Serbia at the top of the rankings for attacks on journalists, at the bottom regarding media freedoms: How to improve this unfortunate statistic?

The infamous statistics are corroborated by the latest report from Reporters Without Borders, which states that media freedom in our country continues to deteriorate.

Although Serbia has formally advanced two positions in the World Press Freedom Index for 2025, now ranking 96th out of 180 countries, Pavol Salai, the representative of Reporters Without Borders (RSF) for the EU and the Balkans, recently assessed this as an illusory improvement, as a decline in the overall media freedom index in the country has been recorded simultaneously.

According to the Media Freedom Index, Serbia continues to be categorized among countries with a "severe" situation regarding media freedom, which is the second worst category out of a total of five, as reported by NUNS.

Serbia fell by 0.92 points (to 53.55 points out of a maximum of 100), which represents the lowest score for our country in the 23 years since the Media Freedom Index has been tracked.

The RSF report noted that in a politically charged atmosphere further polarized by anti-government protests in 2023 and 2024, journalists are often targets of attacks from members of the ruling elite, a situation exacerbated by certain national TV channels.

“Neither politicians nor state institutions, including the Regulatory Body for Electronic Media (REM), whose members are largely appointed by the government, have shown the will to improve the situation.” The report also indicated that female journalists in Serbia continue to be targets of attacks due to their work, as well as their gender, and that national television and pro-government tabloids often violate ethical standards when reporting on violence against women and national minorities.

Regarding the safety of journalists, the conclusion of RSF is that they still do not feel protected in Serbia.

Recently, Maria Babić, a lawyer with the Independent Association of Journalists of Serbia, expressed concern over the troubling statistics, stating that since the beginning of 2025, there have been 125 recorded attacks and pressures on female and male journalists, while the entire previous year saw 166 such incidents.

According to data provided by Veran Matić, a member of the permanent Working Group for the Safety of Journalists and the president of the Board of the Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM), there was only one conviction out of 62 registered attacks on journalists in the past year. He noted that this is minimal compared to 13 convictions in the previous year.

At a recent meeting of the Permanent Working Group for the Safety of Journalists held in Niš, Babić emphasized that journalists have been exposed to various types of pressures and attacks for many years, primarily verbal threats, but that in the last two years there has been a noticeable trend of increasing physical attacks on journalists. She believes that the rising number of attacks and pressures on journalists is caused by the state of society and how people generally treat journalists, particularly representatives of institutions and high state officials, and that their behavior "spills over" onto ordinary citizens.

Babić assessed that progress in journalist safety will occur when the atmosphere in society changes and the importance of journalistic work is recognized, along with increased awareness not only among holders of executive functions but also within the judiciary, police, and legal systems.

Disheartening Results

– Although I personally participated in its establishment and had high hopes for it, I must say that the results of the Working Group for the Safety of Journalists, which was once founded by the prosecution, police, and journalistic and media associations, are more than disheartening. The evidence is simply stated: the longer the Group worked, the worse the safety of journalists in Serbia became. The same holds true for other platforms involving the state that profess to care about the safety of journalists, especially those from independent media who are regularly under attack from regime owners, as well as their fanatics and lunatics – says Nedim Sejdinović.

In his view, the immediate reason for the inefficiency of these bodies lies in the fact that institutions in this country are, to put it mildly, dysfunctional.

Sejdinović emphasizes that something like a Working Group would only make sense in a country where the rule of law exists. As he notes, its work may only be meaningful as a rehearsal for future times when state institutions will be freed and returned to their purposes.

If we ever reach such a point.

– Here we come to the key problem regarding the safety of journalists in Serbia. The matter is as simple as beans. The ruling regime is led by a person and a system that are inherently enemies of freedom of speech and critical thought. If they could, they would fire cannonballs at media freedoms. They are the ones who constantly, directly and indirectly, openly or covertly, but certainly consciously and intentionally threaten the safety of journalists, aiming to intimidate and dissuade them. Therefore, the prerequisite for increasing the safety of our colleagues is the removal of this regime. For the past 13 years, we have received daily evidence of this, regardless of the thousands of conferences and consultations on the safety of journalists, at which enormous amounts of foreign taxpayers' money have been senselessly wasted, and where regime operatives have sat – Sejdinović believes.

Necessary Systemic Changes

Slobodan Ćirić, a journalist and member of the Association of Journalists of Serbia, points out that the issue of media freedoms is fundamentally systemic and far surpasses the simplistic notion that if the government changes, the situation regarding media freedom will improve.

– What people might say could happen, but it doesn't necessarily mean it will. A mere change of government, in the sense of “Kurt leaves and Murta takes over,” will mean nothing for the media sphere if the new government, like its predecessor, perceives media as “public information tools” that can be used, exploited, and abused for narrow, group, party interests – Ćirić states.

There will be no improvement for the media if, as he says, the new government views journalists as socio-political workers who will serve it blindly, rather than as truth-seekers who will serve only the public.

– I don’t have a recipe and I don’t know a simple answer to your question about how to get out of the situation where Serbia is at the bottom of the media freedom rankings and at the top of the list for the number of attacks on journalists. I only know that the situation will not improve until essential systemic changes are implemented, resulting in politics becoming a matter of the common good, rather than personal careers and lining pockets, leading to a judiciary that diligently and without exception fulfills its duties according to laws and the Constitution, resulting in journalists, true professionals, brave and well-paid, critically examining all social phenomena, without interference from anyone, especially not the government – says Ćirić.

According to Tamara Filipović Stevanović, Secretary General of the Independent Association of Journalists of Serbia, the statistics that rank Serbia among countries with the lowest degree of media freedom and among those with a high number of attacks on journalists are not coincidental.

They are a result of systemic problems that have not been resolved for years, and in order to change the situation, more than declarative support for media freedom is needed, believes the interlocutor of Danas.

As some of the key steps on that path, she mentions an effective institutional response, meaning that every attack on journalists must be urgently and thoroughly investigated, and those responsible prosecuted. Failure to prosecute attacks, emphasizes Filipović Stevanović, encourages new pressures and creates an atmosphere of impunity.

She also states that political will is needed to protect journalists, and that representatives of the authorities and public officials must stop targeting independent journalists and media, as such rhetoric often precedes pressures, threats, and attacks.

Our interlocutor emphasizes the need to strengthen independent institutions.

– A regulatory body like REM must operate in the public interest, rather than according to political interests, while public services must be genuinely independent and accountable to citizens – says Filipović Stevanović.

There is also a need to support local and independent media through transparent and fair co-financing of projects of public interest and the allocation of funds to those who truly work in the public interest, rather than politically favorable media, which is currently the case.

– Changing statistics does not happen overnight, but those politically responsible must recognize that free media are not a threat but the foundation of a democratic society – concludes Tamara Filipović Stevanović.

Source: Danas