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“I call on the President of Serbia to clearly distance himself from the campaign against Veran Matić. Otherwise, if anything happens to Veran Matić, we will hold the President of Serbia responsible,” emphasizes Pavol Salaj, director of the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) bureau in Prague, highlighting that the organization is outraged by the video broadcast on several television channels and the defamatory statements that accompanied it.

The Ministry of Information and Telecommunications has announced the register of candidates for members of the selection committees for co-financing projects in the field of public information.

My support for Veran today is support for a simple, basic, yet critically endangered idea: that a journalist must not be prey, that an editor must not be a target, and that the safety of journalists is not a privilege, but the minimum requirement of any society that calls itself democratic.

The International Press Institute (IPI) from Vienna has condemned, as stated, the unacceptable smear campaign against their Media Freedom Hero in the world, Veran Matić, and called on those behind the recent attacks to immediately remove the "defamatory content."

The Municipality of Merošina has revoked its previously adopted decision to announce a competition for project co-financing of media content for the year 2026. The reason likely lies in the fact that the Ministry of Information and Telecommunications has urged authorities not to announce competitions until the final list of candidates for the project evaluation committee members is published.

Attacks on media professionals reflect the general climate of polarization in Serbia and the high tensions caused by anti-government protests. The fact that only two attacks last year resulted in convictions is shocking. We have not seen such coordinated bot attacks in Europe before.

After he was identified by journalists, the police had been searching for him until a few days ago. The attacker on the N1 team, Vladan Sretenović, is now in custody due to the risk of reoffending and potential flight. Now that the first step has been taken, what could be the outcome of this case?

The Coalition for Media Freedom demands that the authorities urgently halt the intimidating and ominous media campaign being waged against Veran Matić, the Chairman of the Board of the Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM) and a member of the Permanent Working Group for the Safety of Journalists (SRG), which seriously jeopardizes his safety.