MEDIA SCENE OF SERBIA IN APRIL 2026

April is the month in which you can best see the media darkness in which Serbia lives. That month marks the thirty-second anniversary of the murder of journalist Dada Vujasinović, the twenty-seventh anniversary of the murder of journalist Slavko Ćuruvija, the twenty-seventh anniversary of the death of sixteen RTS workers and the nineteenth anniversary of the assassination attempt on journalist Dejan Anastasijević.

In April, the international organization Amnesty International published the 2025 State of the World's Human Rights Report, which states the problems faced by rebellious citizens, journalists and civil society organizations in Serbia. The international organization Reporters Without Borders created the World Media Freedom Index for 2026, according to which Serbia, out of 180 ranked countries and territories, was in 104th place. Journalists and media associations, in support of their colleagues who were attacked during the local elections held on March 29, organized a rally in front of the Presidency building. The Minister for Public Investments, Darko Glišić, called on the parents of future students not to enroll their children in "blockader faculties" because they will be "returned to them like they returned this girl from Šabac, in a coffin". While Minister Glišić addressed the students' parents, Minister of Information and Telecommunications Boris Bratina addressed the students, symbolically, on their day (April 4th), saying that "they are not aware that the police have the right to beat and kill them".

During April, Radio-television of Serbia was also a topic: the qualification (diploma) of general director Manja Grčić and the appointment of Bojana Mlađenović as editor-in-chief of the news program, as well as television N1: the departure of long-time director Aleksandra Subotić from the company United Media and the mutual termination of professional cooperation between the company Adria News Network (ANN), the umbrella management network founded in February 2026 for several news media in the region (including N1, Nova, Radar and Danas), and the former director of TV N1 Serbia, Igor Božić.

The journalists of N1 were the target of verbal attacks received from the lectern of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia. TV N1 journalist Maja Nikolić and cameraman Ivan Pavlović expressed their displeasure during the procedure initiated in connection with a complaint about the unprofessional behavior of police officers. Threats were received via the Internet by: Miljko Stojanović, journalist and editor of the portal Glas Zaječara, Marko Vidojković and Nenad Kulačin, authors of the podcast "The Good, the Bad, the Ugly" and columnists of the media Danas, and Maria Popović, journalist and editor of the portal Pravo u centar from Lazarevac. Immediately before the panel discussion on social divisions and the role of the media, a group of people gathered in front of the editorial office of the Storyteller portal in Kulpin.

The Basic Public Prosecutor's Office in Vranje dismissed the criminal complaint filed against Zoran Dimitrijević, director of the Public Utility Company "Komrad" from Vranje, for the physical attack on Večernje Novosti correspondent Jelena Stojković. The Court of Appeal in Belgrade overturned the decision by which the High Court in Belgrade convicted Saša Mirović for endangering the safety of Kurir journalist Jelena Spasić. The commercial appellate court in Belgrade confirmed the first-instance verdict by which the first-instance court rejected the claim of the publisher of the daily newspaper Kurir that the publishers of the portals: KRIK (KRIK's Raskrikavanje project), Danas, Cenzolovka, N1, Media daily, as well as the company Adria News d.o.o. oblige them to compensate the plaintiff for the amount of damage they (allegedly) caused him.

Due to several texts published on the investigative portal KRIK, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia Đuro Macut addressed the Complaints Commission of the Press Council.

In the analysis made by ANEM, based on data obtained from the Media Register of the Agency for Business Registers, 52 new media were registered in Serbia from the beginning of 2026, and the pro-government tabloids Alo and Informer continued to expand the network of local media.

Cenzolovka portal published the news that, although the REM Council is not constituted, and its members do not have any obligations regarding their functions, four members receive a monthly fee ranging from 220,000 to 250,000 dinars.

The Association of Independent Electronic Media announced that according to data available through the Unified Information System (JIS) of the Ministry of Information and Telecommunications, five local governments did not announce tenders for project co-financing. The association demanded that the decisions on the appointment of members of project evaluation commissions within the competition for project co-financing of media content be annulled due to irregularities. ANEM also published the database of results of the competition for project co-financing of media content for the year 2026, as well as a register through which it is possible to track candidates for members of project evaluation commissions. NUNS has published an analysis of the shortcomings of the system for selecting members of commissions for co-financing media projects in Serbia.

The reader can learn about all of the above in this month's Monitoring of the Media Scene in Serbia.

This publication was published with the financial support of the European Union. The Association of Independent Electronic Media is solely responsible for its content, and that content does not necessarily express the official views of the European Union.

Text of this Monitoring Report was prepared by expert monitoring team from the law office "Savović" in cooperation with ANEM.