WAN, a federation of national newspaper associations, has up until now represented newspaper companies through their membership in national associations. Membership of individual newspaper executives has been possible since 1994, but not that of companies.

The new membership structure was approved by the WAN Annual General Meeting at its meeting in Seoul, Korea, on Wednesday.

"The service offer that WAN can make to individual companies has grown considerably in recent years and constitutes an attractive package that many enterprises wish to benefit from directly," said Timothy Balding, Director General of WAN.

Details of the company membership offer will be announced soon.

The Paris-based WAN, the global organisation for the newspaper industry, represents 18,000 newspapers; its membership includes 72 national newspaper associations, individual newspaper executives in 102 countries, 11 news agencies and nine regional and world-wide press groups.

Inquiries to: Larry Kilman, Director of Communications, WAN, 7 rue Geoffroy St Hilaire, 75005 Paris France. Tel: +33 1 47 42 85 00. Fax: +33 1 47 42 49 48. Mobile in Seoul (until 2 June) +82 (0)11 9679 9721. E-mail: lkilman@wan.asso.fr