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EUROVISION AND PRESS FREEDOM OF SPEECH

Reporters without borders have published their annual Freedom of speech index in the world, read the whole list and info here. As a Finnish blogger I am happy to see Finland at the top for the third year in a row. All in all there are 9 Eurovision countries in the top-10, the one exception being New Zealand at #8 (and Liechtenstein at #7, but they have been flirting with Eurovision for so long that it almost counts like one of those countries that actually did take part in the past, Andorra, Monaco ...) as the Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, Andorra, Denmark, Iceland and Sweden complate the top. Very northern and Nordic isn't it?
The Big5 are spread a bit on the top half of the list: Germany 17th, United Kingdom 29th, Spain 36th, France 37th and Italy 57th. Italy, Hungary and Greece get a special attention on the text.
On the lower places, out of 179 countries are Russia 148th, Turkey 154th, Azerbaijan 156th and Belarus 157th. Is someone surprised? Even lower are the 'stanis ready for Turkvision: Kazakhstan 160th, Uzbekistan 164th and Turkmenistan 177th.... Anyone want to get accreditated for that? :-)

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