MIL-OSI Europe: Written question – Questions surrounding the real role played by Internews, a partner of the EU and the Commission – P-000796/2025

Priority question for written answer  P-000796/2025
to the Commission
Rule 144
Mathilde Androuët (PfE)

The aim of Internews, an NGO, is to train and support journalists and ‘independent media’ and to promote ‘human rights’ and ‘access to trustworthy information’ all over the world[1]. Internews maintains close partnerships with the EU and the Commission[2] under financial framework partnership agreements and specific projects such as AGILE[3].

WikiLeaks has revealed that 87 % of Internews’ funding over the past 17 years came from the United States Agency for International Development, including during Donald Trump’s first term of office, and later from the State Department and controversial organisations such as the Open Society Foundations. This financial dependence raises concerns about the editorial independence of Internews.

The President and CEO of Internews, who has close links to the foreign policy of the US administration[4], has also been criticised for her support for global advertising ‘exclusion lists’, which could lead to subjective and unjustified censorship of certain online content[5].

On the basis of the information available to the Commission before it entered into its partnership with Internews, what is the Commission’s assessment of the proximity of this NGO to the US Government and of the fact that significant funds have apparently been channelled through Internews to support censorship and media-monitoring initiatives?

Submitted: 20.2.2025

• [1] https://internews.org/
• [2] ‘InfoPoint conference: Supporting independent media through global partnerships’, European Commission, https://international-partnerships.ec.europa.eu/news-and-events/events/infopoint-conference-supporting-independent-media-through-global-partnerships-2024-12-05_en
• [3] ‘Supporting Independent Media Through Global Partnerships: A post-event statement from Internews and its FFPA consortium partners’, Internews, https://internews.org/supporting-independent-media-through-global-partnerships-a-post-event-statement-from-internews-and-its-ffpa-consortium-partners/
• [4] https://skoll.org/attendee/jeanne-bourgault/
• [5] ‘WikiLeaks reveals US spent $472.6M to promote covert censorship, media control through NGO’, Yasin Gungor, Anadolu Agency, 9 February 2025.