On 9th and 10th June 2026, Media Defence brought together lawyers from across Europe for its latest Litigation Surgery, held in Budapest, Hungary.
The two-day event drew eight participants from five countries, including lawyers from partner organisations HCLU, HRP, and MLSA. The cohort from Bulgaria, Hungary, North Macedonia, Turkey, and Ukraine reflected the breadth of the legal challenges facing journalists across the region, from EU member states grappling with digital regulation to countries where press freedom is under acute pressure.
Litigation Surgeries are a core part of Media Defence’s work to strengthen the capacity of lawyers defending journalists and independent media. They are an opportunity for practitioners working in very different legal contexts to think through difficult cases together, stress-test arguments, and learn from each other’s experience.
What We Covered
The first day focused on some of the most prevalent legal threats to journalism in Europe today. Sessions examined Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs), including how to identify them and what procedural tools exist to counter them, before moving on to discussing hate speech laws and their implications for free expression. The day closed with a session on online speech, covering platform regulation, intermediary liability, anonymity, encryption, and the right to be forgotten.
Day two opened with a presentation on Media Defence’s emergency defence grants scheme, followed by a session focusing on the intersection between data protection and public-interest journalism. This segment was delivered by our partners at the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU) and drew on the team’s direct experience litigating data protection SLAPP cases. The programme concluded with a session on journalist surveillance, examining ECHR case-law and the difficulties of building legal challenges around spyware.
Learning Together
What makes Litigation Surgeries distinctive is the space they create for practitioners to engage with problems collectively. Participants worked through hypothetical case studies together and drew on legislation and lived experience from their own jurisdictions, generating the kind of comparative insight that is difficult to replicate in any other setting.
In answering an anonymous survey shared at the end of the litigation surgery, one participant commented: “I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Media Defence for providing continuous protection and support to journalists and their legal representatives.”
We are grateful to everyone who took part, and to our partners at HCLU for their contribution to the programme.
Learn more about our Litigation Surgeries & Capacity Building programmes here.
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