Referral to the European Court of Justice in a case on media law

The Vilnius regional administrative court has granted our request and referred a media law case to the European Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling.

Our team represents a foreign entity that provides media services worldwide at the Vilnius regional administrative court’s case where the Lithuanian Radio and Television Commission issued a decision to oblige re-broadcasters of programming schedules within 12 months of the decision‘s entry into force, to disseminate the programming schedule only in the programming schedule packages which are disseminated for an additional payment.

Upon arguments of our team the Court decided to refer the case to the European Court of Justice with a request for a preliminary ruling in respect of conformity of national legislation (the Law on the provision of information to the public) with the provisions of the Audiovisual media service directive. The expected preliminary ruling will have high importance both for the free movement of services and freedom of speech.