Twenty-nine Governments Join Forces in Defense of Access to Free and Reliable Information Worldwide

Paris, 29 October: Twenty-nine governments from around the globe convened at the 2025 Paris Peace Forum, including five Heads of State and Government, have committed to hold the line to protect access to trustworthy, reliable information worldwide.

At the High-Level Conference on Information Integrity and Independent Media, a ministerial conference co-organized by the International Fund for Public Interest Media (IFPIM) and the Forum on Information and Democracy (FID),  government representatives from Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe warned that independent and reliable information requires sustained public support across the globe to withstand rapid technological and commercial disruption.

“We are in a crisis that is actually multiple crises,” said President Emmanuel Macron, referring to the financial crisis in media, degeneration of information integrity, and the lack of regulation of the large technology platforms. He called for stronger regulation, as well as for innovation. “We must put in place systems that, in the life of our democracies, guarantee the integrity of our electoral processes. That's exactly the role of journalists; it's to them that we must restore the heart of this democratic life,” he said.

In a global context marked by information wars, media facing financial crises, and increased attacks on the foundations of democracy, the conference was a first-of-its-kind event with such high-level participation.

Government leaders underscored that access to reliable information is essential to human progress and welfare. They made concrete commitments to put principles into action by supporting independent media as a first line of defense against disinformation and manipulation of information. 

"Peace cannot survive without information integrity and democracies cannot survive without those who protect it, journalists, citizens and leaders alike,” said President Maia Sandu of Moldova. “I want to express Moldova's gratitude to all our partners who support free and independent media, including the International Fund for Public Interest Media. Your work strengthens not only journalism, but democracy itself.”

The High-Level Conference yielded four concrete outcomes:  

‍Political commitments to defend information integrity and independent media

Responding to the increasing pressure on independent media and manipulation of other sources of information, the Conference notably led to a firm political commitment to work together: Representatives of 29 countries adopted the Paris Declaration on Multilateral Action for Information Integrity and Independent Media, acknowledging the need to fund access to reliable information as a global public good. 

All countries reiterated their commitment to ongoing engagement in defense of information integrity. As a concrete example, the government of Denmark shared that as part of their presidency of the Council of the European Union, Denmark will host the Copenhagen Conference on Information Integrity on 11–12 November 2025. 

‍A coordinating group to strengthen international efforts on information integrity

On the occasion of this Conference, the Forum on Information and Democracy also announced the creation of the International Coordination Group on Information Integrity, an informal group gathering representatives of international organizations and initiatives working on related topics. 

The first participating organizations include: 
Council of Europe Division on Freedom of Expression and CDMSI
(Steering Committee on Media and Information Society)
The Forum on Information and Democracy
The International Fund for Public Interest Media
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe
(Representative of Freedom of the Media)
The Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie
The Secretariat of the Open Government Partnership
The United Nations
UNESCO

‍A strengthened Partnership for Information and Democracy

Countries also announced their strengthened commitment to the Partnership for Information and Democracy, which was initiated in 2018 at the Paris Peace Forum reaffirming the democratic principles for the global information and communication space as reminded by President Macron. 

At the 2025 edition, Ghana became the Partnership’s 57^th signatory State. “Ghana has decided to assume full membership of the Partnership for Information and Democracy,” said Ghana’s President John Mahama.

The Forum on Information and Democracy also announced the creation of its own consultative committee composed of Signatory States including Armenia, Brazil, Chile, France, Luxembourg, Portugal and Ukraine. “The current information landscape with its unprecedented speed and scale requires a renewed commitment from all of us,” explained Armenian Prime Minister Pashinyan. 

‍Endorsement of IFPIM as the financial arm of the coalition

Countries signing the declaration also endorsed the International Fund for Public Interest Media as the financial arm of the renewed and enlarged coalition, and a first-of-its-kind multilateral organisation dedicated to defending access to reliable information at scale. The International Fund provides funding through grant support to independent media in low- and middle-income countries. France, a founding contributor to the Fund, also confirmed IFPIM as a hosted International Organisation with headquarters in Paris as of May 2025. 

Ghana, which hosts the International Fund’s Regional Headquarters in Africa also announced new financial support: “Ghana will become the first African country to make a financial contribution to the International Fund for Public Interest Media,” said President Mahama. “This gesture reflects our conviction that independent journalism and reliable information are indispensable public goods.”

“Acting bilaterally will not be as effective as acting together. The fund demonstrates that a more multilateral, collective, strategic response is possible. This conference represents a growing global consensus and willingness to act by partners from the North and the South,” said Maria Ressa, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. “In a world on fire, join us and help define what effective multilateral collaboration means today,” she urged the convened leaders. Maria Ressa is CEO of Rappler and Co-Chair of the International Fund.

The Fund raised USD 62 million (EUR 53 million) between its launch in November 2022 and 2025. As the Fund embarks on its next strategic phase, ten donors have committed to financing the expansion of the International Fund, and more than USD 25 million (EUR 21.5 million) in new funding has been secured in recent months for 2026 onwards. This includes announcements at the conference of an initial contribution of EUR 10 million from France for 2026-2028, as well as support from Ghana, Luxembourg, Spain and Switzerland.

The International Fund plans to raise and disburse USD 150 million (EUR 130 million) over the coming three years to provide flexible core funding to independent media in 50 countries. Since it was launched, the Fund has seen urgent demand for support by media organisations that far exceeds available resources; an acute crisis for independent media that risks leaving societies without access to trustworthy, essential information. The Fund is making an all-out effort to raise the funding needed over the coming months.
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About IFPIM:
Launched in 2022, the International Fund for Public Interest Media (IFPIM) is a bold, new multilateral initiative designed to support independent public interest media in low- and middle-income settings. IFPIM is an International Organisation hosted by France and Ghana, and supported by 19 governments and philanthropic donors. The International Fund provides grants to media organisations and ecosystem-level interventions across four focus regions: Africa and the Middle East, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Eastern Europe. The International Fund’s mission is to ensure that people worldwide live in healthy information ecosystems, with access to journalism that provides their societies with information of public interest. To achieve this vision, the Fund aims to dramatically increase the financial resources available to support trustworthy, ethical, fact-based journalism, and to empower a resilient and independent media ecosystem that can work for democracy. In addition, the International Fund’s mission is to foster a paradigm shift in how public interest media is resourced, with the goal of ensuring it is independent, inclusive and resilient. To date, IFPIM has supported more than 120 media organisations in 31 countries.

 Media contact: Rosie Vanek,  rvanek@ifpim.org,  +41 79 445 1485

 About FID:

The Forum on Information and Democracy facilitates the implementation of the International Partnership for Information and Democracy launched by France in 2019 and endorsed by 56 Signatory States worldwide. It was founded by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and a group of leading institutions on digital rights, media and human rights. Since its creation, the Forum has published authoritative policy frameworks on issues ranging from How to End Infodemics (2020) to the Impact of AI on Information Integrity (2024) through Accountability regimes online (2023) and Media sustainability (2021). Mobilizing countries on specific issues such has Ukraine and Luxembourg on private messaging systems or Brazil and Armenia on climate disinformation, the Forum aims at ensuring that regulatory and self-regulatory proposals to tackle the information crisis remains in line with democratic principles. The Forum also hosts the Observatory on Information and Democracy which published its first meta-analysis of information ecosystems in January 2025. 

 Media contact: Camille Grenier, cgrenier@informationdemocracy.org, +33 6 22 26 15 5

About PPF

The Paris Peace Forum is a platform to originate, shape & share multi-actor responses towards global peace & sustainable prosperity. By convening key decision-makers and fostering collaboration between governments, international organisations, businesses, and civil society, we ensure that diplomacy is not just discussed but reinvented to meet the demands of a changing world. For more information, visit parispeaceforum.org.

Media contact: Evan O’Connell,  evan.oconnell@parispeaceforum.org, +33 6 17 57 21 26

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