UKRAINE Freedom of expression and access to information

“Strengthening Freedom of Media and Establishing a Public Broadcasting System in Ukraine” project

The Council of Europe Project “Strengthening Freedom of the Media and Establishing a Public Broadcasting System in Ukraine” aimed to strengthen the legal and institutional guarantees for the effective exercise of the right to freedom of expression and information in Ukraine and to enhance the role of the media as an instrument for consensus building in the society.

This project was built upon the achievements of the Joint Programme between the CoE and EU “Strengthening Information Society in Ukraine” implemented in 2014 and 2015. In 2016 the “Strengthening Freedom of the Media and Establishing a Public Broadcasting System in Ukraine” project was financed from the budget of the CoE’s Action Plan for Ukraine in 2015-2017 and donors were the 16 CoE member States – the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.

The project was aiming to:

Provide expert advice on consolidation of a genuine public broadcaster in Ukraine in 2016-2018.
Develop capacity of the public broadcaster to enable the production of higher-quality programming.
Strengthen institutional capacity of the public broadcaster’s Supervisory Board through building capacities of its secretariat and members, developing relevant regulations and implementing public awareness activities.
Ensure better understanding of the legislative and executive authorities of existing European standards and practices in order to make better informed decisions.
Develop a model of regional public broadcaster with the expert and methodological support.
Provide expert assistance and extensive training to public officials of national and local authorities with regard to applying public interest test in the process of classifying documents.
Increase capacity of an independent supervisory body for access to information.

Summary of results