EPRA Staff
EPRA Chairperson (by interim): Jürgen Brautmeier (DE)
Director, Media
Authority of Northrhine-Westphalia (LfM NRW), Germany
Jürgen
Brautmeier has been appointed as the Chairperson of EPRA by interim on 13 May 2010, further to the resignation of Dunja Mijatovic who took up her new duties as Freedom of Media Representative at the OSCE. Dr. Brautmeier is no newcomer to the EPRA. A founding father of the platform, he had been re-elected as EPRA Senior Vice-Chairperson at the 29th EPRA Meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, on 8 May 2009 for a period of two years.
Jürgen Brautmeier is since 1999 Deputy Director of the Media Authority
of Northrhine-Westphalia (LfM NRW) which he first joined in 1987. After majoring in History and English in Düsseldorf and Cambridge,
he completed his Ph.D. in Düsseldorf about the English occupation in
post WWII Northrhine-Westphalia.
From 1982 to 1987, he was scientific analyst for the CDU group in the North-Rhine
Westphalian Parliament. In parallel to his career within the LfM, he has
been guest lecturer at the Heinrich Heine University of Düsseldorf,
the Lomonossow University of Moskow and the St Petersburg University. He
also participated as an independent expert on behalf of the Council of Europe
to numerous missions dealing with the drafting of broadcasting laws in Central
and Eastern Europe.
At the end of 2006, he was appointed Board member of the Medienrat, the
regulatory authority of the German-speaking Community of Belgium, and became
its Deputy Chairperson in July 2007. On 26 March 2010, he was elected as the new Director of the North Rhine-Westphalian regulator ; he will take up his new position as of 1st September 2010.
Further to the EPRA Statutes, the Chairperson chairs the meetings and represents the EPRA in its external relations. He/she is also responsible for the agenda and the minutes of the meetings.
EPRA Vice-Chairperson: Mónica Ariño (GB)
Monica Ariño joined Ofcom’s international team in January 2006. She has worked as a policy advisor in the areas of European content regulation, convergence, and consumer issues, project managing the negotiations of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive and the consumer aspects of the Review of the Electronic Communications Framework. From January 2008 she is responsible for the coordination of the international team’s activities internally and externally, including the engagement with key European institutions. She also plays a liaison role with the academic community in the UK and abroad. Monica graduated in law at the Autónoma University (Madrid) and in 2005 obtained a PhD in law from the European University Institute (Florence). She has published widely and has been a visiting scholar at the Universities of Columbia and Oxford. Prior to joining Ofcom, Monica was a lecturer at Central European University (Budapest).
Director, Conseil Supérieur de l'audiovisuel (CSA) of the French Community of Belgium
Jean-François
Furnémont was re-elected as EPRA Vice-Chairperson at the 29th EPRA
Meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, on 8 May 2009. He has been active in the EPRA Board since 15 May 2008.
Jean-François
Furnémont qualified in Journalism Studies at the Université Libre
de Bruxelles (ULB) and in International Relations and European policy
at the Université de Liège (ULG). Former freelance journalist, he is the
author of numerous political biographies (Jean Gol, François Perin, Guy
Spitaels). He was also spokesperson of the Parti réformateur libéral.
Former manager of the public service broadcaster of the French-speaking
Community of Belgium (RTBF) and of its advertising unit (RMB), he joined
the Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel in 2000, of which he is Director
General since 2003. He is also member of the Editorial Committee of the
legal magazine "Auteurs & Médias". For a more detailed biography, see: http://www.csa.be/membres/show/3.
EPRA Vice-Chairperson: Sebastiano Sortino (IT)
Commissioner, Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni - AGCOM,
Italy
Sebastiano Sortino was re-elected as EPRA Vice-Chairperson at the 29th EPRA
Meeting in Tallinn, Estonia, on 8 May 2009 for a further period of two years.
Sebastiano Sortino was elected by the Italian Parliament as member (Commissioner)
of the Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni (AGCOM) in
2005, within which he belongs to the Commission for Services and Products.
After reading for the bar at the University of Catania, he specialised
in economics in Italy and abroad. He worked for more than ten years for
the Confindustria (i.e. the leading entrepreneurial organization in Italy)
as the person in charge of the small entreprises sector. He was then in
charge of the relationships between the Ente Nazionale Idrocarburi (Italian
oil national company) and the regions and further public entities during
five years. From January 1997 to Febuary 2005, he was Director general
of the Italian Federation of Newspaper and Periodical Publishers (FIEG),
and represented the FIEG both in the Italian public bodies in charge of
implementing press law and at the international level. He was also member
of the National Council for Economic Affairs and Labour (CNEL).
EPRA
SECRETARIAT
Secretary
to the EPRA
Emmanuelle has been Secretary to the EPRA since 1996 and is currently
working full-time from the new Secretariat's location, hosted by the European Audiovisual Observatory in Strasbourg. She
has been working in parallel as a Project Manager at the European Institute
for the Media (EIM) in Düsseldorf with focus on European media regulation and policies
until 2002 when she started working full time for the EPRA. She studied
media law at the University of Poitiers and did a post-graduate course
in European Studies at the University of Aachen, Germany.
She has written several publications and articles dealing with comparative
broadcasting regulation in Europe and regulatory authorities.