The European Union will allocate €10 million in aid for independent media in Ukraine.
This was reported by the EU Ambassador to Ukraine Katarina Maternova, Ukrinform reports.
Discussions on allocating €7 million of this amount are currently ongoing and a decision should be made soon.
Maternova said that €2 million will go to Reporters Without Borders, including subsidizing small media outlets and supporting production for journalists at risk. Another €3 million will go to Internews for the Media Development Fund for a sub-grant, €1 million to the Institute of Mass Information with a sub-grant for small and medium-sized media outlets, and €1 million to several other smaller projects, including the Black Sea Foundation, Docudays, and Culture vs War.
For the remaining €3 million, the EU will launch a competition specifically for regional media and independent journalists.
According to her, since 2017, the EU has provided over €100 million to independent media through various initiatives, contracts, sub-grants and partners.
Maternova added that since February 2022, the EU has allocated €37 million for independent media in Ukraine, in particular for Suspilny, which received a total of over €16 million.
In addition, the EU has ongoing projects worth almost €20 million, for which calls for proposals are ongoing for direct support to medium and small media and promotion of free independent media — of which €8 million has already been used, she noted.
There is also a €1 million project for independent media aimed at training in dangerous environments, and a number of other initiatives.
- On March 10, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio reported that the US was officially closing 83% of USAID programs. He explained this by saying that these programs were spending “tens of billions of dollars” and that it was allegedly not beneficial and was harming the States. This agency funded, among other things, a number of Ukrainian independent media outlets.
- On March 18, a US court ruled that Elon Musk and his DOGE likely used unconstitutional powers in the liquidation of USAID.
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