The Regional Platform for Advocating Media Freedom and Journalists’ Safety said that it registered an increase in various forms of pressure and threats targeting media and journalists across the Western Balkans, especially in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The Platform registered 134 incidents in 2019, of which 30 were attacks on journalists, 42 cases of death threats and grave injuries, 40 other kinds of threats against journalists, 17 attacks on media organisations and five threats made against them.

“As was the case throughout previous years, Serbia is the notorious number one of 2019 when it comes to threats against journalists and the media with a total of 67 reported incidents,” the Platform said.

Second is Bosnia and Herzegovina, with 36 reported incidents, and Kosovo is third, with 21 of them, it said.

The Platform said that the concerning trends from 2019 have increased during the coronavirus crisis and that in the first four months of this years, 56 incidents were reported with more than half of them in Serbia.