Greece Press Freedom Index Improves; Still Last in EU

Greece’s press freedom index improved, rising 19 places in 2024, but remains last among EU countries, according to the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) 2024 World Press Freedom Index, released on Friday.

The country has risen to 88th place from 107th last year out of 180 countries and its overall score increased to 57.15 out of 100, from 55.2 in 2023. Norway, Denmark and Sweden are best-in-class, with scores ranging from 88.3 to over 91.9.

However, Greece comes last among the EU for the third year in a row. Greece is behind Qatar and Thailand, and performing worse than countries such as Niger, Lesotho and Haiti, the press freedom organization’s ranking shows.

“The rise is largely explained by the deterioration of press freedom in other countries, given the meagre improvement in the score,” said Pavol Szalai, the head of RSF’s EU and Balkans desk, adding that previous years were marked with grave press freedom violations, such as the murder of a journalist in 2021 or the outbreak of a surveillance scandal in 2022.

“2023 was marked above all by inaction in the face of systemic problems,” Szalai said, naming among others political attempts to undermine the independence of the investigation into the surveillance scandal, SLAPPs, media concentration and weak pluralism.

The report says that press freedom in Greece has suffered a systemic crisis since 2021. The scandal of the wiretapping of journalists by the National Intelligence Service (EYP) has yet to be cleared up, as is the case regarding the murder of veteran crime reporter Giorgos Karaivaz in 2021.

It adds that despite constitutional guarantees, press freedom has been challenged at the legislative level. New laws passed by Parliament, meant to provide better protections for citizens against arbitrary surveillance, in response to the Predatorgate wiretapping scandal, fall short of European standards. A new media bill has led to the creation of a controversial ethics committee.

In April the US State Department’s annual report on Human Rights noted that domestic and international agencies said journalists and media outlets faced pressure to avoid criticizing the government or reporting scandals.

It also noted that the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, urged authorities to ensure “human rights defenders and journalists could work safely and freely.”

Greece’s PM says press freedom report is “crap”

In November 2022, Greek PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis responded to the 2022 report of RSF. He labeled it as “crap.”

“I think there is no issue on press freedom in Greece,” the Greek PM said. “We have a vibrant press, journalists can write anything they want.”

Referring to the report by Reporters Without Borders, Mitsotakis said that placing Greece in 108th position in terms of press freedom behind Chad “is crap…excuse my language.”

Mitsotakis admitted that there are steps Greece can take in terms of further fostering a vibrant civic society, but he insisted that freedom of the press “is not an issue.”

“Just look at the daily newspapers in Greece,” he said. “Probably three-quarters are harshly criticizing the government, as they have the right to do. I would argue that Greece has very weak libel laws.”