Tag: Croatia

Croatia’s Burgeoning Fintech Scene Blazes Trail For Western Balkans

Posted on by BIRD

When it comes to the digitalization of the public sector in the Western Balkans, not that much happened until COVID-19 came along.

But as the pandemic has continued, certain public services have had to become digital by a force of nature, while the pace of others that started on this road in the last few years has accelerated. The same goes for businesses and industries – those that started this process earlier are now ahead of the curve. One industry likely to emerge strengthened by the challenges that the pandemic has brought is financial technologies, fintech as it is known – as more institutions and businesses opt for “digital-only” services.

With an ICT market growing exponentially each year, Croatia is widely seen as the next fintech destination in Southeast Europe.

Some estimates say the country has close to 60,000 active ICT professionals already. It also has many fintech companies with a presence in global markets as far as Southeast Asia.

“Croatia has seen a tremendous improvement of its fintech scene in the past few years, mostly due to people developing their digital skills independently,” Vlaho Hrdalo, chair of the Croatian Association for blockchain and cryptocurrencies, UBIK, told BIRN.

“A recent Eurostat survey showed Croatian young people to be the leading Europeans in the category of digital skills,” he added.

“These young people realized what skills they needed and then acquired them on their own, as no institutional support was available; and it still isn’t.” Hrdalo continued, noting that while global investors are beginning to turn their attention towards Croatia, the local fintech scene still needs further investment.

Success stories, and hurdles up ahead


Illustration. Photo: Unsplash/Alexandre Debieve

Croatia’s biggest success story when it comes to fintech and the digital payments sector, arguably, is Microblink, a software company that develops computer vision technology.

When it started in 2013 as a local company, it relied only on the financial resources of its founders. Now it has a global presence in the US, Europe and Southeast Asia, developing AI-powered scanning and data extraction products that more than 100 million end-users use.

Microblink’s products have opened up business opportunities for the company, which has been recognised by the fintech industry. It was listed among Europe’s fastest growing companies for 2020.

The company isn’t planning on stopping now, either. It plans to launch new innovative products that revolutionize the fintech industry.

“Two weeks ago, we launched a first-of-its-kind identity document scanner made to be used directly in a web browser. And we firmly believe in-browser ID scanning holds the potential to reshape the way we onboard financial services for the better,” the company told BIRN in a statement.

Another company to watch is Elektronički računi, a company that primarily provides digital business services. It was founded in 2013, when digital invoicing was beginning to become an important segment of business modernization.

“Since 2014, we have introduced the e-Invoice to tens of thousands of companies,” Josip Kovacec, a member of the board of the company, told BIRN.

“It gave us a foothold in the market in EU member states at the time when the mandatory electronic issue of invoices in public procurement was introduced,” he added.

“The idea was to make the e-Invoice available to everyone, with special emphasis on the SME sector, which usually does not have the financial resources to digitize operations,” Kovacec continued.

He said the company had now positioned itself as the largest private information intermediary on the market, sending about 200,000 e-Invoices a month to the Croatian government service that receives all electronic invoices addressed to public entities.

While there are other successful fintech startups and scale-ups in Croatia, what is lacking, however, is a sense of cohesion that would make the Croatian fintech scene a more powerful trend, experts say.

“There have been meetups and conferences, but the situation around COVID-19 has made such events impossible,” Ivan Brezak Brkan, the founding editor of Netokracija.com, told BIRN.

“For experience and knowledge to compound for the whole community, there has to come a point where they all need to work together to create a ‘fintech scene,’” he added. “A rising tide lifts all fintech – and an active community would help create interest among developers, new companies, and so on.”

Regulation remains a grey area


Illustration: Unsplash/Clifford photography

Besides hosting companies that are developing high-quality fintech products, Croatian towns are also implementing some of those technologies locally.

At the end of June, the town of Sveta Nedelja became one of the first in the whole of the EU to introduce a payment service that includes cryptocurrencies.

Built by another Croatia-based company, the cryptocurrency brokerage Electrocoin, the service enables shops to accept payments in cryptocurrencies for free, converting them into the national currency, the kuna.

However, as financial technologies enter more and more segments of Croatian society, regulations about the way fintech companies conduct their business remain a grey area.

“Not much has happened in this area, as there still are no laws governing fintech, blockchain, or artificial intelligence,” UBIK’s Hrdalo explained.

“UBIK held numerous meetings with Croatian regulators to bridge the gap between galloping industries and dormant laws. This was successful, as the approach of the regulators did change from initial scepticism to acceptance,” he added.

“But without exact rules in place, digital companies in Croatia have to discover where they touch the regulatory perimeter on their own, which isn’t always the best way forward,” he continued.

Experts say general business-related laws affect these companies the most. “For example, high taxes on employment make these companies less competitive than rivals in other markets, and a business-unfriendly administrative system makes it literally uneasy to do business,” Netokracija’s Brkan said.

“While the recently re-elected Prime Minister, Andrija Plenkovic … has said he will make the country more business-friendly, most entrepreneurs remain skeptical,” he noted.

Bureaucratic hurdles and the presence of numerous regulatory bodies pose a challenge for all companies in Croatia.

“Take consumer protection – almost every branch or type of service has its own regulatory agency, and in parts where two branches potentially overlap, there are discrepancies in their procedures,” Kovacec pointed out.

“During the pandemic, most business with the state was digitized, which gave some hope that Croatia could aspire to reach Estonia’s level of digitalization at least. But, with the fall in the number of infections and the reopening of the economy, suddenly everything needs paper again.”

Beacon for the rest of the Balkans


Illustration. Photo: Unsplash/Christian Wiediger

As “digital-only” services become the new normal, Croatia’s progress ha the potential to set a trend for the rest of the Western Balkans.

With ICT industries in most Western Balkans countries also among their most prosperous, the potential to be explored is vast.

“We have top IT experts recognised everywhere in the world. But we have not yet realised that this sector can be one of the most important industries in Croatia,” Kovacec claimed.

Recently, North Macedonia took a step towards developing its own digital economy, signing an agreement with financial giant Mastercard. The deal on implementing digital identities would allow its citizens to open bank accounts without being physically present at banks, for example.

This country also has companies that are becoming serious players in the fintech industry, and could potentially follow the Croatian path. “We have one startup that works with storing the digital data and tokens of wealthy people from the Arab world, which the whole insurance industry is talking about,” Skopje-based business consultant Igor Izotov told BIRN.

“Maybe tomorrow we can say the digital tokens and bitcoins of a reality or Hollywood star were stored on a Macedonian software solution,” he mused.

However, for these and similar companies from the region to fully realise their potential, more marketing skills are needed, experts warn.

“As with the rest of the Eastern European startup scene, business skills and scaling are proving most valuable. One low-valued skill in the post COVID-19 era is content creation, inbound marketing and thought leadership,” Brkan explained.

“Self-taught content marketers aren’t given the budgets or the freedom to experiment, so B2B sales for fintech are definitely one of the biggest hurdles – and the strategic use of content for B2B is one of the skills that is lacking,” he concluded.

Croatian PM Accused of ‘Shameful’ Accusations Against Journalist

Posted on by Ivana Jeremic

Andrej Plenkovic was accused of “shameful” behaviour for claiming during Monday’s pre-election debate on the private RTL channel that a journalist from the Croatian public broadcaster, Maja Sever, prepared his political rival Davor Bernardic for the televised showdown.

“Shameful behaviour by Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, who accused colleague Maja Sever of working for the [opposition] SDP [Social Democratic Party] during a debate with Davor Bernardic on RTL. Unworthy of the office of Prime Minister,” Hrvoje Zovko, president of the Croatian Journalists’ Association, wrote on Twitter.

Zovko also claimed that Plenkovic constantly accuses journalists of working for the opposition.

But Plenkovic told reporters on Tuesday that this was not an attack on Sever, who he said he respects.

“If anyone has a feeling for journalists, then I have,” Plenkovic said.

The long-awaited TV debate ahead of this Sunday’s elections saw the two likeliest candidates for the next prime minister face each other in the studio – Plenkovic from the ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, and Social Democratic Party, SDP president Bernardic.

During the debate, Plenkovic asked Bernardic if Sever prepared him for the show, because Bernardic came to the studio with a sheaf of documents, which included data and graphs that he tried to use to prove the failures of Plenkovic’s government.

Sever is president of the Trade Union of Croatian Journalists and a longtime journalist with Croatian public broadcaster HRT. She collaborates with the host and editor of the HRT talk show ‘Nedjeljom u dva’ (‘Sunday at 2 pm’), Aleksandar Stankovic, on which Plenkovic was a guest on June 14.

During that show, Stankovic confronted Plenkovic with some of his unfulfilled promises. Afterwards, according to media reports, Stankovic received criticism from his superiors for attacking the prime minister too much.

On Monday evening, Sever wrote on social media that before the HRT show on June 14, she and Stankovic prepared a few graphs and a list of Plenkovic’s statements and promises from the 2016 election campaign.

“It is an ordinary and simple journalistic job. I emphasise journalistic… The comments by the president of the HDZ [Plenkovic], who permits himself to say… that I was preparing someone for debate, is another attack by Andrej Plenkovic on independent journalism,” Sever wrote.

On June 23, Plenkovic also accused N1 TV journalist Hrvoje Kresic of agitating for the opposition after Kresic asked him if he would go into self-isolation when it was revealed that he had been in contact with tennis player Novak Djokovic, who was infected with coronavirus during a tennis tournament in Zadar in Croatia.

“I know you like to agitate for a team that you would like to not be in opposition, but in power,” Plenkovic told the N1 reporter. Kresic replied that he was not agitating but asking questions as a journalist.

The Croatian Journalists’ Association responded to this by saying that Plenkovic should stop making “inadmissible accusations against journalists who ask legitimate questions”.

“Journalists work neither for the government nor for the opposition, they work exclusively in the public interest,” the association said.

Insults, Leaks and Fraud: Digital Violations Thrive amid Pandemic

Posted on by Ivana Jeremic

From January 26 to May 26, BIRN collected information about 163 cases of breaches of digital rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Hungary, North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia.

Sixty-eight of the cases related to the manipulation in digital environment, while 25 related to publishing falsehoods and unverified information with the intention to damage someone’s reputation.

BIRN’s monitoring of digital rights, developed together with the SHARE Foundation, has shown that ordinary people were the most affected by such violations, with members of the public being the target in 126 of the cases.

State institutions or state officials violated digital rights in a total of 37 cases, meanwhile.

States rarely addressed the abuses arising from these violations, and in 45 cases, the perpetrators were not identified, while 139 of the total of 163 cases were not resolved.

Eight cases were the result of pressure related to the publication of information, 12 were linked to insults and unfounded accusations and 11 were hate speech and discrimination.

Medical and personal data breaches featured in 18 cases, computer fraud was registered on 11 occasions, while the destruction and theft of data and programs happened in three cases.

Beyond the countries listed above, BIRN noticed an unprecedented rise of digital violations in Montenegro and Turkey, where there were arbitrary arrests and data breaches.

Hackers, data breaches and illegal processing


Infografic: BIRN

Leaked documents, fake websites and the publication of people’s personal and health data have been commonplaces during the ongoing pandemic, but the scale and consequences of the breaches and of the illegal processing of data has yet to be established.

Speculation about the number and identity of COVID-19-infected people led to the mass exposure of personal and private data on social media and messaging platforms. In some cases, the leaks were small in terms of data, but had potentially serious consequences, particularly in situations in which patients’ personal data was revealed.

The most serious cases were reported in Croatia, North Macedonia and Montenegro.

In March in Croatia, a message containing a list of infected patients was shared among people living on the island of Murter, mostly through messaging apps.

Illegal personal data processing and privacy breaches took place in North Macedonia as well. The country’s Agency for Personal Data Protection filed criminal charges against an unknown person for publishing the personal data of people living in the town of Kumanovo.

The public in Serbia became concerned when it was discovered that the login credentials for Serbia’s information system for analysis and storage of health data during the pandemic were publicly available on a health institution website for eight days.

Citizens of Montenegro suffered most from stigmatisation due to a number of leaks of COVID-19 patients’ records. The infected patients’ identities were revealed in posts on social media, sparking hate speech against them.

Individuals who were violated self-isolation measures were also targeted, and often, it was governments that were revealing their personal information.

In Bosnia’s Serb-dominated entity, Republika Srpska, authorities launched a website on which they published the names of people who did not follow the entity’s self-isolation measures. The list can still be found online.

As a measure against the spread of the coronavirus, Montenegro’s government published a list of individuals who were put in self-isolation after  returning home from abroad. The lists, structured by municipalities, include the individuals’ names, surnames, the date when they were put into isolation, and their home addresses. The list was only removed a month after it was published.

People were also targeted by hacker attacks and fraudulent messages or emails, usually trying to collect their personal information or request payments to foreign banks or crypto-currency accounts, as cybercriminals took advantage of the public concerns and confusion created by the pandemic.

Scams, phishing campaigns and cyber-attacks exploiting people’s fear of COVID-19 were most common in Croatia, Serbia, Hungary, North Macedonia and Romania. The Romanian cybersecurity giant Bitdefender said in March that such attempts at fraud “have risen by 475 per cent in March as compared to the previous month”, and were expected to keep increasing.

Threats, hate speech and discrimination


Infographic: BIRN 

While some countries limited the scope of the freedom of speech during the pandemic, some people used their online freedom to unleash threats, insults, discriminatory posts and hate campaigns.

BIRN’s overview looked at several categories of violations:

  • Hate speech and discrimination
  • Threatening content and the endangerment of security
  • Insults and unfounded accusations
  • Falsehoods and unverified information directed towards the damaging of reputations

In total, more than 15 per cent of all the cases that were monitored included one of these violations. The largest number –

This type of online behaviour was often combined with the use of fake accounts and the paid promotion of false content.

The people most commonly affected by the digital violations that were monitored were journalists, medical professionals and people in quarantine.

Discriminatory posts and acts were directed mostly towards refugees, Chinese and Jewish people, women and the Roma community, with the largest number of such cases occurring in Hungary.

Gender-based discrimination was reported in Serbia, where the victims were predominantly politically-engaged individuals and journalists who criticise the government.

Threats and calls for violence against the police in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were found on Facebook. In both cases, authorities reacted promptly and perpetrators were identified and detained. In North Macedonia two police officers were fined for having taunted and offended people on social networks.

Violations related to damaging reputation predominantly affected governments’ political opponents, independent media and journalists.

Serbia was the country with the largest number of posts aimed at damaging the reputation of independent journalists. In three of four cases of publishing falsehoods, the journalists who were targeted were women.

Journalists were also targeted in North Macedonia and Hungary.

Pressure and arrests for publishing information


Infographic: BIRN 

Due to the highly controlled media landscape and poor level of media literacy in the countries that were monitored, the public was overwhelmed with contradictory information and had much more difficulty in recognising false and misleading information during the pandemic than usual. At the same time, the public’s need for timely and proper information had never been bigger.

While the flow of information continued to grow immensely, states started to arrest citizens for posts on social media over the accusation they caused panic and unrest. Some countries imposed authoritarian regulations that limited the flow of information.

Members of the public, media representatives and politicians were arrested and fined for their writings on social media, often without any clear criteria. Journalists were arrested in Serbia, Kosovo and Turkey.

Arrests and fines have become one of the main tactics to counter fake news and violations of restrictions imposed by all governments in the states that were monitored. In Hungary, Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia and North Macedonia, top state officials warned the public that they faced immediate sanctions for spreading fake news amid the pandemic.

From conspiracy theories to false measures


Illustration: BIRN 

Out of 163 cases, the largest number, 68, were linked with the misuse or manipulation of information. They mostly concerned different fake news, the use of false identities online, the sharing of conspiracy theories, or posts classified by the authorities as causing panic and disorder.

Some of the topics that were misused in this way included:

  • Medicines that can cure the coronavirus, vaccines and laboratory tests
  • Disinfection procedures
  • Tips and advices on how to cure the coronavirus
  • The number of infected people
  • Information about infected people
  • Information on medical institutions and their work
  • The start of the virus and how it developed
  • State measures and actions that have never been declared nor taken
  • Supermarkets and food shortages
  • 5G
  • Other conspiracy theories
  • Online education and information relevant for students
  • Offensive posts and videos about quarantined citizens and about people who arrived from a foreign country
  • Disturbing announcements about the COVID-19 outbreak

In some countries, such as Serbia and Hungary, levels of media freedom are low, with mainstream media often spreading disinformation, while independent media are called fabricators of lies by the authorities.

Nearly 25 per cent of all cases of the misuse or manipulation of information were resolved in some way. The outcomes included:

  • Website or content removal by the state
  • A request for the removal of the problematic post
  • Detention or arrest of a person
  • Official statement about the incident or a public apology

In Romania, most cases in this category ended in content removal. In Serbia, Hungary and Croatia, arrest was the most common outcome.

Manipulated information, conspiracy theories and unfounded claims emerged en masse on social media platforms and news website when most of the countries introduced emergency measures.

Disinformation was most intensively distributed via YouTube, where content blamed the expansion of 5G technology for the COVID-19 outbreak, or blamed multinational companies or foreign governments for the pandemic. In Croatia, one person even destroyed WiFi equipment, thinking it was 5G infrastructure. Mentions of the alleged influence of 5G networks on the pandemic was noted in Romania and Serbia, both on news websites and on social media.

News websites in Serbia, Romania, Hungary and Croatia often published manipulative content that included false information.

April was the month with the largest number of cases reported in this category. Some  30 out of the total 68 cases of manipulations in the digital environment were registered that month.

Information circulating in April and May, which was manipulated or false, mainly referred to the curfew, the number of COVID-19 patients and tests, students’ exams, people in quarantined, 5G transmitters, enforced microchipping and the funding of religious communities. In almost all cases from this category, members of the public were ones affected.

The rise of ‘unknown’ attackers


Illustration: BIRN

In comparison to the cases of online violations reported before the COVID-19 outbreak, BIRN’s monitoring noted a significant rise in cases in which the perpetrators cannot be identified. The number of these cases increased tenfold on a monthly basis.

These unknown perpetrators have been creating Facebook pages, using the virus situation to persecute independent journalists and others, send fraudulent messages in order to destroy computer software systems or steal money, and creating fake website accounts to spread conspiracy theories or medical disinformation.

Unknown perpetrators have also been responsible for computer frauds, the destruction and theft of data and for making content unavailable using technical skills. Hungary had the most cases involving unknown perpetrators, mainly related to computer fraud.

Cases have also shown how states can be violators of digital rights and freedoms. The increased number of cases which ended in arrest or detention revealed the tendency of states to use more power than was necessary, particularly to arrest journalists and citizens for posts on social media.

From having double standards when it comes to reactions to fake news to using their authority to silence people, governments often acted against the interests of their own citizens. According to the monitoring findings, in almost 25 per cent of all cases, the state itself or a state official was described as the perpetrator of a violation of certain guaranteed rights or freedoms.

On the other hand, members of the public were the victims of violations in 126 cases.

Media regulations across the region have been tightened under states of emergency and journalists have been arrested on accusation of spreading misinformation about authorities’ responses to the spread of the coronavirus. Some countries, like Serbia, sought to centralise the dissemination of official information and banned certain media from regular briefings.

The first worrying legal initiative was noted in Croatia, where the government proposed a change to the Electronic Communications Act under which, in extraordinary situations, the health minister would ask telecommunications companies to provide data on the locations of users’ terminals. The legislative change is currently pending.

In Hungary, the Bill on Protection Against Coronavirus, giving the government almost total control of the flow of information about the pandemic, was adopted at the end of March. The Hungarian government also decided to limit the application of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, GDPR, and to extend the deadline for public institutions to provide data requested via freedom of information regulations from 15 to 45 days.

Romanian civil society organisations also drew attention to a lack of official transparency and the possibility of media freedoms being curbed by state-of-emergency provisions. Provisions enacted as part of the state of emergency to combat the spread of the coronavirus allowed the authorities to shut down websites that publish fake news and exempted the authorities from answering urgent inquiries from journalists. Access to a dozen websites has been blocked since then.

In North Macedonia, the media faced new procedures for the issue of work permits during coronavirus curfews. The government insisted that its pandemic measures would not affect the public’s right to information, but in practice, institutions were less responsive to freedom of information requests.

In general, there was a trend among many countries to suspend freedom of information requests.

Digital rights, and rights to privacy and freedom of expression on the internet have all faced serious limitations and breaches in South-East and Central Europe. In the semi-democracies of the region, dominated by regimes with elements of authoritarianism, there is legitimate concern about disproportionate interference in citizens’ personal data and concern that recently-imposed measures are not properly tailored to achieve their objectives while causing the least possible damage to guaranteed rights.

Many people’s lives during this period have completely shifted to the online world, where harmful behaviour usually remains unnoticed by authorities preoccupied by offline violations.

During BIRN’s monitoring period, the lack of a human rights-based approach towards people in the digital environment led to discrimination, hate speech and threats. Although protection of basic human rights and fundamental freedoms should be guaranteed on the internet in the same way as it is offline, in practice we have seen an increase in the number of cases of online violations. The forms that those violations take have been evolving as well.

A lack of knowledge and understanding of the online space, and the subsequent lack of internet governance have opened a Pandora’s Box, allowing various state institutions to arbitrarily, partially and unequally interpret people’s online behaviour.

The intense nature of the battle for control of the narrative about the coronavirus has made meaningful oversight of online life and practices, and establishing accountability for online actions, harder than ever.

To read the detailed overview of our digital rights monitoring click here. For individual cases, check our regional database, developed together with the SHARE Foundation.

Croatia Accused of Slurring Watchdogs in Police Violence Dispute

Posted on by BIRD

Human rights organisations have accused the Croatian Ministry of Interior of resorting to slurs, after it rejected media reports of police tagging migrants and refugees who attempted to enter Croatia from Bosnia with paint.

“As a diversion tactic, the crudely written response by the MUP [Interior Ministry] simply used slurs and unfounded allegations against the reporting organisations and journalists,” two watchdog organisations, No Name Kitchen, NNK, and Border Violence Monitoring Network, BVMN, said on Thursday in a joint press release.

“Instead of dealing with these grave allegations and initiating an investigation, the Croatian MUP has fallen back on its traditional stance of denying all existence of violent removals from its territory and ignoring the photographic evidence and witness accounts,” they said.

The latest report by the BVMN and NNK said EU border countries like Croatia were continuing their established practice of conducting illegal “pushbacks” of migrants and refugees trying to enter from Bosnia and Serbia – with the additional use of paint.

“A relatively new development in pushback practices is the tagging of groups with orange spray paint,” BVMN said, referring to two events at the beginning of May, when migrant groups attempted to enter Croatia from Bosnia.

After the case was reported in the international media, including the UK Guardian, Croatia denied the allegations on Wednesday, stating that the BWMN “regularly publishes accusations against the Croatian police and the Republic of Croatia, as well as all other countries on the Balkan migrant route”.

“The fabrication that migrants are marked [with a spray] in the sign of the cross because of their faith demonstrates the authors’ ignorance and a premeditated attack against Croatia without any knowledge of the basic facts,” the Interior Ministry said, adding that it had “immediately conducted an urgent investigation with the help of our police administrations”.

“It has been established that along the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina which has been indicated, the Croatian Police did not conduct any [such] activities towards migrants,” the ministry said.

The watchdog organisations meanwhile concluded that they will “continue to carry out their work as independent monitors, tracking and reporting on the unfolding situation at EU external borders”.

Croatian Journalists Hit by Coronavirus Austerity: Union Chief

Posted on by BIRD

“The crisis has affected journalists, so salaries have already been cut at a number of media outlets,” the president of Trade Union of Croatian Journalists, Maja Sever, a longtime journalist with Croatian public broadcaster HRT, told BIRN in an interview.

Sever noted that some outlets have cut employees’ salaries by 50 per cent, and that “some media did it even before the financial indicators showed that something like this should be done”.

She recalled how the Trade Union of Croatian Journalists and the Croatian Journalists’ Association warned the government that measures must be taken to safeguard journalism soon after the crisis began, but did not receive a meaningful response.

For this reason, she believes that the role of the journalists’ union, as well as unions in general, is more important than ever.

“Under labour law, it is the union that has the legal basis to negotiate with an employer about possible cutbacks. Basically, it’s the one institution that we have with which we can fight for our rights, even in crisis situations like this, but also in situations where we are not in some kind of crisis,” Sever said.

Government should protect media workers


Maja Sever, the president of Trade Union of Croatian Journalists and Hrvoje Zovko, president of the Croatian Journalists’ Association, on a meeting with Croatian President Zoran Milanovic. Photo: Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia.

According to a survey by the Trade Union of Croatian Journalists and the Croatian Journalists’ Association, less than a month into the crisis, as many as 28 per cent of Croatian freelance journalists and part-time media employees were left without any media work, 26 per cent lost most of their engagements, and 16 per cent of them lost half of their engagements.

This shows that more freelancers should be unionised, said Sever: “This crisis has shown how unprotected they are; their contracts are simply cancelled and that’s it.”

Both journalists’ organisations have argued that measures taken by the government to support the economy during the pandemic have mainly aided entrepreneurs and commercial publishers.

To avoid more redundancies among journalists and other media workers, they suggested that the measures to safeguard solvency and employment should be urgently extended to all media.

More than a month after these warnings, Sever and Hrvoje Zovko, president of the Croatian Journalists’ Association, met separately on Thursday with Croatian President Zoran Milanovic and Culture Minister Nina Obuljen Korzinek, whose ministry is responsible for the media sector.

“The president, in principle, was talking with us and supporting our efforts. [But] he does not have the mechanisms or authority to do such a thing [impose measures to save journalism],” Sever said.

“As far as the minister is concerned… I cannot say that there have been any developments that we have agreed upon, but the fact is that we have begun talks on some topics and started to talk specifically about how to help freelance journalists,” she continued, adding that it is necessary to speed up the disbursement of EU aid funds which will “certainly help many non-profit media”.

Although the Croatian government has enacted a job-saving measure that gives financial assistance to employers to retain employees, Sever warned that the criteria for receiving state aid are related to bans on layoffs, not bans on wage cuts.

Commenting on the meeting with the journalists’ organisations, Obuljen Korzinek told Jutarnji list newspaper on Sunday that “there have already been a number of government measures adopted to assist the economy concerning the media” and that talks continue with journalists’ associations about supporting independent journalists.

Press freedom still endangered


A man wearing a protective face mask reads a newspaper in Zagreb, Croatia. Photo: EPA-EFE/ANTONIO BAT.

Sever argued that Croatian journalists, who are now facing a major threat to their health while covering the coronavirus crisis in the country, are underappreciated.

“For the first week of the crisis, we made a huge effort [to raise awareness] that journalists must be protected… We also wrote to the ministries, to the employers. Then we procured the protective equipment by ourselves and sent it to the people who asked for it,” she recalled.

The union also called for press conferences to be held in a way that would protect the participants from possible infection.

“Unlike most of our fellow citizens who were able to stay home with their families, we journalists go to our job every day, exposing ourselves and our families to health hazards,” she continued, adding that part-time media workers and freelance journalists do not have proper health insurance coverage.

Meanwhile, she added, “journalists are still exposed to attacks”.

At Catholic Easter, on April 14, when a journalist from the local news website Dalmatinski Portal and a camera operator from N1 TV tried to report on an Easter mass being held in defiance of social distancing measures at a church in Sirobuja, a suburb of Split, they were physically attacked by several men.

On the same day in Sirobuja, a rally was held by masked, black-clad protesters to support the priest who had called on worshippers to attend the mass. Two of the protesters displayed World War II fascist Ustasa movement’s insignia and a banner with the slogan “Journalists are worms”.

According to Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index, Croatia has improved its press freedom status and is now ranked 59th in the world, whereas in 2019 was ranked 64the. A lower score indicates greater press freedom, but Sever described it as “small progress”.

“We are still in a society that is not known for media freedom. I think we would have to do a lot more, but unfortunately [from] large operations like public media to some kind of support for independent journalism and non-profit media, in principle we are failing to make any significant steps,” she said.

“Politicians still like to have some influence on the big mainstream media and this is really felt in this crisis,” she continued.

Sever dismissed the suggestion that Croatia should take comfort in the fact that, as far as media freedom is concerned, the country is doing better than some of its ex-Yugoslav neighbours.

“Why don’t we compare ourselves to countries that are just a little north of our geographical location and then see how we stand with press freedom?” she asked.

Some Balkan States Waging ‘Crusade’ Against Media, Report Warns

Posted on by BIRD

Media freedom in Turkey, Bulgaria and Montenegro is the worst in the region, according to the 2020 World Press Freedom Index, published on Tuesday by Reporters Without Borders – but other Balkan countries have largely failed to improve.

“In southern Europe, a crusade by the authorities against the media is very active,” the report warns.

Turkey holds 154th place out of 180 countries worldwide in Reporters Without Borders’ media freedom rankings.

“Turkey is more authoritarian than ever,” the report says, noting an increase in media censorship, particularly of online outlets, despite the release of a number of imprisoned journalists.

Bulgaria is ranked in 111th place, and the report notes that despite international pressure, public radio management suspended experienced journalist Silvia Velikova, a government critic.

This highlighted the lack of independence of Bulgaria’s public broadcasting media and the hold some political leaders have over their editorial policy.

In Montenegro, which is ranked 105th, the report notes no progress, adding that authorities favour pro-government outlets while exercising pressure against other media outlets and journalists.

“In May 2018, investigative journalist Olivera Lakic was shot in the leg. Like in many previous physical attacks on journalists, Lakic’s case is still unsolved,” the report adds. It also mentioned the recent arrests of three journalists on suspicion of causing panic and disorder by publishing fake news.

Serbia is ranked in 93rd place. “After six years under the leadership of Aleksandar Vucic… Serbia has become a country where it is often dangerous to be a journalist and where fake news is gaining in visibility and popularity at an alarming rate,” the report notes.

It says that the number of verbal attacks by politicians on media has risen sharply, and that officials increasingly use inflammatory rhetoric against journalists.

It adds that the assailants who set fire to the house of investigative journalist Milan Jovanovic have yet to be convicted.

North Macedonia is ranked in 92nd place, an improvement on last year, which the report mostly attributes to the attempts for better self-regulation and the publishing of a register of professional online media.

But it also notes that municipal authorities are still able to place advertisements, which remains a tool for financial pressure on media outlets, and that the ruling party, the Social Democrats, have advertised their government’s achievements.

Moldova retains 91st position and the report notes an “extremely polarised” media landscape, with continuing concerns about ownership.

“The media empire built by former billionaire and Democratic Party boss Vladimir Plahotniuc has lost its influence but has been quickly replaced by a media group affiliated to the Democratic Party’s rival, the pro-Russian Party of Socialists,” the report says.

Albania is ranked 84th in the world, down two places from last year, a result of recently-adopted laws against defamation and tightened regulation of online media which could result in censorship and make journalists more vulnerable to government pressures.

Kosovo is ranked 70th by Reporters Without Borders, with the report noting that media in the country remains divided among ethnic lines, and that many outlets are not financially stable.

“Some of the shared concerns are physical and verbal attacks on journalists, cyber-attacks on online media as well as the lack of transparency of media ownership,” the report says.

Greece’s place in the Reporters Without Borders press freedom index, 65th, remains unchanged this year.

Croatia moves up five places and is now ranked 59th, but the report notes that the government is still meddling in the affairs of the national broadcaster, HRT, the defamation is still criminalised and that investigative journalists are often the targets of harassment campaigns.

Bosnia and Herzegovina is ranked 58th, also scoring a five-point rise. The report says the further collapse of public service broadcasters in the country is one of the main weaknesses, along with the polarised political climate, marked by constant verbal attacks and nationalist rhetoric, which “has created a hostile environment for press freedom”.

Romania is ranked 48th in the global index – the best position of all Balkan countries – but the report highlights some continuing shortcomings.

“The attitude towards journalism and free speech that prevails within the state and the political class continues to encourage censorship and self-censorship,” it says.

“The media’s funding mechanisms are opaque or even corrupt, and editorial policies are subordinated to owner interests. The media have gradually been turned into political propaganda tools and are routinely subjected to surveillance by the security services,” it adds.

The report marks Norway, Finland and Denmark as the three best countries in the world for press freedom, while Eritrea, Turkmenistan and North Korea are at the bottom of the list of 180 countries.

Reporters Without Borders says the report shows that the decade ahead will be “decisive for the future of journalism, with the COVID-19 pandemic highlighting and amplifying the many crises that threaten the right to freely reported, independent, diverse and reliable information”.

Social Media a Help and Hindrance in Balkan Coronavirus Fight

Posted on by BIRD

Serbia has no confirmed cases of coronavirus yet, but on Tuesday a WhatsApp voice message began doing the rounds on social media claiming several people had already died from the virus in the capital, Belgrade.

“Doctors are strictly forbidden to talk about the virus,” the woman is heard saying on the message, which was published on several Serbian news portals.

A similar thing happened in neighbouring Croatia, where another WhatsApp message contained the claim that the first case had been recorded in the coastal city of Split, before authorities actually confirmed the first case in the capital, Zagreb, on February 25.

With its epicentre in Italy, Europe is grappling to contain the spread of Covid-19. In the Balkans, cases have been confirmed in Croatia, North Macedonia and Romania.

Governments and concerned experts and citizens in the region and elsewhere are taking to the Internet, social media and mobile phone messages to spread information.

But likewise they face what Italy’s foreign minister, Luigi Di Maio, has called an “infodemic” of false information and scaremongering in the media and online.

In Serbia, the interior ministry said on Wednesday that its Department of High-Tech Crime was trying to identify the women who made the WhatsApp recording claiming that coronavirus had already claimed its first victims in the country.

In Albania, prosecutors on February 24 announced investigations into what they called the “diffusion of fake information or announcements in any form aimed at creating a state of insecurity and panic among the people.”

Scientist: Behaviour ‘not in line with magnitude of danger’

Serbia’s Health Ministry has launched a website dedicated to the coronavirus outbreak, regularly posting updates, news, advice, contacts and warnings for those coming to Serbia from affected areas.

On Wednesday in Moldova, the government began sending mobile phone text messages telling Moldovans what symptoms to look out for and what steps they should take if they suspect they may have contracted the respiratory virus.

“Take care of your health. Call your family doctor immediately if you have a fever or cough. If you have returned from areas with Coronavirus and feel ill, call 112,” the SMS reads.

Croatian scientist Igor Rudan of the Centre for Global Health Research at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, said on Wednesday the state of panic in Europe did not reflect the level of threat posed by Covid-19.

Even if the virus were to spread throughout Croatia, he wrote on Facebook, “the casualties should be at least roughly comparable with the number of cases of death from the flu or with the number of road traffic fatalities during the same period.”

“This panic is triggered by the persistent media coverage… rather than by generally accepted and scientifically-based knowledge about the coronavirus,” Rudan wrote. 

“If you started behaving differently than you did during the winter months, during the flu epidemic, for example, collecting food supplies or wearing masks on the streets, this is not the kind of behaviour that reflects the actual magnitude of the danger.”

The post has been shared 2,500 times.

The Covid-19 outbreak originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan in late December. 

According to the World Health Organisation, there are now more than 82,000 confirmed cases in 45 countries.

In the Balkans, there are three confirmed cases in Croatia, one in North Macedonia and one in Romania. More than 180 people are under supervision in Montenegro. In Serbia, 20 people have tested negative for the virus, while several Serbian citizens who recently travelled to affected areas are in quarantine in Belgrade and the nearby town of Sabac, the public broadcaster reported.

BIRD Community

Are you a professional journalist or a media worker looking for an easily searchable and comprehensive database and interested in safely (re)connecting with more than thousands of colleagues from Southeastern and Central Europe?

We created BIRD Community, a place where you can have it all!

Join Now