03. 01. 2008

WORRYING STATE OF MEDIA IN SERBIA LAST YEAR

BELGRADE, 3 January 2008 (Beta) - Journalist associations say that 2007 was worse than 2006 when it comes to freedom of the media and press.

President of the Independent Association of Serbian Journalists (NUNS) Nadežda Gaće said that this was brought about primarily by the fact that state structures and political party representatives were not aware that the media had to be free and autonomous.

Furthermore, certain tycoons were buying up the media and attempting to get involved in editing certain aspects.

According to Gaće, a 2007 NUNS survey showed that journalists gave their own profession a low rating, and said that there was a certain amount of bribery and corruption going on, and that citizens felt that the only profession that lied more than journalists were politicians.

President of the Association of Serbian Journalists (UNS) Nino Brajović said that 2007 had seen a large number of attacks and threats at reporters' expense, and that UNS had been forced to respond 70 times.

"Contributing factors to this situation have been the privatization of local media and the fact that after privatization, many company employees were left redundant," said Brajović, adding that 3000 people had been left unemployed at the end of this process.

The presidents of the two associations felt that it was a “disgrace” that the murderers of journalists, Slavko Ćuruvija and Milan Pantić had still not been found, or for that matter, that any light had been shed on the death of Duga reporter Dada Vujasinović.

They also reiterated that the attempted murder of weekly Vreme journalist Dejan Anastasijević remained unsolved, as did the threats passed on to President of the Independent Society of Vojvodina Journalists Dinko Gruhonjić.