page_title: 2013 Romanian protests against the Roșia Montană Project
section_title: Media portrayal
hierarchical_section_title: 2013 Romanian protests against the Roșia Montană Project / Media portrayal
caption_attribution_description: English: Graffiti "Salvaţi Roşia Montană" (cf. rosiamontana.org) in Cluj-Napoca, Romania
context_page_description: The 2013 Romanian protests against the Roșia Montană Project were a series of protests in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and dozens of other cities in Romania and abroad against the Roșia Montană mining project. The protesters say that the mining project would destroy the environment and heritage of Roșia Montană and demand the withdrawal of a law which would enable this project to commence. In Bucharest, protests are held every evening in the University Square and marches are held each Sunday.
  Although at first largely ignored by the world press, the demonstrations are starting to receive more significant worldwide attention both by the media and the general population via the use of social networks. The protests were dubbed by Romanian press and not only Indignants Movement and Romanian Autumn.
context_section_description: Protesters accused the Romanian media of a media blackout, claiming that this was due to the fact that Gabriel Resources paid large sums of money in advertising throughout the years. According to Forbes Romania, Roșia Montană Gold Corporation paid 5.4 million €-worth (rate card prices) of advertising in the Romanian newspapers during the last three years and about 550,000 € in TV ads last year.
  On 7 September, thousands of protesters marched to the publicly funded Romanian Television (TVR) headquarters to protest against the TVR's blackout, but this protest was not featured in its news program, either.
  With the exception of the national television channel Digi 24, the first week of protests went uncovered in almost all mainstream mass-media, which led to a strong negative reaction in the protesters.
  As the protests became larger, it became impossible for the media to ignore the events. Still, the press was continuously criticised of presenting the news in a biased or distorted manner, in ways such as grossly minimising the activists' number to suggest the existence of a minor revolt or making use of TV personalities such as the popular media figure Mircea Badea to present the protesters as a mass of disoriented people with no defined purpose.
  Some media outlets accused the protesters and environmentalists of financial gains. For instance, TV show host Mihai Gâdea of Antena 3 (Romania) accused Horia-Roman Patapievici of being a real estate speculator for owning land in Roșia Montană. Patapievici replied in an open letter that he owns only 1 square meter, as a symbol of solidarity with the people of Roșia Montană and that it's not a real estate investment. Evenimentul Zilei accused the "cunning NGO activists" involved in the protests of receiving money from foreigners (such as George Soros's Open Society Foundations) and using the money to organize the protests. Likewise, Mihai Gâdea has addressed, in one of his shows, an insulting message to opposers of the Roșia Montană Project in University Square. He called protesters "Băsescu's slaves", adding that "many of you don't know because of ketamine, high ketamine impedes you understanding things." He later defended himself, arguing that he didn't insult all the protesters. More than that, both Mihai Gâdea and Mircea Badea were threatened on Facebook by angry protesters.
  The protesters chanted against what they perceived as the corruption of press. Evenimentul Zilei claimed that this is part of a "campaign of disinformation" which intends to "discredit the mainstream media".
caption: Save Roșia Montană (Romanian: Salvați Roșia Montană), logo used by protesters
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