Bring the ‘European Media Freedom Act’ (EMFA) to a successful conclusion during the Swedish Presidency of the EU Council? The Swedish Minister for Culture, Patricia Liljestrand, expressed cautious optimism as she presented Stockholm’s priorities (see EUROPE 13092/12) to the European Parliament’s Committee on Culture (CULT).
“Our greatest priority in the media field is the EMFA [and] we have high ambitions but also understand that there are many questions that we need to resolve and we need to find well-balanced solutions”, she said. In essence, Sweden hopes to be able to reach a political agreement on the text (‘general approach’) at the ‘Education, Youth, Culture and Sport’ Council in May, despite the differences between Member States (see EUROPE 13073/25).
Asked how the Presidency intended to achieve this, including by Irena Joveva (Renew Europe, Slovenian), Niyazi Kızılyürek (The Left, Cypriot) and Petra Kammerevert (S&D, German), the minister said she could not anticipate the discussions in the EU Council. However, for her, the question of the Union’s competences in the media field will be central: “News media and the press have so far been regulated nationally, in many case through self-regulation, but at the same time, it is generally agreed that we need to continue enhancing our cooperation to strengthen media freedom and pluralism”.
The legal basis of the text, she said, is currently under discussion in the EU Council and still needs to be clarified by the Legal Service.
Asked by Sabine Verheyen (EPP, German) what concrete measures Sweden would take to protect media pluralism, Ms Liljestrand called for inspiration from the June 2021 Council Conclusions on the recovery and transformation of the media sector. Thus, “it’s important that the negotiations on the EMFA focus on strengthening the single market for media services”, she concluded. (Original version in French by Hélène Seynaeve)