Brussels slams Polish bill, urges EU media freedom act

Brussels on Thursday slammed Poland's planned new media law after it was backed by lawmakers, and called for an EU act to protect press freedom.

"Media pluralism and diversity of opinions are what strong democracies welcome, not fight against. The draft Polish broadcasting law sends a negative signal," European Commission vice-president for values and transparency Vera Jourova tweeted.

"We need a media freedom act in the whole EU to uphold media freedom and support the rule of law," she said. A European Commission spokesman later referred reporters to the tweet.

On Wednesday, Polish MPs voted in favour of the new law that critics say would curb media freedom by preventing companies from countries outside Europe holding a controlling stake in media outlets.

That would force US group Discovery to sell its majority stake in TVN, one of Poland's biggest private TV networks, and whose news channel TVN24 is often highly critical of Warsaw's government, led by the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party.

Poland is an EU member, and opinion polls suggest solid public support for remaining so, but the government of Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki is increasingly at loggerheads with Brussels.

The European Commission has yet to approve Warsaw's plan to spend its share of the EU's post-coronavirus recovery plan and has challenged its judicial reforms and the anti-LGBTQ policies of some regional authorities.