopted cyber security legislation, “but Moldova needs to start implementing the law.” “Moldova needs to align its legal framework with the Electronic Communications Code, and EU best practice on media needs to be more widespread. Implementing legislation also including the laws on freedom of expression, personal data protection and access to information, need to be amended to align with the EU acquis,” the report stipulates.
