The Croatian Parliament will continue its session on Tuesday with a debate on the final text of the law implementing the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), which aims to establish a common framework for all types of media services across the EU market while safeguarding media independence and pluralism.
Representatives of the Croatian Journalists’ Association (CJA) expressed disagreement with the draft law from the outset, stressing that the situation on the ground cannot be resolved through a regulation that offers only partial solutions. The proposal fails to address provisions related to guarantees of independence for governing bodies of public media services (Hrvatska radiotelevizija and HINA), the financing of public media, the appointment of the governing body of the independent media regulator (the Council for Electronic Media – VEM), as well as issues of media ownership transparency, editorial independence (through newsroom statutes), and the protection of journalistic sources.
Editorial independence remains a problem, as media statutes are not functioning in practice and newsroom autonomy is not respected. The CJA also warned the Ministry of Culture and Media that, under EMFA, funding for public service media (HRT and HINA) should be stable and predictable to ensure resilience to political influence—something the current draft law fails to guarantee.
As stated in the parliamentary agenda, the European Media Freedom Act is fully binding and directly applicable in all EU Member States.
The new law on the implementation of the EU regulation establishing a common framework for media services on the internal market introduces definitions related to media services that are not currently covered by the Media Act and the Electronic Media Act.
Furthermore, a new Media Agency will be established, with competencies extended to include print media, with the aim of ensuring equal enforcement of the EMFA.
At the same time, a Media Council will be given oversight over the selection of members of governing bodies of public service media HRT and HINA.
The law also more precisely regulates provisions concerning ownership transparency, sources of funding, and obligations of public authorities or entities when placing advertising, as well as when allocating funds for program production and broadcasting.
Additionally, the Agency will be required to maintain a register of print media distributed in Croatia whose headquarters are outside the country and which are not listed in the Register of Newspaper Publishers. Media service providers, electronic publications, and video-sharing platforms will also be obliged to label any content that is generated, in whole or in part, by artificial intelligence.
On Tuesday, Parliament will also discuss a report on the number of voters registered in the voter register and by electoral districts for the third quarter of 2025.
As of September 30, 2025, a total of 3,609,130 voters were registered across ten electoral districts (I–X), a decrease from 3,615,381 recorded at the end of the first quarter of 2025.
All recorded deviations in the number of voters by electoral district remain within the legally permitted range of ±5 percent.
Parliament plans to discuss six additional agenda items by the end of the week, when votes on matters debated this and the previous week are scheduled.