Regulations of audiovisual and interactive media are set in The Law on the Provision of Information to the Public (1996) (last edition in 2025), the Law on the National Radio and Television (1996) (last edition in 2024) and The Law on Cinema (2002) (last edited in 2019).
The principal law governing the audiovisual and interactive media is the Law on the Provision of Information to the Public. This Law sets up procedures of collecting, preparing, publishing, and disseminating public information, establishes the rights, obligations and responsibilities of producers, media, journalists, and institutions that regulate their activity, as well as operating principles of Media Support Fund.
The Law on the National Radio and Television (1996) establishes the procedures of governance, operation, funding, reorganisation and liquidation of the Lithuanian National Radio and Television broadcasting company as well as its duties, rights and responsibilities. The article 19 of the law also establishes the principles of LRT financing by fixing its share from certain sources: “amount of funds allocated to the LRT from the state budget each year is 1 per cent of the state budget and municipal budget revenue from personal income tax and 1.3 per cent from excise revenue actually received in the in the year before last”.
The Ministry of Culture is one of the institutions responsible for the implementation of the Law on the Protection of Minors against the Detrimental Effect of Public Information (2002) (last edition in 2024). This Law establishes the criteria of the public information that has a detrimental effect on minors’ physical, mental, and moral development, the procedure of its publication and dissemination, and the rights, duties and liability of the producers, disseminators and owners of such information, as well as journalists and the institutions which regulate their activities.
Several articles of The Law on the State Language (1995) (last edition in 2002) are related to the audiovisual and interactive media, e.g. Article 13 states, that the audiovisual programmes, motion pictures publicly shown in Lithuania must be translated into the state language or shown with subtitles in Lithuanian; and the article 22 requires that the mass media of Lithuania (the press, television, radio, etc.), all publishers of books and other publications must observe the norms of the correct Lithuanian language.
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