WAN-IFRA elects Gavin O'Reilly as president

Horst Pirker, chairman of the board of Austria-based Styria Media, was elected first vice president and is in line for the presidency when O'Reilly's term ends in December 2010. Pirker had been president of IFRA.

As CEO of Independent News & Media, O'Reilly oversees a leading international newspaper group with more than 200 titles in Ireland, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and India.

As president of WAN, O¹Reilly spearheaded a number of global initiatives for the industry, notably creation of the Automated Content Access Protocol to protect intellectual property rights of online publishers, and the formation of the News Media Coalition to defend open news coverage of sports and other events. WAN had also undertaken numerous press freedom and industry support initiatives during his tenure.

Fred Arp, chief financial officer of the Telegraaf Media Group in the Netherlands, and Tore Stangebye, CEO of Norway-based Berner Gruppen, were elected treasurers.

View full list of board members

New board members of the World Editors Forum:

• Wolfgang Krach, deputy editor, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Germany;
  
• Reetta Merilainen, editor-in-chief, Helsingin Sanomat, Finland;
  
• Roman Gallo, director, Nase Adresa, Czech Republic;
  
• Paul Ramadge, editor-in-chief, The Age, Australia

The WAN-IFRA annual general meeting will be held next year on 10 June 2010, during the 63rd World Newspaper Congress and World Editors Forum in Beirut, Lebanon. Newspapers worldwide are invited to attend the events, to be held from 7 to 10 June 2010.

Follow the events at the 62nd World Newspaper Congress

• WAN-IFRA multiblog:www.wan-ifra.org/blogs/wanindia2009
  
• World Editors Forum blog:www.editorsweblog.org
  
• Twitter: @WANIndia2009, @NewspaperWorld and the M&G's Trevor Ncube, @3bucn
  
• Twitter Search: WANindia09 or #WAN

For more on WAN-IFRA, go to www.wan-ifra.org.