Albania backward in press freedom

TIRANA, Oct 21 – A report of the Reporters Sans Frontieres on press freedom took Albania backwards to the 88th position (from 79th a year ago), which ranks it the last in the region and almost the whole Europe.
“Press freedom must be defended everywhere in the world with the same energy and the same insistence,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Jean-Fran谩s Julliard said as his organization issued its eighth annual world press freedom index.
“It is disturbing to see European democracies such as France, Italy and Slovakia fall steadily in the rankings year after year,” Julliard said. “Europe should be setting an example as regards civil liberties. How can you condemn human rights violations abroad if you do not behave irreproachably at home? The Obama effect, which has enabled the United States to recover 20 places in the index, is not enough to reassure us.”
Reporters Without Borders compiles the index every year on the basis of questionnaires that are completed by hundreds of journalists and media experts around the world. This year’s index reflects press freedom violations that took place between 1 September 2008 and 31 August 2009.
In Albania vitality and growth in the media sector does not always ensure the emergence of genuine pluralism of news and information. Investigative journalism remains embryonic and struggles to find space in a press belonging either to industrial groups determined to protect their spheres of influence or by political parties that too often confuse news with propaganda.
Corruption in public services and real estate are particularly sensitive issues, as is organized crime and smuggling.
Journalists’ financial and social instability, linked to the absence of a legal framework for the exercise of the profession, leaves reporters at the mercy of arbitrary decisions and furthers corruption.
Government control over the public media is ubiquitous. Press management positions are political appointments thus ensuring a favorable editorial line. Even though privately-owned media do have more freedom, they are not protected from a number of forms of pressure. Excessive bills for public services, withdrawal of advertising, tax changes and official snafus are all “legal” weapons used to promote the self-censorship which is already apparent in a large number of media.
Police on 9 January 2009 surrounded the offices of the privately-owned daily Tema in the capital Tirana and banned access to journalists and other staff after the interior ministry enforced a rupture in its lease. It was applying a finance ministry ruling of 16 December 2007 that ended without notice the lease of offices Tema had been renting for 20 years in a state-owned building. This decision was however overturned on appeal on 6 January 2009 allowing Tema to occupy the buildings legally.
The National Council for Radio and Television (NCTR) also played an effective role in enforcing “respect for national identity” by fining News 24 TV eight million leks (7, 000 Euros) for broadcasting a spoof press campaign by the non-governmental organization G99 of Prime Minister Sali Berisha, boasting of government efforts and successes in the fight against corruption, calling on citizens to contact him on his mobile phone to report corruption cases directly to him.