Hungary's public media company MTVA announced on Tuesday it had fired two journalists who went on hunger strike to protest government influence on media coverage.

The MTVA "has ended the employment of Balazs Nagy Navarro and Aranka Szavuly with ... immediate effect on December 27," it said in a statement, adding that the two journalists "have breached the media law" and the public media code banning all expression of political opinion.

Trade union leader Nagy Navarro and unionist Szavuly went on hunger strike in front of the public television building on December 12 over government meddling in news programmes.

Loudspeakers churning out high-pitched tunes and high-power reflectors attached to the television building have been used to try to disrupt their action.

Szavuly told AFP that they had not been informed of their sacking but insisted they would continue their action "despite the Gestapo methods" of their employer.

The television already tried to fire the two reporters a few weeks ago but failed without the trade unions' support, Nagy Navarro said.

The protest comes almost exactly a year after a media law came into effect that many critics at home and abroad said constitutes a major attack on press freedom in the EU state.
-Sapa-AFP