Skopje, 1 April 2026 – The Agency for Audio and Audiovisual Media Services conducted an ad hoc programme oversight of the Public Broadcaster’s Second Channel, concerning the music programme “Children’s Song Festival – The Nightingales of Korab”, aired on 28 March 2026. The oversight report has been published on the Agency’s website at the following link.
The findings indicate that the performance of the song “Albanian Territories (Trojet Shqiptare)” incites and spreads intolerance on the grounds of national and ethnic affiliation, through irredentist symbols and explicit political messages promoting a mono-ethnic, irredentist legacy calling for territorial unification. The child performing the song was dressed in a T-shirt displaying, on the front, a clear illustration of the so-called “Greater Albania,” encompassing territories of Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia, Kosovo, and Greece—depicting areas inhabited, or historically inhabited, by ethnic Albanians. On the back of the T-shirt, the words “1 GJUHË, 1 KOMB, 1 GJAK” (“One language, one nation, one blood”) were written in Albanian. During the stage performance, the performer and two accompanying dancers repeatedly made the hand gesture of the double-headed eagle. In addition, the song’s lyrics contained messages advocating expansionism and territorial unification of countries and cities in the region, including territories of the Republic of North Macedonia, Kosovo, Albania, and Montenegro.
In conducting the oversight, the Agency applied the criteria set out in the Guidelines for Monitoring Hate Speech, the standards of the European Convention on Human Rights, and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (notably Roj TV v. Denmark and Zana v. Turkey). It was established that restricting this type of expression is prescribed by law, pursues a legitimate aim (protection of national security, public order, and the rights of others), and is necessary in a democratic society.
Broadcasting such content within a programme intended for the youngest audiences constitutes an attempt at indoctrination with ideas are fundamentally at odds with the principles of coexistence and tolerance in a multiethnic society. Moreover, conveying such messages through children represents a serious misuse of minors for political purposes.
The fact that the disputed content and messages passed through MRT2’s editorial filter without being removed points to a serious and systemic failure in programme planning and content structuring.
The Agency recalls that the Public Broadcaster bears a particular responsibility to prevent the misuse of its programming for the promotion of ideas that undermine the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the state, or that incite cultural, ethnic, religious, gender-based, racial, national, or other forms of intolerance. It also reiterates that MRT is obliged to ensure full protection of minors in its programmes.