Reaffirming its commitment to safeguarding freedom of expression and media freedom in North Macedonia, the third Steering Committee meeting under the joint European Union and Council of Europe action “Protecting Freedom of Expression and of the Media in North Macedonia” (PRO-FREX) took place in Skopje. During the meeting, key achievements of the project were presented and discussed, with participants agreeing on the upcoming activities for 2025.
The event gathered key institutional stakeholders and civil society representatives, including the Association of Journalists of Macedonia, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Justice, the Academy for Judges and Public Prosecutors, the Bar Association, the Media Regulator, and authorities responsible for access to information and data protection, as well as EU and Council of Europe representatives. Their participation highlighted a shared commitment to reinforcing the safety of journalists, countering SLAPPs, and advancing media freedom as a core democratic value.
A major milestone in the second year of implementation was the ratification of the Tromsø Convention in 2024, marking a significant step in North Macedonia’s alignment with international standards on transparency and access to information. Additionally, efforts to amend the Law on Free Access to Public Information to fully comply with the Tromsø Convention are ongoing.
In 2025, the action will focus on strengthening the capacities of key institutional and legal stakeholders, enhancing journalist safety through better protection mechanisms, countering the use of SLAPPs by aligning with the Council of Europe and EU anti-SLAPP standards, and supporting the Council of Europe’s “Journalists Matter” campaign to ensure a coordinated approach to journalist protection.
With North Macedonia’s EU accession process progressing, the Steering Committee reaffirmed the importance of aligning national legal frameworks with European human rights and media freedom standards, particularly Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights and aims to contribute to an improved environment for the exercise, in particular by journalists and media actors, of their rights of freedom of expression, in a more pluralistic and safer media environment.
The action “Protecting Freedom of Expression and of the Media in North Macedonia”(PRO-FREX), implemented by the Division for Co-operation on Freedom of Expression, is part of the joint European Union and the Council of Europe programme “Horizontal Facility for the Western Balkans and Türkiye 2023-2026”.
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Publish date : 2025-02-21 07:25:00
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