Statements by Jerzy BUZEK, EP President and by Polish, British, Hungarian and Swedish journalists, laureates EP Prize for Journalism 2010, in the European Parliament in Brussels.

Brussels

statement

BUZEK, Jerzy (EPP, PL)

freedom of press and media (T)

EP Prize for Journalism 2010: extracts from the statements by Jerzy BUZEK, EP President and the laureates

SOUNDBITE (English), Nuri KINO, Sveriges Radio Ekot (Sweden), A couple of weeks after we edited our reportages we received several e-mails saying you should contribute to the contest; I would say both of us are really grateful.

SOUNDBITE (English), Nuri KINO, Sveriges Radio Ekot (Sweden), Of course this prize is giving us even more confidence to go on with the investigative journalism.

SOUNDBITE (English), James CLIVE-ATH, in English) , blogger and journalist, UK: "Pretty much every week you'll get somebody referring to the European Court of Human Rights as 'the EU Court'... because people are just fundamentally ignorant about the EU, have 0 knowledge about the EU, and any attempts to educate people about it you hear "ah, it's propaganda, brainwashing people". But it's basically because the EU does lots of small, boring things, which all come together to be very useful, saving all kinds of money... but it's very difficult to prove that!" On the fact that EU legislation is about too much technicalities that people do not really understand.

SOUNDBITE (English), James CLIVE-MATTHEWS, blogger and journalist (United Kingdom), Pretty much every week you'll get somebody referring to the European Court of Human Rights as 'the EU Court'... because people are just fundamentally ignorant about the EU, have 0 knowledge about the EU, and any attempts to educate people about it you hear "ah, it's propaganda, brainwashing people". But it's basically because the EU does lots of small, boring things, which all come together to be very useful, saving all kinds of money... but it's very difficult to prove that!" On the fact that EU legislation is about too much technicalities that people do not really understand.

SOUNDBITE (English), Witold SZABLOWSKI, Polish daily Gazeta (Poland), On his surprise by winning this prize with such a critical article about the EU: as Mr president said, the EU wants journalist to be critical and I was quite surprised to discover it is true.

SOUNDBITE (English), Witold SZABLOWSKI, Polish daily Gazeta (Poland), I can see that European institutions are doing its best, and some times they are far from its best. The problem I wanted to show is about a moment which is far from the best; I wrote about illegal immigrants that are trying to enter Europe from the Turkish and Greek borders; that's a place that is not only far away from the best but also far from European law and standards.

SOUNDBITE (English), Jerzy Karol BUZEK, EP President, Our obligation and responsibility is to take good decisions for our citizens, and we can know if decisions are good or wrong, thanks to independent journalists, objectives ones.