The World Press Freedom Committee, a group with a large U.S. newspaper membership founded in 1976 to challenge a proposal in UNESCO to create a “New World Information and Communication Order,” has merged with the much-bigger human rights organization Freedom House, the WPFC announced Friday.
“Having served as WPFC chairman since 2006, I am convinced that the new whole will be even greater than the sum of the parts,” Dick Winfield said in the announcement. “With the merger, all the key programs of our committee continue under the fine auspices of Freedom House.”
Rony Koven, the committee's long-time European representative, and Javier Sierra will operate in a new unit, the World Press Freedom Committee of Freedom House that will be overseen by its director of advocacy, Paula Schriefer.
“Among our new combined initiatives is a major international conference we are organizing in Stockholm in October 2010,” Winfield said. “There we will bring together the leading independent exile media from the world's most repressive regimes. The list of conference sponsors includes Google, UNESCO, Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, and the Open Society Institute.”
The 70-year-old Freedom House is a non-partisan, non-governmental organization with a budget of $20 million.
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