Credit deals for Mochovce

• The Slovak government signed credit agreements worth $900 million with French, German, and Czech banks, plus a local consortium for the completion of the first two blocks of its controversial Mochovce nuclear power. A government statement said that of the overall credits some $100 million will be spent on credit servicing, insurance and clearing payments. An additional $150 million Russian credit was agreed earlier this month in Moscow for the delivery of nuclear fuels and upgrading construction documentation for the two 440 megawatt blocks of the Soviet-designed nuclear plant. (CET ON-LINE)

Albanian NGOs On-Line

• The Albanian Civil Society Foundation, an NGO support foundation operating in Tirana and presently supporting over 100 Albanian NGOs in all sectors with funds provided by Danish government aid, has published a list of Albanian NGOs (400 of them) on the Web, available at: http://inet.uni-c.dk/~dialogue/acsf.htm. The foundation is available for inquiries of all kinds to link Albanian NGOs and foreign partners/donors.

Cooperation in Lithuania

• The Lithuanian Ministry of Environmental Protection has sent a letter of intent to national NGOs in order to promote cooperation in the field of environmental protection. The Ministry undertakes to inform partner NGOs about major governmental plans and programs and environmental laws in preparation, in order to involve them in the drafting and decisionmaking process. The NGOs in return will inform the Ministry about their activities, provide it with their publications and submit comments and proposals on plans put to them. To date, some 30 NGOs have approved and signed the letter of intent, thus forming a basis for concrete agreements to be signed between the ministry and individual NGOs. (Source: Network 21)

Gabcikovo Dam trial

• Hungary and Slovakia's long-standing dispute over a dam on the Danube could be settled next spring with a ruling by the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The court has set the start of the verbal stage of a trial related to the controversial Gabcikovo hydropower plant for February 17, 1997. The verbal hearing is likely to take three to five weeks and the verdict should come a few weeks later, said Gyorgy Szenasi, head of the international legal division at the Foreign Ministry. (The Hungary Report)

Slovak journalist shuns award

• Peter Strelinger, deputy editor in chief of Slovenska Republika, on 15 August rejected the Ludovit Stur prize for journalism, Narodna Obroda reported. In a letter to Slovak TV director Jozef Darmo, Strelinger said the reason for his refusal was the "personal and moral situation" at Slovenska Republika. The prize was awarded by the Association of Slovak Journalists in cooperation with the government. It's recipients to date have been only pro-government journalists and newspapers. Slovenska Republika reported on 15 August that besides Strelinger, the winners include the weekly Literarny tyzdennik and the state press agency TASR. - Sharon Fisher OMRI

Croatian update

• The Council of Europe on 2 July invited Croatia to join that organization, Reuters reported. But it added that "the decision is not immediately effective as the (Council's ministerial) committee reserved the possibility of reconsidering it in the second half of September with reference to Croatia's observance of the Dayton peace agreement and, in particular, its attitude during the elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina." An acrimonious exchange has been going on for some months between Zagreb and the Council over Croatia's record on human rights and media policy. Meanwhile, a Novi list reported on 2 July that Croatian TV (HTV) suddenly dropped a popular late-evening news program. No reason was given, but the authorities later said it would be merged with another news program as part of summer schedule changes. HTV is tightly controlled by the governing party, but the banned program had managed to provide some coverage of stories the authorities would rather not publicize. - Patrick Moore

Polish TV pulls independent political programming

• According to a decree issued on 9 August by Ryszard Miazek, president of Polish TV (TVP), political programs produced by independent studios will no longer be aired on TVP, Polish dailies reported 13-14 August. While Miazek explained that the decree is intended to prevent "professional TVP journalists from being pushed off the air" by independent studios, the Polish media is full of charges that the decree is a form of censorship directed at independent and frequently critical political programs. There have been frequent rumors that the decree was the result of political pressure applied to Miazek by his colleagues in the Polish Peasants' Party, one of the members of Poland's coalition government and a target of frequent criticism by the independent media. - Ben Slay OMRI

Bulgarians cite bias in state news coverage

• According to a poll published in Standart on 16 August, the vast majority of Bulgarians living in Sofia and Plovdiv receive information on domestic affairs from the state media. Some 74% of respondents said state TV was their main source of information on events in Bulgaria and another 10% said state radio. Only 9% get their information from newspapers and 3% from private radio stations. At the same time, 56% of respondents said the news coverage and commentary of the state media is politically biased. - Stefan Krause OMRI

Lithuanian Seimas passes mass media law

• The Seimas on 2 July adopted the much-discussed mass media law, BNS reported. Until January 2002, state-owned Lithuanian Radio and TV is to be financed by budget allocations, subscription payments, sales of its programs, sponsorship, charity funds, and advertising revenues. The law establishes a National Radio and TV Board, which will appoint the LRTV director-general and approve programming. The Seimas also ratified the Lithuanian-Polish treaty on their common border. - Saulius Girnius OMRI

Controversy surrounds Romanian news agency

• A group of employees of the Information and Synthesis Center of the RADOR news agency, which is part of the Romanian Radio Company, on 7 August protested the dismissal of their editor in chief and his replacement by a former activist of the Communist Party's Central Committee. Its protest letter, says that Mihai Andrei, the dismissed editor in chief, set up the center six years ago and implemented stringent standards for unbiased, non-discriminatory reporting and prompt delivery of information. The center monitors broadcasts in Romania and foreign broadcasts in the Romanian language, supplying information bulletins to government and non-governmental organizations, political parties, and news agencies. The signatories say Andrei's dismissal will endanger independence and emphasize that this bodes ill on the eve of elections. - Michael Shafir OMRI

NGO Snapshot

• The REC's NGO Needs Assessment Project, which was launched earlier this year, is now in full swing. So far, 71 personal interviews have been conducted with leaders of environmental NGOs from 9 different CEE countries and nearly two-thirds of the approximately 3000 mail questionnaires have been returned from NGOs in 15 CEE countries. REC staff are currently analyzing the answers to develop a composite image of NGOs in the region.

  This one-year project aims to determine the problems and needs of CEE environmental NGOs and the impact of REC programs. This information will be used to help REC find ways to improve services to NGOs. A final report, which should be ready by the beginning of next year, will show the results for the region as a whole, for subregions such as the Balkans and the Baltics, and for each country.

Ohrid lake

• The World Bank has given responsibility to REC Local Offices in Albania and Macedonia for the administration of the NGO component of the project on the "Management of Ohrid Lake." This component consist of raising the public awareness of local people as to the value of Ohrid Lake in addition to supporting other steps of the project. The Local Offices are working in cooperation to coordinate the activities - considering the lake as one ecosystem. The Local Office Albania has evaluated the activities proposed by NGOs around the lake and have awarded a total of nearly 7,000 USD.

EMTC

• This summer, the EMTC Network has been extremely busy with its international training-of-trainers (ToT) activities. Not one, but two important ToTs have been successfully completed, both within the Danube Environmental Programme. At the beginning of June, 27 participants from nine Central and Eastern European countries attended the "Management Training for Municipal Water Authorities," funded by the GEF/UNDP, and organized in collaboration with the Universities of England Consortium for International Activities.

  The second notable training course, organized together with the project team of Environmental Development Consultants Ltd. "Training on EU Environmental Policy, Standards and Regulations," funded by the European Commission Phare Programme, has trained 11 trainers coming from Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, and Slovenia on June 24-28 in Hungary, with further 15 trainers from Bulgaria, Moldova, Romania, and Ukraine to be trained in Romania at the beginning of July.

  Both training courses took place in the new REC Conference Center in Szentendre, Hungary. All freshly trained trainers will work with the respective EMTC Network member institutions on delivering the national training courses.

Need a little space

• In a continued effort to improve access to environmental information for local users in the Central and Eastern European countries and to promote the exchange of information and cooperation among NGOs and other REC constituents, the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe now provides Webspace/Distribution space for mounting environmental resources relevant to Central and Eastern Europe, allowing real-time Web/FTP/Gopher/LISTSERV updates.

  This offer is available only to nongovernmental organizations from the Central and Eastern European Region.

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  To see a list of the Environmental Resources already available at the REC's Web server, check our home page at: http://www.rec.org/