Head of Member Relations David Lewis at the European Commission in Brussels, signing an EBU action plan entitled "Enabling the democratic role of Public Service Media in the EU accession countries". Looking on is former EBU Vice-President Boris Bergant, a very active consultant on the activities.

The European Commission has today unlocked EU funding for EBU activities to strengthen public service media in countries seeking to join the European Union.

The funds will be released after signature in Brussels on 6 March, by Mr Yngve Engstroem, Head of Regional Cooperation and Programmes Unit at DG Enlargement, of an EBU action plan entitled "Enabling the democratic role of Public Service Media in the EU accession countries".

EBU Director General Ingrid Deltenre welcomed the news.

"The signing of this agreement shows that the EU recognizes not only that public service media are a key element of modern European democracy, but also that the EBU has the expertise to mount activities that will make public service media indispensable," she said.

Ms Deltenre was in the Montenegrin capital on 5 March to open a regional conference on the topic "Public service media and the citizen".

Focusing on the mutually supportive relationship that should exist between public media and civil society, the conference is one of a series of activities to be co-funded under the action plan following an EU-EBU Memorandum of Understanding signed in Brussels last July.

Other activities under the plan include:

• High-level advocacy 
• Development of strategies to strengthen the independence, sustainability and contribution to democratic discourse of public service media
• Training on public service news standards and investigative journalism
• Assessment of audiovisual archives in the interests of their preservation through digitization
• A regional conference in Pristina in April on public service media and Roma minorities.

The plan will be carried out by the EBU Partnership Programme* in Albania, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo.

EBU Members from neighbouring countries – including Armenia, Georgia, Hungary, Turkey and Ukraine – will be invited to attend certain regional conferences under the plan, funded as necessary by the EBU's own Partnership Fund.