Joint SOFJO event with OSCE Parliamentary Assembly

Vienna, 21 April – Yesterday, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media Teresa Ribeiro and OSCE Parliamentary Assembly hosted a Joint Web Dialogue on the Safety of Female Journalists Online: The Role of Parliamentary Action.

This was the first event in a common initiative to promote the safety of female journalists online (SOFJO) across the OSCE region. The event built on a SOFJO questionnaire, which provided important first indications of the challenges many parliamentarians identify in improving the safety of journalists.

During the event, parliamentarians took stock of existing challenges to the digital safety of women journalists and elaborated on the proposed actions presented in the SOFJO Resource Guide, and parliamentarians’ role in ensuring that freedom of expression is enabled for all. In particular, the event provided a platform to discuss how national parliaments can ensure adequate, timely and effective prevention, protection and prosecution mechanisms and reinforce mobilizing action in that regard. Thereby, the joint initiative by the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media and OSCE Parliamentary Assembly aims at contributing to closing the implementation gap when it comes to the online safety of women journalists.

The SOFJO Resource Guide is available online: https://www.osce.org/fom/safety-female-journalists-online.