EU NEIGHBOURS east. The 2025 IPI World Congress and Media Innovation Festival, held in Vienna on 23-25 October. The event brought together over 600 journalists, editors, and media leaders from over 100 countries to celebrate independent journalism and exchange ideas on how to continue to defend free media globally.
Under the theme ‘Defending the Future of Free Media’, this year’s World Congress also marks IPI’s milestone 75th anniversary – a chance to reflect on 75 years of defending press freedom, strengthen the resilience and solidarity we need now, and collaborate on a vision for the future of public-interest journalism.
At the opening session, Beate Meinl-Reisinger, Austria’s foreign minister, reflected on the ongoing killing of journalists around the world in the past year and spoke about the need for international cooperation to defend free media. “Freedom of speech is not something we can take for granted,” she said. “We must protect and strengthen it every day, in every country, at every level.”
The second day’s sessions cast a spotlight on press freedom, media innovation and big tech, and AI disruption. For example, the panel ‘Taming Big Tech: Power, platforms and press freedom’ brought together media experts to discuss a toolbox for solutions for regulating tech giants, funding public interest media and to address the relationship between journalism and generative AI.
The International Press Institute (IPI) also honoured seven journalists as World Press Freedom Heroes, including journalists from Georgia and Ukraine.
During the third day, participants discussed environmental reporting, the importance of photojournalism for storytelling, particularly in communicating the human cost of war, and the similarities and differences of the authoritarian playbook in different countries.
The EU-funded Regional Communication Programme EU NEIGHBOURS east has partnered with the International Press Institute (IPI) to bring journalists from Eastern Partner (EaP) countries to the 2025 IPI World Congress and Media Innovation Festival.
The International Press Institute (IPI) is a global network of editors, media executives and leading journalists who share a common dedication to quality, independent journalism.
