APA chief new president of the European news agencies

For the second time in his career, Wolfgang Vyslozil, Managing Director of the Austria Press Agency (APA), will become President of the European news agencies. The 60-year-old was unanimously elected Chairman of EANA (European Alliance of News Agencies) for two years in Geneva on Friday, replacing the Managing Director of the Dutch agency ANP, Paul Tesselar. At the same time, EANA celebrated its 50th anniversary. It also presented the Award for Excellence in News Agency Quality to the European mobile communications project Minds for the first time (see ).
 
Born in Thuringia, Vyslozil began his professional career in 1974 at the Vienna Press House as assistant to the management of the daily newspaper Die Presse. In 1976, he became deputy managing director of the traditional newspaper. As a representative of the press, he was already a member of the APA Supervisory Board at that time. In 1982, he was appointed Managing Director and member of the Management Board of the news agency. Under his leadership, the initially financially unstable APA developed into one of the most successful news agencies in Europe, generating regular profits since 1988 and distributing annual dividends to its owners, the ORF and all Austrian daily newspapers with the exception of the 'Kronen Zeitung', since 1993.
 
The main aim of EANA itself is to ensure press freedom and independent reporting through suitable economic and legal framework conditions. In addition to the Swiss SDA, the alliance includes AFP (France), Dpa (Germany), PA (UK), EFE (Spain), ANSA (Italy) and ITAR-TASS (Russia).