Despite continuing tensions between the communities, the freedom of information is steadily improving, especially in the Croatian-Bosniak area.

Despite continuing tensions between the communities, the freedom of information is steadily improving, especially in the Croatian-Bosniak area.

Under the leadership of the office of the UN High Representative, Wolfgang Petritsch, in 2001 the international administration continued to restructure the audiovisual media sector. It began by disengaging monitoring and regulatory structures from the media and increasing the responsibility of local players. On 2 March it created a new "Communications Regulation Agency" (CRA) that combines the powers previously exercised by the Independent Media Commission, created in 1998 to act in news matters, and by the Telecommunications Regulatory Agency. Responsibility of each of the sectors, including the media, is given to a domestic expert. The office in charge of monitoring the implementation of decisions is composed of seven members, including only three international officials. The information campaign of the past several years issued as a supplement to the local media on topics dealing with the implementation of the Dayton peace agreement, the return of refugees, respect for individual freedom and the democratic functioning of institutions has continued given the very slow progress in these different fields. In October the Bosnian and Croatian media carried out an unprecedented rapprochement despite the tensions between the two communities in the west of the country. On 22 October the Bosniak (BH Press) and Croatian (Habena) press agencies merged into a new agency, Fena. At the end of the month, FTV, a new public-service television network of the Croatian-Bosniak Federation, was created with the approval of the Bosnian and Croatian authorities and in agreement with the UN High Representative. In particular its mission is to ensure true representation for all citizens of the Federation. The Bosniak government is offering technical aid to the network.

A journalist attacked

On 5 May 2001 an unidentified journalist was wounded during a violent demonstration of Bosnian Serbs protesting the rebuilding of a mosque destroyed during the war in the predominantly Serbian city of Trebinje in the southern part of the Serb Republic of Bosnia. The confrontations caused several injuries. The local Serb authorities approved the rebuilding. On 7 May fresh violence broke out during a similar ceremony for rebuilding a mosque in Banja Luka in the north of the Serb Republic of Bosnia.

A journalist threatened

On 10 March 2001 a bomb destroyed the car of Rezak Fukanovic, a Bosniak journalist and owner of the television network 101 in Prijedor, in the north-west of the Serb Republic of Bosnia. An investigation was opened.

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