Journalists Matter, Council of Europe Campaign for the Safety of Journalists
The Council of Europe encourages member states to transpose the Campaign to the national context. Without each member’s committed and effective effort at national level, through the development of the so-called ‘national chapter’, the Campaign cannot reach its goals.
In this section, we will present developments in Italy:
National Focal Points
Mr Davide MAROTTA, First Counsellor, Directorate General for Public and Cultural Diplomacy, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation
Ms Claudia SARTORI, Director General for International Affairs, Department for information and publishing, Presidency of the Council of Ministers
Ms/Mme Serena TONELLI, Second Secretary, Directorate Générale for Public and Cultural Diplomacy, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation
National Campaign Committee
To implement the Campaign’s national Chapter, Italy has established an inclusive National Committee, composed of governmental and non-governmental stakeholders:
Office for Communication Coordination of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation;
Department for Information and Publishing of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers;
Inter-Ministerial Committee for Human Rights of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation;
Office for the Council of Europe of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation;
Department of Public Security of the Ministry of the Interior;
Legislative Office of the Ministry of Justice;
Italian Order of Journalists;
Italian National Press Federation;
Italian Federation of Newspaper Publishers;
Italian National Association of Online Press.
The Committee is responsible for supporting the national focal points on:
(i) the analysis of the current situation in the Country and identification of strengths (best practices) and weaknesses (areas for improvement) in protecting journalists’ safety;
(ii) the elaboration of a comprehensive, multidimensional national action plan;
(iii) the implementation of the action plan, through the establishment of legal and practical mechanisms for the protection of journalists and the coordination of national and local initiatives;
(iv) the preparatory work for the annual meetings of the national focal points.
The Committee is expected to meet at least twice a year, in person or online. The meetings are organized by the national focal points, who are responsible for decision-making and for coordinating the implementation of the Campaign’s national chapter.
The first meeting of the national Committee was held on September 25, 2023, and it was mainly focused on the preparation of the first gathering of the national focal points that took place in Riga on October 6th, 2023.
The first meeting of the National Committee and the following consultations have helped outline some of the main challenges in the safety of journalists and the measures put in place in the recent years in order to tackle them.
The main legal framework to safeguard journalists is based on:
Art. 21 of the Italian Constitution, which ensures free expression of thought through speech, writing and any other means of dissemination. Press cannot be subject to authorization or censorship; seizure can be carried out only by a consistent act of the judicial authority, subject to the right of revision, in the case of crimes for which the press law expressly authorizes it and when no other means of investigation are fruitfully eligibile.
General regulations are contained in Law no. 47 of 1948 (press law) and Law no. 69 of 1963 regulating the profession of journalism: it recognizes professional secrecy by providing that journalists are required to respect secrecy regarding the source of the news when this is required by their fiduciary nature.
Consistent with these guarantees, article 622 of the Penal Code provides that the disclosure of professional secrecy is punished with imprisonment of up to one year or a fine of up to 516 Euros. In turn, the violation of the ethical rule of secrecy on the fiduciary source entails disciplinary responsibility (Law 69 of 1963).
These protections are counterbalanced. Article 200 of the Code of criminal procedure recognizes the journalist's professional secrecy to be limited to the names of the people from whom he/she has received confidential information. A judge can order the journalist to disclose his/her sources of information only if deemed indispensable to prove a crime.
A new Law, currently under discussion, contains, among other things, specific provisions relating to the exclusion of prison sentences for journalists in the event of defamation and the provision of additional financial sanctions for anyone who files a reckless complaint against a journalist related to his/her activity, in the belief that denuntiation and civil suits whitout legal basis may constitute acts of intimidation against the freedom and the independence of the journalists.
As regards the overall safety ecosystem, in 2023 the Italian Government adopted a number of measures aimed at protecting journalists and their professionalism in terms of improvement of their working conditions and employment protection, in the belief that this is functional to strengthening their independence.
The regulation providing a public financial support to news agencies was reformed. It created a “List of Agencies of national relevance”: the registration in the list is a pre-requisite for accessing the public tenders launched by the Department for Information and Publishing (DIP) for supplying the State administrations with news bulletins (and get the relevant financial contribution). The main requirements for the registration in the List of national relevance are the minimum number of permanently employed journalists (no less than fifty), and a salary no lower than the minimum threshold established by the national collective agreement for the journalism sector. The financial contribution eventually granted by the DIP is also proportional to the number of journalists with permanent contracts.
The Government created the "Fund for pluralism and digital innovation in information and publishing", which regulates the resources assigned to this sector. The criteria for the disbursement of contributions take into consideration, among others, the number of journalists hired on fixed-term contracts. For local media, incentives and reward mechanisms are proportionally higher, in order to encourage pluralism and a more equitable distribution of resources in favor of non-profit, small or local media. Such measures aim at supporting regional and local information industry, whereby journalists are more vulnerable and the effects of the economic crisis have a stronger impact on media freedom and pluralism.
The Government established the “Technical Committee to study the impact of Artificial Intelligence on the editorial and information system”. This is aimed at evaluating how and to what extent Artificial Intelligence will affect the employment, vulnerability and evolution of the journalism profession.
Finally, in terms of protection measures, in 2017, the Ministry of Interior established the "Coordination Center for monitoring, analysis and permanent exchange of information on the phenomenon of acts of intimidation against journalists". The Coordination Centre aims at strengthening the monitoring tools and fostering the exchange of information among the main stakeholders. It also promotes in-depth analysis on acts of intimidation against journalists and formulates proposals to identify targeted prevention and contrast strategies.
Furthermore, on September 2018 the Central Directorate of the Criminal Police created the Permanent support body to the Coordination Center. The latter is a forum for discussion: it is chaired by the Deputy Director General of Public Security - Central Director of the Criminal Police and includes representatives of Carabinieri, Guardia di Finanza, State Police, Communications Police, as well as representatives of the National Federation of the Italian Press and the National Council of the Order of Journalists. The Permanent support body:
carries out a constant monitoring of the acts of intimidation against journalists, also through the analysis of the data provided by the territorial branches of the structures that compose it;
proposes prevention and contrast initiatives and strategies to the Coordination Center and develops operational intervention tools, taking into account the assessments developed with reference to the different territorial contexts;
it periodically reports to the Coordination Center on the progress of the phenomenon under examination and on the developments of ongoing initiatives.
The Permanent support body issues quarterly reports and publishes them on the website of the Ministry of Interior.
Italy, National chapter
