HATE SPEECH ON TELEVISION: Screens of Dangerous Narratives

This and previous year, the Agency for Audiovisual Media Services (AMU) has imposed four fines of €500 each, along with several issued warnings on television broadcasters in Montenegro on the accounts of hate speech. In addition to Pink, Adria and Prva TV, dangerous narratives were also spread by the national public broadcaster Radio and Television of Montenegro (RTCG) and Podgorica’s municipal public channel.

According to data obtained by the Center for Investigative Journalism of Montenegro (CIN-CG) from the Agency for Audiovisual Media Services (AMU), hate speech is spilling over from social media into the programmes of broadcasters with national coverage. This is reflected in the growing number of penalties issued by the regulator for discriminatory and offensive speech.

MONTENEGRINS, CROATS, TURKS… ALL TARGETED

In February this year, the AMU Council decided to temporarily restrict the reception and rebroadcasting of the TV Pink programme Novo jutro – Jutro sa dušom (New Morning – A Soulful Morning), hosted by Jovana Jeremić and Predrag Sarapa, both known as vocal supporters of the Aleksandar Vučić regime. The sanctioned channel is part of Serbia’s Pink Media Group, owned by businessman Željko Mitrović.

The measure was imposed for six months due to a breach of Article 7(1) of the European Convention on Transfrontier Television, which requires programme content to respect human dignity and the fundamental rights of others. Instead of a “soulful morning,” Jeremić’s show featured hate speech directed at members of the Montenegrin nation, as well as Croatian citizens and citizens of Turkey.

Croats were labelled as Ustaše, Turks were called new occupiers, and Montenegrins were claimed to be “mutated Serbs,” or hybrids of sorts, who had embarked on a pro-Ustaša path, but that would soon become part of Serbia.

“AVNOJ-era Montenegro will not exist much longer, and I can say that almost with certainty. Borders will change, Serbia will once again have access to the sea, and that is what frightens Brussels,” reads one of the quotations cited in the AMU decision.

The problem is not limited to Pink, which has a long tradition of spreading hateful narratives. Media outlets funded by Montenegrin citizens, the public broadcaster RTCG and Podgorica’s municipal broadcaster, have also promoted dangerous and problematic narratives.

“Data from recent years point to a worrying trend. In 2025, AMU issued six warnings for discriminatory and offensive speech, as well as three fines of €500 each. By comparison, in 2024 only one warning was issued on those grounds, out of a total of 107, while no fines were imposed,” the Agency told CIN-CG.

That the trend continues in a negative direction is also shown by the fact that in the first three months of 2026 alone, one fine has already been issued for repeat violations.

“It should be borne in mind that a fine is imposed when a broadcaster, despite having already received a warning, commits the same violation again within a period shorter than six months. The number of fines therefore indicates that certain broadcasters are knowingly neglecting or failing to take measures to prevent the airing of problematic content,” AMU said.

At the end of February, the Agency fined Adria TV €500 for repeated violations of the ban on inciting discrimination and for failing to disclose the source of rebroadcast material. The penalty related to the rebroadcast of a New Year’s programme from Informer TV in Belgrade.

The programme glorified the Chetnik movement and denied Montenegrin identity. Lyrics of traditional and original songs were altered to portray Montenegro as “Serbian,” statements such as “This is not Montenegro, but Serbia by the sea” and “every Serb is a Serb” were broadcast, and the names of convicted war criminals were chanted and sung as if they were heroes, according to the AMU ruling.

During 2025, fines and warnings were imposed on Prva TV and Adria TV, while warnings were also issued to RTCG, TDI Radio and Gradska TV.

“The content subject to sanctions most often involved views and labels that could be considered discriminatory towards certain groups, including ethnic, national, political, migrant, minority and other vulnerable communities. In such cases, group affiliation or an actual or presumed personal characteristic is often emphasised as a basis for discrimination, through prejudice, targeting or promoting restrictions on the rights of those groups. In some cases, historical events or crimes were relativised, facts selectively presented without relevant sources, and terminology used that may provoke discrimination and deepen social divisions,” the Agency explained.

FINES FOR ADRIA TV AND PRVA TV

Before being fined, Adria TV and Prva TV had already ignored two AMU warnings, as they had allowed or editorially shaped content that incited discrimination, spread stereotypes or favoured narratives portraying certain social groups negatively.

Prva TV earned its first €500 fine over a morning programme discussing reactions to the erection of a monument to Chetnik commander and war criminal Pavle Đurišić, as well as an initiative to relocate the monument to Duke Mirko Petrović. Viewers heard messages justifying the monument to Đurišić on the grounds that it was “on private property and financed with private money,” along with dangerous comments from viewers claiming that “Montenegrins and Serbs were not slaughtered by Turks, but by Bosniaks.”

AMU also reacted to the station’s reporting on chauvinistic incidents in Podgorica involving Turkish citizens. In the programme 60 minuta (60 Minutes), statements were made such as “an attack by Turks on a young man from Podgorica,” along with questions like “what are we going to do with thousands of Turkish citizens, many of whom are offenders?”

Prva TV also came under AMU scrutiny on 25 June last year when it rebroadcast a programme titled Specijalna emisija (Special Show), co-produced by pro-government Serbian broadcasters. Participants included Gordana Uzelac (TV Pink), Dragan Vučićević (TV Informer), Milomir Marić (TV Happy), Ivana Vučićević (Studio B), businessman Branko Babić, Professor Lazar Stijak of the Belgrade Medical Faculty, Oliver Jakšić (TV B92), and convicted war criminal Vojislav Šešelj.

The programme featured a number of claims directly denying the genocide in Srebrenica, including assertions that unrest planned in Serbia from 28 June to 11 July, around the anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre, was intended to “brand Serbs as a genocidal people,” even though “there was no genocide.” According to the Agency, it also allowed statements that incited violence, emphasised group identity in a discriminatory manner, and violated the privacy and dignity of citizens.

Adria TV was also fined over the documentary Srebrenica, anatomija obmane (Srebrenica, Anatomy of Deception). The Agency found that the programme presented a selective account of events during the Srebrenica genocide. While it did not directly deny the genocide, the overall tone and narrative suggested that the violence could be viewed as “a consequence of earlier injustices.” AMU warned that such an approach could deepen social divisions and legitimise discriminatory attitudes in the public sphere.

Before being fined, Adria TV had also received warnings over the programmes Zorom (At Dawn) and Press Plus, in which lawyer Miomir Joksimović and civil activist Zarija Pavićević expressed views inciting hostility and discrimination towards foreign nationals and certain ethnic and religious groups.

The programmes aired claims about the alleged creation of closed foreign communities. Joksimović warned that in some neighbourhoods “Sharia law could be introduced in 15 years,” while Pavićević advocated stricter controls on foreigners, saying “you can tell where someone is from,” and that police should carry out random street checks of legal status. Calls were also made for “the number of foreigners in Montenegro to be cut by at least half,” urging citizens to “continue the struggle and protect themselves and their property.”

WARNINGS

AMU issued a warning to TDI Radio over jokes targeting Roma people and persons with disabilities. The disputed content aired in the entertainment programme Antidepresiv (Antidepressant) in April 2025. Through jokes and humorous sketches, certain social groups were stereotyped and insulted, including people with disabilities and members of the Roma community.

After reviewing the recording, the Agency concluded that the content had been editorially selected and broadcast as part of an April Fools’ Day programme. Although the broadcaster argued it was humour and included disclaimers that there was no intention to offend, the Agency found that such a format does not remove responsibility when content crosses the boundaries of permissible satire and may reinforce discriminatory stereotypes.

Podgorica’s local public broadcaster Gradska TV also received a warning over remarks made by Srpska 24 editor Ivan Milošević during the programme Presing. He said he believed “it is somewhat inappropriate that in a country where 74 per cent of the population is Orthodox, foreign policy is led by a representative of a national minority,” referring to Foreign Minister Ervin Ibrahimović. The Agency concluded that such remarks stigmatised members of a national minority by suggesting it was inappropriate for someone from that community to hold an important public office.

Gradska TV repeated the programme later the same day, thereby failing to prevent the further spread of the unlawful speech, AMU found. The regulator also questioned the choice of guest for a local public broadcaster, given Milošević’s previous statements. He had earlier drawn public attention with a withdrawn column titled Koncert za Nermina: Islamizacija Podgorice?  (Concert for Nermin: Islamisation of Podgorica?), published on the Borba portal, in which he wrote that Nermin Abdić, then a candidate for mayor of Podgorica and an MP from the Democratic Party of Socialists, “belongs to a religious and national minority and can hardly unite under his wing what Podgorica was, and still is. This city is, after all, a settlement of Orthodox inhabitants and their tradition…”

The national public broadcaster RTCG also received a warning. It concerned the broadcast of the second and third episodes of the documentary series Vraneš –  Zemlja i ljudi (Vraneš – Land and People) on the First Channel on 6 and 13 January 2025. The Agency concluded that the programmes promoted discriminatory conduct.

Its analysis found that documentary ethics requiring credibility, accuracy and integrity had not been respected. Historical facts were selectively and imprecisely presented without relevant sources, crimes were relativised, and terminology was used that could provoke discrimination and deepen divisions.

This applied particularly to the portrayal of the timing and causes of population migrations in the area, especially the departure of the Muslim population at the end of and after 1924 from the Tomaševo (then Šahovići) and Pavino Polje areas.

“Given that the mass killing of several hundred Muslim residents in early December 1924 was the main cause of the subsequent mass exodus, the broadcaster unjustifiably, inaccurately and inappropriately referred to the consequence of that event merely as ‘migration’, while on several occasions using relativising terms such as ‘dramatic events’ and ‘tragic events’ without mentioning the key historical context — that the displacement was the result of a horrific crime involving mass murder,” the AMU ruling states.

AMU told CIN-CG that “content contributing to the creation or spread of negative perceptions and discriminatory attitudes towards different groups cannot be protected as a form of freedom of expression, because it constitutes an abuse of that freedom. In such cases, sanctions are a mechanism for protecting the rights of others and the public interest.”

Author: Predrag Nikolić

The article has been originally published on Center for Investigative Journalism Montenegro’s website. It has been translated and published here with permission.