On 9 September 2024, the Panhellenic Federation of Journalists’ Unions (Posey) issued a statement denouncing the government’s exclusion of journalists and media from the opportunity to submit questions during the press conference held by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis at the Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF) on 8 September 2024. The statement lists a number of media outlets that were excluded from posing questions: ERT3, Rizospastis, the newspaper ‘Avgi’ and the radio station ‘Sto Kokkino’, as well as the newspapers ‘Documento’ and ‘DIMOKRATIA’.
The exclusion from the submission of questions applied to, in the vast majority, media that are not friendly to the Greek government, despite requesting the submission of a question in good time.
The statement concludes that this exclusion and discrimination in the submission of questions, far from contributing to the full information of Greek society, are not consistent with freedom of the press.
Under the rule of law, where individual rights and freedom of the press are protected, journalists have the right to exercise their profession freely and independently, without censorship, and without disproportionate or unjustified restrictions, in order to fully inform the public on issues of major public interest.
Despite the guarantee of freedom of the press under Article 14 para. 2 of the Constitution , in this case journalists’ unions denounce the unjustified and disproportionate restrictions on freedom of the press imposed against certain journalists and media outlets during the process of submitting questions to the government in order to hold it accountable on issues of public interest.
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