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At the end of September 2003 Bulgaria adopted its Protection against Discrimination Act. The Act shall enter into force on 1 January 2004. Until recently the prohibition of discrimination was proclaimed by a general rule of the Bulgarian Constitution and was provided for by several rules scattered among diverse regulations (such as the Penal Code, the Labour Code and some others). The legal provisions were designed in a way that made them barely effective. For example, there were no definitions of the existing forms of discrimination. The new anti-discrimination act was also Bulgaria's response...

As of 1 August 2003 the members of the Bulgarian society for collective management of the copyrights of recordings' producers (PROPHON) decided to cancel all agreements with electronic media and to introduce a ban for broadcasting of music if a contract for compensating neighbouring rights is not closed by this date. Until last year producers allowed electronic media to pay for the broadcast music by advertising time in which PROFON's members promoted their catalogues. Under the Act on Copyrights and Neighbouring Rights, the organisation of producers and performers can collectively represent and...

The new Telecommunications Act of 23 September 2003 (State Gazette, issue 88, 7 October 2003) is meant to bring Bulgarian law into line with the acquis communautaire and to conduce to the liberalisation and opening up of services in the fixed network telephony market. The Act places particular emphasis on the obligations of operators with considerable market power, the distribution of licences, the imposition of administrative charges and local loop unbundling. For example, it introduces a "must carry" provision (Art. 48), which obligates cable network operators to transmit public service broadcasting...

At its regular meeting on 12 May 2003, the Council of Electronic Media discussed the implementation of the provisions of the Radio and Television Law and the European Convention on Transfrontier Television regarding sponsorship of radio and TV programmes. After a discussion the Council decided that the development of broadcasters' commercial practice calls for further clarification of the Bulgarian Radio and Television Law's provisions concerning sponsored broadcasts. These provisions are as follows: "Section 92. - (1) Sponsored broadcasts shall not promote the sale, purchase, or use of goods and...

The South Eastern Europe Cinema Network (SEE) was set up in 2000 on the initiative of the Greek Film Centre (a state-owned organisation attached to the Greek Ministry of Culture). It promotes and supports the national film industry of eleven Southeast European states (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Greece, Croatia, “the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovenia, Turkey, Cyprus). The aim is to provide support for the development, production and advertising of the member states’ films both within and outside the network. A support fund for co-productions...