Staff who left Belgrade weekly NIN will go to work in a new United Media weekly publication which is set to be launched soon, a press release said on Wednesday.

“United Media, the leading media company in southeastern Europe, will launch a new weekly publication on the Serbian market soon with the entire editorial staff of NIN weekly,” it said.

“We feel that there is room on the media scene for a new weekly which will continue with the highest standards of independent and professional work and which will be edited an written by top professionals who have carefully built up their integrity and maintained it over the past decades.

“The former NIN editorial staff along with Vesna Malisic and Milan Culibrk will be part of the new weekly publication which will very quickly be available to readers across the country. The editorial concept which was maintained to date is fully in line with United Media policies and will not be changed in the coming period.

“Despite the semblance of a rich media scene and wide choices, we see that freedom of the media is at a very low level and that the public has limited access to the truth. Being professional is an especially great challenge today. We have always, through our media, been devoted to professional, objective, unbiased and independent journalism and I am deeply convinced that this will be the case with the new weekly,” United Media CEO Aleksandra Subotic said.

“She added that the NIN editorial staff showed that it takes its professional role seriously because they do not want to make compromises with the truth, with facts.

United Media includes N1, Nova, Danas, Sport Klub in Serbia and the details of the new weekly will be released to the public soon.