Ukraine is not a regional leader in the field of media freedom among the Eastern Partnership countries, and it is ahead of only Azerbaijan and Belarus, according a pilot project to study the index of press freedom in six countries of the Eastern Partnership initiative, which is conducted as part of a media monitoring project with the financial assistance of the European Union.
The first results of the project were presented at a press conference in Kyiv on Tuesday.
Project Coordinator at Internews-Ukraine Natalia Sad noted that according to the study, Ukraine, in terms of the media freedom index, was only ahead of Azerbaijan and Belarus, countries with strong authoritarian trends. At the same time, she said, Moldova, which is on a waiting list to sign the Association Agreement with the EU, was second in the ranking, behind Georgia.
Program Director at Internews-Ukraine Andriy Kulakov said that a network of media organizations would be set up to implement the project and that it would monitor the situation with media freedom in the Eastern Partnership countries.
“The more that Western institutions and experts are aware of trouble, problems and sore points in the field of media freedom in our country, the more they will be able to create so-called diplomatic pressure on our government and the legislative field in order to resolve these problems,” he said.
Kulakov said that the project was designed to run for two years.
