Mongolia celebrated World Press Freedom Day. Mongolia organized several events to celebrate World Press Freedom Day, a global observance marked annually on May 3 to raise awareness of the importance of the freedom of the press and to celebrate the fundamental principles of press freedom. The Mongolian Journalists’ Union held the very first Mongolian Forum on Digital Journalism two days prior to World Press Freedom Day and Globe International Center, a Mongolian NGO, organized the “Freedom Expression is a Human Right” round table discussion.

To celebrate World Press Freedom Day, journalists all around the world unite to call for press freedom and freedom of expression on this special day. This year’s World Press Freedom Day in Mongolia was focused on raising the most pressing issues facing Mongolian journalists and advocating for securing a free and open Internet in connection with the fifth Freedom Online Conference to take place in Ulaanbaatar. In addition, it’s likely for Mongolia to adopt a new law on press freedom as the Government of Mongolia has initiated a brand new draft bill on media freedom and another draft for the Broadcast Law.

Press and media communities in Mongolia are looking at the bills optimistically since many positive changes were addressed by the draft bills, including increasing the transparency of media ownership, ensuring editorial independence, adopting new editorial ethics and rules, and establishing a Media Ethnics Council for discussing professional errors.