These are troubling times for the TV industry in Central and Eastern Europe. Twenty-five years after the end of the Cold War, it feels like we’re back to square one in some countries.
Just this week we learned that CNN has decided to stop broadcasting in Russia due to the new 20% maximum permitted foreign ownership level in media assets. At the same time, a new international multimedia agency named ‘Sputnik’ has been formed, on the foundations of the now closed RIA Novosti, its mission being to counter what is termed as “aggressive propaganda promoting a unipolar world” in the western media.
Meanwhile in the UK, the regulator Ofcom as threatened Russia Today, now known as RT, with sanctions for what it said was unbalanced reporting of events in Ukraine earlier this year.
Elsewhere, in what was regarded as one of the most liberal countries in the Soviet Block just prior to the momentous events of 25 years ago, Hungary seems intent on turning the clock back through its actions against the media industry, and in particular RTL, the country’s most successful broadcaster.
Romania has fared little better in the eyes of the world through the jailing of one of its leading media entrepreneurs on dubious charges earlier this year.
More generally, the low-level, though still very real, conflict in eastern Ukraine, preceded by the Russian annexation of Crimea, has been accompanied by a propaganda war waged by both sides. As we all know in such situations, truth is always the first casualty.
So what is to be done? Unfortunately, there is very little the TV industry itself can do, being caught up in something not really of its own making.
However, life is cyclical, and one day I’m sure we’ll again return to what were much better and positive times in post ’89 Central and Eastern Europe.
