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SKOPJE- 07.09.2010– The Broadcasting Council (BC) will request from all broadcasters to provide BC in a timely manner with information if they broadcast sport or other type of programs with exclusive rights for Republic of Macedonia,

so BC would prevent any illegal broadcasts of the same programs by the operators of public communication networks (cable, IPTV, DVB-T,DVB-S) by re-transmission of foreign channels.

During today’s session, BC noted the rebranding of the Hallmark Channel in Universal and the adult channel, XXX in Darling.

BC also registered 19 program packages of operators of public communication networks.

SKOPJE, 10.08.2010 – The Broadcasting Council (BC) called upon all television stations in Republic of Macedonia to protect the authors’ and related rights of the broadcast content, no matter if it is of national or foreign production, after the reaction from the “Vardar Film” Film Centre, in regard to certain unauthorized broadcasts of its movies on some TV channels.

Prior to every broadcast of a movie from “Vardar Film” production, the TV stations must sign a contract with “Vardar Film”, which will allow TV broadcast, because this production house has no long term broadcasting contracts any broadcasting enterprise in Macedonia.

„The Broadcasting Council will continue its intensive monitoring both on the operators of public communication networks and on the broadcasters focused on the adherence to the legal provisions for protection of the authors’ and related rights. Every infringement of the authors’ and related rights brings moral, civil and criminal responsibility“ – said BC President, Zoran Stefanoski.

During the past four months BC initiated about 30 misdemeanor and criminal procedures against legal entities that had violated the legal provisions for protection of the author’s and related rights. In the fight against piracy the Broadcasting Council collaborates with all relevant institutions, as the governmental Coordinative Body for Intellectual Property Protection, the State Market Inspectorate, the Ministry of Interior and the Agency for Intellectual Property Protection.

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<strong>СКОПЈЕ, 23 јули 2010</strong> – Советот за радиодифузија заради поефикасна заштита на авторските и сродните права, а за поголема транспарентност на програмите што се дозволени за реемитување на операторите на јавните комуникациски мрежи<!–more–>

(оператори на кабелска телевизија, оператори на дигитална земска телевизија, IPTV…), на веб страницата ги објави регистрираните пакети за кои операторите ги имаат уредено авторските права.

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<div>Советот за радиодифузија интензивно работи на санкционирање на оние оператори кои нелегално реемитуваат програмски содржини, за што имаше поплаки од многу граѓани, а реагираа и медиумски компании, чиишто канали незаконски се пренесуваа во Македонија.</div>
<div>СРД заедно со Државниот пазарен инспекторат, Координативното тело за интелектуална сопственост, Министерството за култура, Министерството за внатрешни работи и Јавното обвинителство,  засилено ќе ги мониторира програмските понуди на операторите, а можноста за нивно менување ќе биде условена со регулирани авторски и сродни права со домашните и странските радиодифузери.</div>
<div>Операторите на јавни комуникациски мрежи не смеат да го менуваат програмскиот пакет (да додаваат или  исклучуваат програмски сервиси) без претходно добиено одобрение на Советот. СРД го задржува правото по службена должност да повлече од пакетот програмски сервис, поради истечени права за негово реемитување, раскин на договор за реемитување или други правно оправдани причини.</div>
<div>Ваквиот пристап на Советот за радиодифузија ја афирмира Република Македонија како правна држава во која ќе бидат заштитени домашните и странските медиуми од нелегално реемитување. Заштитени ќе бидат и граѓаните, кои ќе имаат правна сигурност при стапувањето во договорен претплатнички однос со операторите.</div>

SKOPJE – 30.06.2010 – During today’s meeting, hosted by the Broadcasting Council (BC), representatives from BC, Agency for Electronic Communications, Ministry of Interior, Public Prosecutor’s Office, Agency for Protection of Intellectual Property and Coordination Body for Protection of Intellectual Property set a deadline to the telecom operators until 7 July 2010

to deliver a list of television program services with regulated author’s and related rights for re-transmission on the Macedonian market, no matter if there are analogue or digitally delivered through their public communication networks. (Cable, IPTV or DVB-T)

”The Broadcasting Council will stay on its position of having zero tolerance for illegal re-transmission of audio-visual content also in the future. Our monitoring action of TV programs, which are re-transmitted by the telecom operators, continues and we will severely penalize the offenders by initiating misdemeanor and criminal charges.”- said the president of the Council, Zoran Stefanoski, adding: “Today’s meeting is a proof that the most significant institutions for protection of author’s and related rights have shown willingness for cooperation and the results are already obvious in the field. I expect even bigger success in future.”

The Broadcasting Council in the shortest possible period will inspect the lists of television program services delivered by the operators and will publish them on its web site in order to make them visible and accessible to the whole public. In this way the opportunity for re-transmission of TV services, which have not been registered by BC, will be set to a minimum.

In this way BC shapes an environment for healthy competition for the telecom operators and creates a solid ground for them to adhere to the legal provisions, which regulate the media market. An added value is that BC is also making efforts to protect the subscribers from unpredicted turning on and off of unregistered TV channels.

SKOPJE, 25.06.2010 – Ten misdemeanor and four criminal charges will be initiated against cable operators, which violate the Broadcasting Law. This decision was adopted during the last session of the Broadcasting Council after a conducted monitoring of the programs that are re-transmitted by cable operators within their analogue and digital packages outside of the capital city.

“The misdemeanor procedures mostly refer on re-transmission of programs with no regulated author’s rights; some operators are going so far, that offer whole program packages that have not been registered by the Broadcasting Council. As a regulation authority, we will not tolerate this kind of illegal activities.” – said the President of the Council, Zoran Stefanoski.

Through initiating criminal charges the Council penalized those cable operators, which illegally broadcast the World Football Championship by retransmission of foreign TV channels. The members of the Council reminded the operators that only the Public Broadcasting Service – Macedonian Radio and Television has exclusive rights for re-broadcast of the World Football Championship.

The Broadcasting Council continues with the intensive monitoring of the public communication networks as well in Skopje as in the rest of the country.

SKOPJE, 11.06.2010 – During today’s session the Broadcasting Council (BC) decided to order an immediate switch off of all TV services, whose author’s and related rights are not regulated and yet are re-transmitted by 11 cable operators. BC decided to initiate misdemeanor and criminal procedures against those cable operators, which have violated the previous instructions for switching off of the illegally re-transmitted TV services.

BC initiated criminal charges against the following operators: BTV- Bitola (MiksNet), Kale 2001 DOOEL Kicevo, Pela Digital 2008 DOOEL Struga, Robi-Mobi Bitola, TELNET KOM DOO Tetovo.

The Broadcasting Council calls on adherence to the exclusive rights of the Macedonian Radio-television (MRT) for re-broadcasting of the World Football Championship: “We call on the operators of public communication networks – which is in the interest of adherence to MRT’s exclusive rights for re-broadcast of the matches from the World Football Championship in South Africa, both live broadcasts and re-runs – during the period between 11th of June and 11th of July 2010, to  scramble the foreign TV channels in their program packages at the time when the matches from the World Football Championship are live broadcast or re-run.”-  said BC President, Zoran Stefanoski.

Also, the Broadcasting Council reminded the 35 cable operators who have no longer contracts for re-transmission of the television program services of RTV –  Pink (Pink Plus, Pink Music and Pink Folk), to exclude these TV services from their respective program packages.

BC will penalize every violation of the legal acts, committed by the broadcasters and operators of public communication networks, in accordance with the Broadcasting Law and other laws that regulate this matter.

SKOPJE 27.05.2010 – Due to unregulated author’s and related rights, the Broadcasting Council on today’s session requested the operator of digital terrestrial network Digiplus Multimedia, to exclude the TV services of the national televisions: Kanal5, Kanal5 Plus, Sitel, Sitel3 and Alsat-M  from the program packet BoomTV.

„The Broadcasting Council will continue to facilitate the negotiations between the operator of digital terrestrial network and the broadcasters, with an aim to resolve the dispute.  I sincerely hope that both sides will overcome the dispute as soon as possible, because it is in a joint interest and in an interest of the digital TV audience.”- said the President of the Broadcasting Council, Mr. Zoran Stefanoski after the session of the Council