website d, w dot com. me up next is a dw interview with sarah geraldo, vice president of the european commission. i've told me a logical, myself of the team, thanks with every day campus for us and for our planet. global ideas is on its way to bring you more conservation. how do

we make cities greener? how can we protect animals and their habitat? what to do with all our waste? we can make a difference by choosing reforestation over deforestation recycling over disposable smart new solutions over steam set in our ways or is truly unique. and we know that that uniqueness is what allows us to live and survive. google ideas, the environmental series, global 3000 on d, w, and online with russian souls spreading disinformation across the european union, governments in the youth, spying on journalists, business people, buying newspapers to gain influence media. freedom appears under attack

from outside and within the block. that is why the european commission says it is introducing new legislation to protect free and independent journalism. the european media freedom act. let's talk about that with the era you over the european commission, vice president charge with you values and transparency. thank you for being with us . thank you very much for your interest. madam vice president and media freedom in the european union is a fundamental right. so how can it be that this riot is under threat right now? how did we get there? we saw this trend over 3 years. we have a good day tire by air comparing the there is really a negative trend. political attacks, economic distress, spying journalists, worsening situation for the journalist when it comes to that, a safety,

abusing justice system, i own generalist. so you ask about how it is possible? well, a we very lying a lot on member states, rules and legislation, and at some omen we realized wait a minute. this is funny reference problem. and if we let the threat continue, if the media will be weakened, be on some line. we will not be able to see democracy protected sufficiently. so that's why we are coming with the legally binding rules. and i believe that we had a difficult legislative process maybe, but i'm ready very to push it through because i believe we need it. so you saying that the member states are to blame for the situation? no, i would not formulate that i, i just realized that we have a very even stand down level of protection of

media in our member states that are countries that out a lot of safeguards and i can name germany. that's why i had to get a lot of promises to different german figures and, and politicians, and also the media organizations that we are not going to destroy the systems which work well. but i also try to convince everybody that there are gaps that out there is this trend why we see that the legally binding rules, the media will be the victims of the last funny situation. just look at the platforms and the power see the money which went to the big platforms which weakened the media. economically. look at some states which try to use the political power to influence the editorial content. look at the using the

spyware. again, the journalists, you named at the beginning, the problems we face in the commission says that the media freedom act with hands, media, independence, and transparency. how is it going to do it? exactly. we are focusing on several big thinks of on the basis of the problem identified. so 1st of all, we are warning the member stay the, the political layer. do not interfere. let the journalists do the job, don't use the spyware. don't push them to disclose the sources of information are at the same time where we are alerting. when it comes to public service media. we belief that the right of people to have objective information and neutral kinds of news that we need to see in all the member states. high,

highly professional, public service media, not state media or party media. we see a lot of public money being sent to media through advertising. and we want to see how much and to which media and otherwise we want to see more transparency in how the public money is used. whether you just buy the space or whether you also buy some editorial gratitute and we don't see a lot of for information regarding a transparency of ownership of media. in a recent interview, said the hungry, often criticized before it's handling off media, was an inspiration for the bill. what exactly did you mean by that? well, of course we had to we had in mind several concrete cases. when i was

asked very done simply what we'll the commission do in this house. i was a grill so many times and i had to repeat, well, we do not have any tool in hand. you cannot actually see something happening in hungary or in poland or we had an issue in slovenia. we see some negative trend in many other member states. and are, you know, like you reply and 9 times i cannot do anything. and the time you are not willing to refinish it any more. so the solution is the european law. i will honestly try to convince everybody that this is a good thing. we will have may be difficult. the legislative process for everybody has to admit that the media are not protected enough,

but talking about hungary, well this legislation has immediate effect on hungary, for instance, on media owned by oligarchs close to the government. of course it's going to be used or actively, sorry, i'm a lawyer, so i have to mention that. but this law sets the criteria for which will be used for assessment of concentration of media ownership. and i, i believe that although monopoly against smile which we see in hungary functioning ah, of would not be possible. would not have been possible with such a laws. and critics in hungry are already saying that this proposed legislation is a concealed threat to freedom of speech. so is sir the commission protecting their freedom of media by restricting freedom of speech by restricting opinions that the commission doesn't like. this is a fatal misunderstanding. i don't know if i made

a mistake in communication, but ah, by server saudi. want by this law to increase the protection of the freedom of speech. that's why i also mentioned the platforms that, that a should be special treatment fault. that professional journalists to be able to place that opinions and then use in that digital space. and on i have to repeat that we are not, are elating media themselves, regulating the space for the media. the european parliament this week, sad stat hungry is a systemic threat to e u values as a commissioner in charge of those values. do you believe that governments, like the one in budapest should have a space in the european union? ah, you can imagine the commission shares a lot of times which are in the resolution, which was already in the previous one. we see issues in judiciary system. we

discussed the media drinking space or the civil society. there are thousands of little bigger things which goals some kind of erosion of, of the hungarian democracy. and so this is now the choice for, for hungary to prove that they belong to the club of europe in the countries . while it's my job to have a dialogue on gary or to use the tools which i have as a commissioner to try to convince them through different measures to come back. and in the past week to all been hungry and prime minister already verbally attacked you and demanded you resignation. so are you not afraid of a backlash in hungry and in other countries? for instance, poland because of this legislation. ah, when you enter politics,

you cannot take things personally. i had several other enemies. i realize that that is something on the slogan. it's my slogan. tell me who your enemies are and i will tell you who you are. and i was not happy that mister mom was taking me, but i was happy that love on the lion protected me, that she, she was supporting me. and i think that in general, it is not a good thing that in politics, we do not speak about opponents. mores speak about adversaries or enemies. a thing that should come back to some kind of descent, politics, why we lack this the arguments rather than this offensive. but how does it feel to have in your opinion, a european leader as your enemy? ah, that it sounds cynical if i say i got used to it and i also have

a lot of friends and you grow up in coming in to redeem in the then general slovakia before that i one will went down. so how has this experience impacted you personal view of journalists and media? it's uneasy to combat the time before the illusion and after, because we cannot speak on it about any media in strict lucky or either of us, some newspaper. there was tv, but my father always little telling me, veronica, do not believe any thing. but you read in newspaper. it was very important part of my education and equipment for the rest of my life. to day. my message would be please, people don't believe everything you read. and here comes my fight to get this

information and faking us. and now we have regimes like the one in russia and the commission is saying, you want to restrict foreign propaganda and it's inflammation. but isn't this motion coming too late? you know, we, we have in dna and iraq, we are really protected the freedom of speech. and the media doing the job must be protected. but then we came to the point when we saw that russia to dance put, nick, became just the water weapons, not the media anymore. so if it came late, i think it came in the proper moment. together with enhancing the support of the journalist in ukraine, and we are sending a lot of money to help you. oh so, so they are heroes working that in the battlefield. met and vice president. thank

you very much. thank you very much. ah, what's making the headlines and what's behind them? dw, news africa, the show back. all the issues shape in the continent. life is slowly getting back to normally where on the street to give you enough reports on the insights our correspondence is on the ground reporting from across the continent, all the trend stuff, the mazda to you next on d w. oh. mm hm. did you work as an architect, reco allan or not at all? women in architecture?

why are they so invisible to the larger public? we decided to ask them. this is, what is the poetry, the secret of a house i'm housed about, their struggles and dreams for the responsibility is huge. they have so much to william, shattering the glass ceiling women in architecture. this will just have to be really, really good. start september 30th on d, w. this is seed avenues, africa coming up on the program. confronting colonialism of the queen, elizabeth, stan. we have a report from the hotel in kenya where her rained began. but now that it has ended is there hope for the people seeking compensation.