Belgium - Media

International and domestic telegraph and telephone service, operated by a government agency, is well developed. There were 4,769,000 main line telephones in use in 1997 and 974,494 mobile cellular phones.

National radio and television service is organized into Dutch and French branches. Commercial broadcasting is permitted, hence costs are defrayed through annual license fees on radio and television receivers. There are two national medium-wave stations, one broadcasting in French, the other in Dutch. In addition, there are five Dutch-language and three French-language regional stations. Three shortwave transmitters are used for overseas broadcasts. As of 1999, there were 5 AM and 77 FM radio stations and 24 television stations. Cable television subscribers can receive up to 13 additional stations, from the UK and Belgium's continental neighbors. In 1997 there were 8 million radios and 4.7 million television sets.

The Belgian press has full freedom of expression as guaranteed by the constitution of 1831. Newspapers are published in French and Dutch, and generally reflect the views of one of the major parties. Agence Belga is the official news agency. Principal Belgian dailies with their 2002 circulations were as follows:

	LANGUAGE	ORIENTATION	CIRCULATION
BRUSSELS
De Standaard	Dutch	Flemish-Catholic	372,000
Het Laatste Nieuws	Flemish	Independent	308,808
Le Soir	French	Independent	178,500
La Lanterne	French	Socialist	129,800
La Libre Belgique	French	Catholic-Independent	80,000
ANTWERP
De Gazet van Antwerpen	Dutch	Christian Democrat	148,000
CHARLEROI
La Nouvelle Gazette	French	Liberal	94,600
GHENT
Het Volk/Nieuwe Gids	Dutch	Catholic-Labor	143,300

About 500 weeklies appear in Belgium, most of them in French or Dutch and a few in German or English. Their overall weekly circulation is estimated to exceed 6.5 million copies.

The government of Belgium supports free speech and a free press. There are some restrictions on the press regarding slander, libel, and the advocating of racial or ethnic hate, violence, or discrimination.

As of 2000, there were 61 Internet service providers with 2.8 million Internet users in 2001.