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After three years of preparation and any amount of being passed back and forth in Parliament, the Act reforming the audiovisual sector, aimed in particular at strengthening the public sector and opening the way for the development of terrestrially-broadcast digital television in France, was adopted on 29 June. Apart from a few minor points, most of the text was declared to be in compliance with the Constitution by the Constitutional Council on 27 July. Firstly, the Act restructures public-sector audiovisual communication, making considerable amendments to the Act of 30 September 1986. The central...

On 3 July 2000, a user of the Offener Kanal Berlin (Berlin Open Channel) was permanently banned from using the channel by the Media Council of the Berlin-Brandenburg Media Authority (MABB) after repeatedly using it to disseminate right-wing extremist material. The person concerned was responsible for Radio Germania, which had broadcast a total of fourteen times on the Offener Kanal Berlin since 1996. He had been banned from the channel for one year in 1997 for disseminating material liable to corrupt young people. The Media Council based its decision to ban the broadcaster permanently on Section...

Since 1991 the Flemish Broadcasting legislation, with some modifications, stipulates a ban on advertising immediately before and after children's programmes. In a time period of 5 minutes before and after programmes targetting children under 12, no advertising or sponsorship messages are allowed. For many years the commercial broadcasting organisation VTM and its second channel Kanaal 2 have been opposed to this provision of the Broadcasting Decree and have sought the abrogation of the 5-minute rule. A decree proposed in the Flemish Parliament some months ago, however, went in the opposite direction...

On 6 August, the European Parliament adopted a Resolution on the Communication from the European Commission "Principles and guidelines for the Community's audiovisual policy in the digital age" (see IRIS 2000-1: 5). The Resolution endorses in general terms the Commission's guidelines. As to the revision of the "Television without Frontiers" Directive, the European Parliament considers that it should be implemented in the course of 2002. The revised Directive should take a more incisive and effective approach as regards independent production and the circulation of European works. The Commission...

The Swiss Federal Council wants to put an end to the consumption of hard porn being exempt from criminal sanctions. Its bill, adopted on 10 May 2000, proposed the addition of a paragraph 3.a) to Article 197 of the Criminal Code. This makes not only anyone manufacturing or commercialising hard porn liable to prosecution - it also includes anyone in possession of such items, regardless of how they have been obtained (purchase, rental, loan, exchange or gift). So that the prosecuting authorities are not inundated, mere consumption will not warrant prosecution - the passive viewer of works of child...