COUNCIL OF EUROPE RAPPORTEURS TO MEET CRO MEDIA REPS ON FRIDAY

ZAGREB, Nov 11 (Hina) - Two Council of Europe Monitoring Committee rapporteurs on a three-day visit to Croatia will meet representatives of Croatian media most probably on Friday. The meeting was initially scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, but only two Croatian media representatives showed up, Oliver Drazic from Forum 21, an organisation of independent electric media journalists, and Gorana Jursko from "Vjesnik" daily. We would like to meet the representatives of Croatian media, said one of the two rapporteurs, Jerzy Jaskierni. The scheduled meeting on the issue of media freedom and pluralism is one of the key elements of the Council of Europe rapporteurs' visit programme, he added. On November 5 Croatian news agencies were invited by fax to choose their representatives for the meeting. The Croatian parliament's Committee for Interparliamentary Cooperation subsequently checked the names of the participants by phone, and notified the media participants about the re-scheduled meeting, committee secretary Lavoslav Torti told Hina on Wednesday. The Council of Europe rapporteurs were surprised that many journalists showed up to cover today's meeting, but only the representatives of Forum 21 and "Vjesnik" out of the 22 expected were there to hold talks. According to Torti some interpreted the meeting as related to the media issue, while the rest assumed they were supposed to send their reporters to cover the meeting. (hina) ha jn