Management of six national public broadcasters in the Western Balkans signed a memorandum on understanding in Tirana on Thursday, which opened the path to their cooperation within an EUR 1.5 million worth project funded by the European Union (EU).

The public broadcasters’ representatives gathered in Albanian capital city for a two-day conference to present the project aimed at the promotion of European standards and the best practices across the region as a common reference framework for independent and professional media.

“The project of technical support to public media broadcasters in the Western Balkans will take place during the next two years to facilitate transformation of public media broadcasters from the national into true service for citizens, which is one of the EU priorities in the Western Balkans,” it was concluded at the meeting, which gathered representatives of RTSH (Albania), BHRT (Bosnia), RTK (Kosovo), MRT (Macedonia), RTCG (Montenegro) and RTS (Serbia). 

Work of the public broadcasters in Bosnia and Herzegovina is often a target of criticism in the European Commission's (EC) report on the country's progress.

In its 2018 report on Bosnia and Herzegovina, the EC said that the independence of the three public broadcasters in the country is yet to be ensured. “The public broadcasters in the two entities continued to be exposed to political influence, particularly via their politically-controlled steering boards”, said the report.

“The financing of the state-level public service broadcaster remains unsustainable. Due to political obstruction, the steering board failed to establish a functional Public Broadcasting Service corporation, as provided by the law,” the EC warned.

The project signed by the Western Balkan public broadcasters will focus exactly on the financing models, selection and appointment of management bodies, generating the synergy among public broadcasters and the regional exchange of practices within the process of media reform.

According to a statement issued by the EU Delegation to Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Tirana conference was attended by representatives of the international organizations, general managers and senior staff of the public broadcasters, decision-makers, representatives of NGOs and regulatory bodies of Albania, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The project is implemented by the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) together with the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), Austrian Public Broadcaster (ORF), Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and European Regional News Exchange for South East Europe (ERNO).