Georgi Lozanov

Council on Electronic Media (CEM) member and interim head Mariya Stoyanova has been elected permanent chairperson of the Bulgarian broadcast media watchdog after a vote of the council members.

Two members of the Council for Electronic Media (CEM), the broadcast media watchdog of Bulgaria, have been elected by Parliament, local media report.

No debates have been held prior to the election.

The two members, Sofiya Vladimirova and Rozita Mihaylova-Elenova, were proposed by the biggest party GERB and the Bulgarian Democratic Center (BDC) respectively.

Mariya Stoyanova, a member of the Council of Electronic Media (CEM), will be the Bulgarian regulator's chair ad interim, the council has decided.

Stoyanova will replace Georgi Lozanov, who resigned in February, a month before his term of office expired, saying he did not want to be involved in the licensing of a TV station.

Bulgaria's broadcast media regulator CEM has delayed until next week its meeting on the resignation request submitted by its chairman Georgi Lozanov, Nova TV station reported on Tuesday.

The meeting has been postponed because not all members of the Council for Electronic Media (CEM) were able to attend it, Nova said.

The Council for Electronic Media, which regulates TV and radio stations in Bulgaria, will consider the resignation submitted by its head Georgi Lozanov in February.

Lozanov announced he was stepping down as both board member and chairperson.

Georgi Lozanov, the chairperson of Bulgaria's media watchdog, the Council for Electronic Media (SEM), resigned on Thursday.

Lozanov resigned as both member of the council and its chairperson in order to avoid participation in the voting on the registration of the controversial PIK television.

Developments at TV7, where a bailiff accompanied by dozens of police officers tried to switch the station off air, are dominating other Bulgarian media outlets on Thursday.

What just happened in a nutshell:

Contemporary art will be abundant in the program of the Berlin ''Days of Bulgarian Culture - New European Accents'' to be held on February 7 and 8. Focus will be put on civil causes, humanitarian initiatives, and various causes for social tension.

GERB, the biggest partner in Bulgaria's minority coalition government, on Thursday urged print media publishers to draft anti-defamation legislation.

To avoid potential charges of promoting media censorship, Krasimir Velchev, deputy chairman of centre-right GERB, said he was prepared to initiate a series of meetings with the two unions of Bulgarian publishers to discuss the idea.