The 12th Plenary Assembly of the Mediterranean Network of Regulatory Authorities was held in Istanbul on the invitation of the Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK), on 30 September and 1 October 2010 under the Presidency of Mr Juan Montabes Pereira, President of the Consejo audiovisual de Andalucia (CAA) of Andalusia, Spain.
Fourteen regulatory authorities were represented and the following organisations took part in the debates as observers: the Council of Europe (European Audiovisual Observatory), the European Commission and the Agency for Electronic Media of Croatia.
At the end of the meeting, the Broadcasting Council of the Republic of Macedonia, member-observer since the Granada meeting and the Agency for Electronic Media of Croatia, both present, joined the Network under the respective statuses of member and member observer.
MNRA counts twenty member authorities representing seventeen states of the Mediterranean area as well as two member-observers.
President Montabes declared the meeting open by highlighting the work accomplished by the network during the years 2009-2010 after the adoption of the Declaration of Intention regarding the protection of young publics and the fight against violence in the media, calling for a Mediterranean alliance for media literacy. He also saluted the achievements of 2008 marked by the adoption of the Declaration on audiovisual content regulation and its recognition by key euro-Mediterranean players during the past year.
The President reminded that the activities of the Network depend on the research of a shared juridical framework based on the common values of the regulators in this area on the principle of cultural diversity and the respect of national specificities. Faced with the multiplication of digital and satellite content, the Network has to direct its efforts towards this void for a concerted and shared regulation by all the key players in the Mediterranean area.
Then Prof. Davut Dursun, President of the Turkish Authority and Vice President of the Network, in his turn reminded the participants of the importance of multilateral cooperation inthe area and the regional dimension of MNRA. Mr Bülent Arinc, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister responsible for the media in Turkey, attended the meeting and addressed the Plenary during the first day of the meeting.
The first day was devoted to the presentations and exchanges on two current issues for the audiovisual regulation in the Mediterranean space: the protection of minors: regulation and co-regulation (signalisation) and new services (1st session) as well as the representation of women in the media (2nd session).
During the first session, Turkey, Catalonia, France and Morocco made their presentations. The subject of programme signalisation, in the current context of the development of new services, captured all the attention of the regulators. Various criteria are employed and different levels of signalisation are applied for the same programme in many countries. The participants conveyed their wish to engage into a common thought on the subject, proposing the creation of a working tool on the criteria in use for the classification of fiction, TV series, music videos broadcasted in various countries.
The second session on the representation of women in the media was the subject of the presentations of Andalusia, Portugal, Italy and Morocco. Numerous studies and activities on the subject saw the light of the day accentuating national specificities. The participants underlined the stakes for the regulators, in terms of measuring the gender equality, theprogress and the integration of Mediterranean societies, in the North as well as in the South.
The second day was at first devoted to the presentation of the activities of the Network under the Andalusian Presidency and the materialisation of the implementation of the Declaration of Intention adopted in Granada regarding the protection of young publics and the fight against violence in the media. The conclusions of the seminar on Media Literacy that was held in Malaga on 25 June 2010 on the invitation of the CAA were also presented to the participants. Concerning the Euro-Mediterranean scene, the presidency commented on the Memorandum of Understanding that was signed on 20 April 2010 between the Permanent Conference of Mediterranean Audiovisual Operators (COPEAM) and the MNRA, which was the result of the wish between the two platforms and shows the common will to work together and in particular in the heart of the Union for the Mediterranean in order topromote a shared juridical framework.
The President of the Conseil superieur de l’audiovisuel (CSA), Mr Michel Boyon followingly intervened on the necessity for the implementation of the MNRA Declaration on audiovisual content regulation and specifically the cooperation between regulators in the case of satellite trans-frontier broadcasting. He called the members of the Network for an enhanced vigilance and he underlined the necessity for a concrete co-operation in the domain of satellite regulation especially for the sharing of information on audiovisual media service providers as well as the procedures foreseen in the event of content infringement of the principles coded in the Declaration on audiovisual content regulation of Reggio.
Then, Mr Wolfgang Closs, Chief Executive of the European Audiovisual Observatory had the opportunity to present to the participants the activities of his institution and notably the database of MAVISE.
In the second part of the morning, the discussions focused on the Life of the Network.
A new stage for the governance of the network was achieved with the adoption of the Charter amendment concerning the operation of the Network and specifically guaranteeing the representation of regulatory institutions, national and regional authorities in the Network.