Brussels, 24/07/2012 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has sent a letter to Portugal, Slovenia, Finland (concerning the autonomous region of Aland) and to the United Kingdom (concerning Gibraltar), seeing information about their implementation of the audiovisual media services (AVMS) directive. The Commission's letters are part of its efforts to ensure that the national media laws of all member states correctly implemented all aspects of the AVMS rules. In a press release, the Commission states that these requests for information “do not imply that the directive has been incorrectly implemented but simply that, at this stage, the Commission has some outstanding questions concerning their implementation of the directive”.
The Commission's requests for clarification concern: - 1) the country of origin principle and jurisdiction issues concerning audiovisual media services; - 2) audiovisual commercial communications (including rules on product placement, sponsorship, teleshopping and codes of conduct for food high in fat, salt and sugar); - 3) the protection of minors; - 4) the promotion of European and independent works; - 5) the right of reply; - 6) basic obligations under the directive (such as rules on accessibility, co- and self-regulation, registration of on-demand services); - 7) events of major importance to be broadcast on free to air television and short news extracts; - and 8) cooperation between regulatory bodies. The member states concerned have ten weeks in which to respond to the Commission's requests.
In March 2011, the Commission sent a first series of letters to 16 member states of the European Union and a second series to a further 8, in September 2011. Poland has notified only partially a number of transposition measures and is currently the subject of infringement proceedings. (IL/transl.jl)