Agence France-Presse (; AFP) is a French international

news agency A news agency is an organization that gathers news reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such as newspapers, magazines and All-news radio, radio and News broadcasting, television Broadcasting, broadcasters. A news agency ma ...

headquartered in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, France. Founded in 1835 as

Havas Havas NV () is a French multinational corporation, multinational advertising agency, advertising and public relations company, with its registered office and head office in Puteaux, France. Havas operates in more than 100 countries. The group ...

, it is the world's oldest news agency. With 2,400 employees of 100 nationalities, AFP has an editorial presence in 260 cities across 150 countries. Its main regional headquarters are based in

Nicosia Nicosia, also known as Lefkosia and Lefkoşa, is the capital and largest city of Cyprus. It is the southeasternmost of all EU member states' capital cities. Nicosia has been continuously inhabited for over 5,500 years and has been the capi ...

Montevideo Montevideo (, ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2023 census, the city proper has a population of 1,302,954 (about 37.2% of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

and Washington, D.C. AFP publishes stories, videos, photos and graphics in French, English,

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

, Portuguese,

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

, and

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

. Two-thirds of its turnover comes from its own commercial activities, with the remaining one-third being provided by the French government (amounting to 113.3 million euros in 2022) as compensation for carrying out its mission of general interest. In December 2024, AFP was ranked as the 27th most visited news site in the world, with over 105 million monthly readers.

History

Agence France-Presse has its origins in the

Agence Havas Havas NV () is a French multinational advertising and public relations company, with its registered office and head office in Puteaux, France. Havas operates in more than 100 countries. The group is structured into three main operational div ...

, founded in 1835 in Paris by

Charles-Louis Havas Charles-Louis Havas (; 5 July 1783 – 21 May 1858) was a French writer, translator, and founder of the first news agency Agence Havas (whose descendants are the Agence France-Presse (AFP) and the advertising firm Havas). Family background Hi ...

, making it the world's oldest news service. The agency pioneered the collection and dissemination of news as a

commodity In economics, a commodity is an economic goods, good, usually a resource, that specifically has full or substantial fungibility: that is, the Market (economics), market treats instances of the good as equivalent or nearly so with no regard to w ...

, and had established itself as a fully global concern by the late 19th century. Two Havas employees,

Paul Julius Reuter Paul Julius Reuter (born Israel Beer Josaphat; 21 July 1816 – 25 February 1899), later ennobled as Freiherr von Reuter (Baron von Reuter), was a German-born British entrepreneur who was a pioneer of telegraphy and news reporting.

and

Bernhard Wolff Bernhard Wolff (3 March 1811 – 11 May 1879) was a German media mogul. He was editor of the '' Vossische Zeitung'', founder of the '' National Zeitung'' (1848–1938), and founder of Wolffs Telegraphisches Bureau (1849–1934), one of the firs ...

, set up their own news agencies in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

respectively. In 1940, when German forces occupied France during World War II, the news agency was taken over by the authorities and renamed "

Office français d'information The ''Office français d'information'' (OFI, ) was the press agency controlled by the Vichy regime during the German occupation. It was created on 10 December 1940 after the nationalization by the Vichy regime of the information branch of Havas ...

" (French Information Office); only the private advertising company retained the name

. On 20 August 1944, as Allied forces moved on Paris, a group of journalists in the

French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...

seized the offices of the FIO and issued the first news dispatch from the liberated city under the name of Agence France-Presse. Established as a

state enterprise A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a business entity created or owned by a national or local government, either through an executive order or legislation. SOEs aim to generate profit for the government, prevent private sector monopolies, provide goo ...

, AFP devoted the post-war years to developing its network of international correspondents. One of them was the first Western journalist to report the death of the Soviet leader

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

on 6 March 1953. AFP was keen to shake off its semi-official status, and on 10 January 1957, the

French Parliament The French Parliament (, ) is the Bicameralism, bicameral parliament of the French Fifth Republic, consisting of the Senate (France), Senate (), and the National Assembly (France), National Assembly (). Each assembly conducts legislative sessi ...

passed a law establishing its independence. Since that date, the proportion of the agency's revenues generated by subscriptions from government departments has steadily declined. Such subscriptions represented 115 million euros in 2011. In 1982, the agency began to decentralize its editorial decision-making by setting up the first of its five autonomous regional centres, in Hong Kong, then a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

dependent territory A dependent territory, dependent area, or dependency (sometimes referred as an external territory) is a territory that does not possess full political independence or sovereignty as a sovereign state and remains politically outside the controll ...

. Each region has its own budget, administrative director and

chief editor An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's Editing, editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is hel ...

. In September 2007, the AFP Foundation was launched to promote higher standards of journalism worldwide. The

Mitrokhin Archive The Mitrokhin Archive refers to a collection of handwritten notes about secret KGB operations spanning the period between the 1930s and 1980s made by KGB archivist Vasili Mitrokhin which he shared with British intelligence in the early 1990s. Mitr ...

identified six agents and two confidential

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

contacts inside Agence France-Presse who were used in Soviet operations in France. In 1991, AFP set up a joint venture with

Extel The Exchange Telegraph Co. Ltd. (also known as Extel) was created in March 1872 specifically to distribute financial and business information from the London Stock Exchange and other commercial markets direct to subscribers. The company establish ...

to create a financial news service,

AFX News Thomson Financial was an arm of the Thomson Corporation, an information provider. When the Thomson Corporation merged with Reuters to form Thomson Reuters in April 2008, Thomson Financial was merged with the business of Reuters to form the Market ...

. It was sold in 2006 to

Thomson Financial Thomson Financial was an arm of the Thomson Corporation, an information provider. When the Thomson Corporation merged with Reuters to form Thomson Reuters in April 2008, Thomson Financial was merged with the business of Reuters to form the Market ...

. In October 2008, the

Government of France The Government of France (, ), officially the Government of the French Republic (, ), exercises Executive (government), executive power in France. It is composed of the Prime Minister of France, prime minister, who is the head of government, ...

announced moves to change AFP's status, including the involvement of outside investors. On 27 November of that year, the main trade unions represented in the company's home base of France – the CGT, Force Ouvrière,

Syndicat national des journalistes The Syndicat national des journalistes (SNJ, National Union of Journalists), founded in 1918, is a French professional trade union exclusively for professional journalists. It is a founding member of the Solidaires Union (formerly the "Group of ...

, Union syndicale des journalistes CFDT and

SUD Sud or SUD may refer to: Places * Sud (Chamber of Deputies of Luxembourg constituency), a constituency in Luxembourg * Sud (department), an administrative subdivision of Haiti * Sud Department (Ivory Coast), defunct administrative subdivision of ...

, launched an

online petition An online petition (or Internet petition, or e-petition) is a form of petition which is signed online, usually through a form on a website. Visitors to the online petition sign the petition by adding their details such as name and email address. T ...

to oppose what they saw as an attempt to

privatise Privatization (rendered privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation wh ...

the agency. On 10 December 2009, the French Culture Minister Frédéric Mitterrand announced that he was setting up a Committee of Experts under former AFP CEO Henri Pigeat to study plans for the agency's future status. On 24 February 2010, Pierre Louette unexpectedly announced his intention to resign as CEO by the end of March, and move to a job with

France Télécom Orange S.A. (; formerly , stylised as france telecom) is a French multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications corporation founded in 1988 and headquartered in Issy-les-Moulineaux, near Paris. ''Orange'' has been the corporation' ...

. In November 2013, AFP and

Getty Images Getty Images Holdings, Inc. (stylized as gettyimages) is a visual media company and supplier of stock images, editorial photography, video, and music for business and consumers, with a library of over 477 million assets. It targets three mark ...

were ordered to pay $1.2 million compensation to freelance photojournalist Daniel Morel for using his images posted on

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

related to the

2010 Haiti earthquake The 2010 Haiti earthquake was a catastrophic Moment magnitude scale, magnitude 7.0 Mw earthquake that struck Haiti at 16:53 local time (21:53 UTC) on Tuesday, 12 January 2010. The epicenter was near the town of Léogâne, Ouest (departm ...

without his permission, in violation of copyright and Twitter's terms of service. AFP's statute was changed in 2015 to bring it into line with European legislation through Law No. 2015-433 of 17 April 2015. The State's financing of AFP was thus modified and was structured into two components: * Financial compensation for the Agency's missions of general interest * Commercial subscriptions from the State The current

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

and chairman is Fabrice Fries and the Global News Director is Phil Chetwynd. AFP returned to profitability in 2019 for the first time since 2013 and has consistently posted positive net results every year since. In 2023, the net profit reached 1.1 million euros. The debt, which stood at 50.2 million euros at the beginning of 2017, was reduced to 26.9 million euros by the end of 2023. On 11 February 2025, Deputy News Director for Digital Strategy and Director of Communications Grégoire Lemarchand spoke at the AI in the City event at ''École normale supérieure'', part of the

AI Action Summit The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Action Summit was held at the Grand Palais in Paris, France, from 10 to 11 February 2025. The summit was co-chaired by French President Emmanuel Macron and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The 2025 AI Actio ...

. Editorial Manager of the MediaLab Denis Teyssou participated in a

roundtable The Round Table (; ; ; ) is King Arthur's famed table (furniture), table in the Arthurian legend, around which he and his knights congregate. As its name suggests, it has no head, implying that everyone who sits there has equal status, unlike co ...

discussion and Deputy News Director for Photo and Documentation Eric Baradat joined a panel discussion with representatives of Google, Microsoft and Imatag.

Notable journalists

* Christina Assi (1995–), a Lebanese photojournalist who was seriously injured by an Israeli strike on 13 October 2023 while covering the Israel-Hamas conflict from the southern Lebanon border, according to an investigation by RSF. On 21 July 2024, Assi carried the Olympic torch in Vincennes, France, alongside her colleague, AFP videographer Dylan Collins. Assi stated that she did so to "pay tribute to those who have fallen" while working as journalists. * Arman Soldin (1991–2023), Franco-Bosnia video journalist, killed during a rocket strike in Ukraine * Massoud Hossaini (1981–), 2012

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prizes () are 23 annual awards given by Columbia University in New York City for achievements in the United States in "journalism, arts and letters". They were established in 1917 by the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made his fo ...

winner * Shah Marai (1977–2018), Afghan photojournalist based in

Kabul Kabul is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province. The city is divided for administration into #Districts, 22 municipal districts. A ...

, killed during a bombing attack * Javier Manzano (1975–), 2013

winner * Ahmad Sardar (1974–2014), Afghan journalist, killed by the Taliban * Michel Moutot (1961–), French journalist and writer, winner of the Albert Londres Prize in 1999 * Michèle Léridon (1958–2021), French journalist, former member of the CSA *

Sylvie Kauffmann Sylvie Kauffmann (born 30 October 1955) is a French journalist for Agence France-Presse (AFP) and the newspaper ''Le Monde''. She worked for AFP in France in 1979 and as a foreign correspondent from 1980 to 1988. Kauffmann joined ''Le Monde'' as ...

(1955–), French journalist * Pierre Haski (1953–), French journalist *

Kate Webb Kate Webb (24 March 1943 – 13 May 2007) was a New Zealand-born Australian war correspondent for UPI and Agence France-Presse. She earned a reputation for dogged and fearless reporting throughout the Vietnam War, and at one point she was h ...

(1943–2007), New Zealand journalist * Michel Castex (1943–), French journalist * François de Closets (1933–), French journalist and essayist * (1933–1975), French journalist, victim of a bomb attack * Paul Guihard (1932–1962), French editor and journalist based in

New York, New York New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on New York Harbor, one of the world's largest natural harb ...

. Guihard was killed in the

Ole Miss riot of 1962 The Ole Miss riot of 1962 (September 30 – October 1, 1962), also known as the Battle of Oxford, was a race riot that occurred at the University of Mississippi—commonly called Ole Miss—in Oxford, Mississippi, Oxford, Mississippi, as Racial ...

by a bullet in the back while covering the backlash from

James Meredith James Howard Meredith (born June 25, 1933) is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and United States Air Force veteran who became, in 1962, the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated Univers ...

's attempted enrollment at the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (Epithet, byname Ole Miss) is a Public university, public research university in University, near Oxford, Mississippi, United States, with a University of Mississippi Medical Center, medical center in Jackson, Miss ...

. Guihard's murder remains unsolved. * Jean Mauriac (1924–2020), French journalist and writer * Henri de Turenne (1921–2016), French journalist and screenwriter * Éric Schwab (1910–1977), French photojournalist

Distinctions

AFP was voted "Best News Agency" in 2021 and 2020 by the AIB (Association of International Broadcasters). Two photographers won the Pulitzer Prize for an AFP photo: Massoud Hossaini for his photo of a young girl in tears after a suicide bombing in Kaboul (1st place in the category Breaking News), and Javier Manzano in 2013 for his photo of two Syrian rebel soldiers in a room lit by rays of sunlight shining through bullet holes in the wall (1st place in the category Photo Magazine). The World Press photo of the year has been awarded on three occasions to AFP photographers: Hocine Zaourar in 1998 for his photo of a woman in tears in front of a hospital in Algiers, Ronaldo Schemidt in 2018 for his photo of a man running while on fire during a series of riots in Caracas, and Yasuyoshi Chiba in 2020 for his photo of young protesters in Khartoum. The Albert Londres Prize has been awarded to AFP journalists on five occasions: Patrick Meney in 1983, Sammy Ketz in 1988, AFP's Moscow office in 1995, Michel Moutot in 1999, and Emmanuel Duparcq in 2011. Five AFP collaborators have won the Rory Peck Prize: Pacôme Pabandji in 2014, Zein Al-Rifai in 2015, Will Vassilopoulos in 2016, Luis Sequeira in 2019, and Solan Kolli in 2021. The Visa d'Or (in the category News) has been awarded on four occasions to AFP photographers; Georges Gobet in 2003, Bülent Kılıç in 2015, Aris Messinis in 2016, Guillermo Arias in 2019, as well as Sameer Al-Doumy, who won the Visa d'Or Humanitaire in 2022. AFP was distinguished by the "Covering Climate Now Journalism Awards" in 2021 for photos taken by Josh Edelson and in 2022 (in the category "Video – Short Feature").

Prizes and awards

In 1983, the Albert Londres Prize was awarded to Patrick Meney, who wrote a series of articles about 600 French people forcibly detained in the

Gulag The Gulag was a system of Labor camp, forced labor camps in the Soviet Union. The word ''Gulag'' originally referred only to the division of the Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies, Soviet secret police that was in charge of runnin ...

after World War II. In 1984, his book ''Les Mains coupées de la Taïga'' was published. In 1988, Sammy Ketz received the next Albert Londres Prize. Together with his colleague from the liberation movement, Serge Chalandon, he covered the events of the Libyan Civil War for six years. On 17 October 2014, AFP international director Michèle Léridon received the Investigation and Reporting Award at the International Congress of Journalism and Information. Michèle Léridon was the author of the article "Covering ISIS", which was posted on the agency's blog. In December 2014, Bülent Kiliç was named ''

Time Time is the continuous progression of existence that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, and into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequ ...

'' magazine Photojournalist of the Year for his coverage of events in the Middle East and Europe. The photographer received the same acknowledgement from ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' newspaper.

AFP projects

AFP Graphics

In 1988, the agency has its own department of

infographic Infographics (a clipped compound of "information" and "graphics") are graphic visual representations of information, data, or knowledge intended to present information quickly and clearly.Doug Newsom and Jim Haynes (2004). ''Public Relations Wr ...

s – AFP Graphics, which today creates about 70 graphics per day. According to the information provided by the agency's website, thematically infographics have the following distribution: 31% –

politics Politics () is the set of activities that are associated with decision-making, making decisions in social group, groups, or other forms of power (social and political), power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of Social sta ...

, 27% –

economics Economics () is a behavioral science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and interac ...

, 18% –

sport Sport is a physical activity or game, often Competition, competitive and organization, organized, that maintains or improves physical ability and skills. Sport may provide enjoyment to participants and entertainment to spectators. The numbe ...

s, 12% –

society A society () is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. ...

, 10% – general news, 2% –

culture Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and Social norm, norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, Social norm, customs, capabilities, Attitude (psychology), attitudes ...

and

media Media may refer to: Communication * Means of communication, tools and channels used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Interactive media, media that is inter ...

. Infographics are available in 6 languages: French, English, Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish and German.

AFP Forum

In 2014, AFP launches a content platform that is available on all electronic media: computers, tablets and mobile phones. AFP Forum is divided into several sections, including homepage, text materials, photos, videos and graphics. News can be filtered by headings (news, business, sports, science), hashtags and by geographical regions (Africa, North America, Europe, etc.). All information is available in 6 languages: French, English, Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Traditional and Simplified Chinese. In total, there are about 1250 illustrated materials per day, available in

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing data. It defines a set of rules for encoding electronic document, documents in a format that is both human-readable and Machine-r ...

HTML Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It defines the content and structure of web content. It is often assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets ( ...

, TXT, NewsML or WML formats.

AFP Video services

In July 2001, the agency announced the launch of AFP Video services, a video graphics division. Already in 2007, the agency launches AFPTV – a project in which all news from 2011 appear in HD video format. As of 2015, 200 videos in 7 languages appear on the site every day. On 10 June 2024, AFP announced the appointment of Mehdi Lebouachera as its new Global Editor-in-Chief, effective November 2024. Lebouachera succeeds Sophie Huet, who held the position since 2019 and is set to transition to a new role overseeing AFP's artificial intelligence strategy. Lebouachera previously worked as an AFP video journalist in Central America and Mexico before becoming the Video Editor-in-Chief for Latin America in Montevideo. He was later appointed Global Video Editor-in-Chief in Paris and, in September 2021, assumed the role of Editor-in-Chief for the Asia-Pacific region. He has also worked in Nicosia, Jerusalem, Gaza and Baghdad.

Mobile services

In 2008, Mobile services appeared – a separate digital platform for mobile phones. News in Mobile services is available in 6 languages (French, English, Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, German) and is divided into 22 thematic blocks: world news, world sports, football, top pages, Middle East, US news, Asia and Pacific news region, photos, videos, UK news, Africa, business, sports in the US, South African news, science, cricket, US politics, culture, Canada, lifestyle, technology and media, more. In addition to the section by headings, the news is divided into 100 categories (crime, energy, military conflicts, human rights, etc.), 43 countries, 70 cities and 100 hashtags. There is also a general search.

Statutes

AFP operates under a 1957 law as a commercial business independent of the

French government The Government of France (, ), officially the Government of the French Republic (, ), exercises Executive (government), executive power in France. It is composed of the Prime Minister of France, prime minister, who is the head of government, ...

. AFP is administered by a

and a board comprising 15 members: * Eight representatives of the French press; * Two representatives of AFP personnel; * Two representatives of Public Services radio and television; * Three representatives of the government. One is named by the

prime minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

, another by the

minister of finance A ministry of finance is a ministry or other government agency in charge of government finance, fiscal policy, and financial regulation. It is headed by a finance minister, an executive or cabinet position . A ministry of finance's portfolio ...

, and a third by the

minister of foreign affairs In many countries, the ministry of foreign affairs (abbreviated as MFA or MOFA) is the highest government department exclusively or primarily responsible for the state's foreign policy and foreign relations, relations, diplomacy, bilateralism, ...

. The mission of AFP is defined in its

statute A statute is a law or formal written enactment of a legislature. Statutes typically declare, command or prohibit something. Statutes are distinguished from court law and unwritten law (also known as common law) in that they are the expressed wil ...

: * Agence France-Presse may under no circumstances take account of influences or considerations liable to compromise the exactitude or the objectivity of the information it provides; it may under no circumstances fall under the control, either de facto or de jure, of any ideological, political or economic grouping; * Agence France-Presse must, to the full extent that its resources permit, develop and enhance its organisation so as to provide French and foreign users with exact, impartial and trustworthy information on a regular and uninterrupted basis; * Agence France-Presse must, to the full extent that its resources permit, ensure the existence of a network of facilities giving it the status of a worldwide information service. The board elects the CEO for a renewable term of three years. AFP also has a council charged with ensuring that the agency operates according to its statutes, which mandate absolute

independence Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...

and neutrality. Editorially, AFP is governed by a network of senior journalists.

Number of employees

Based in Paris, AFP covers 151 countries, with 201 offices, 50 local correspondents and five regional centres: Washington (North America) Hong Kong (Asia-Pacific) Montevideo (Latin America) Nicosia (Middle East) Paris (Europe and Africa) As of 2020, AFP claimed it employed 2,400 people of 100 nationalities, including 1,700 journalists. It provides information in six languages (French, English, Spanish, German, Portuguese and Arabic), twenty-four hours a day.

Investments

Notable investments include: * AFP GmbH *: AFP GmbH is the subsidiary of AFP in

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, producing German-language services for local press, internet and corporate clients. * SID *: Sport-Informations-Dienst (SID), a German-language sports service * Citizenside *: In 2007, AFP purchased a 34% stake in Scooplive, a citizen news photo and video agency online. Established in France in 2006, Scooplive was renamed Citizenside after this investment, but AFP soon sold its shares to news aggregator Newzulu.

References

External links

* {{Authority control International organizations based in France 1835 establishments in France Companies established in 1835 Mass media companies of France Companies based in Paris Mass media in Paris