“We will report on news that’s in the interest of readers, not of an ideology”

The new editor-in-chief of EL PAÍS, Antonio Caño, said during an internet chat with readers on Monday that the newspaper’s only priority would be the interests of its readers. “I have no intention of taking this newspaper toward the right nor the left; I respect it too much to subject it to personal whims or ideological waverings,” he said.

The new editor-in-chief expressed his regret at the “excessively ideological” moment that Spain is going through, in which ideas are not analyzed on the basis of what they are worth, but on how they are pigeonholed politically.

Later, during a talk addressed to the entire staff of EL PAÍS, Caño said that the newspaper’s editorial line would be “the same as always,” and warned that anyone “looking for an activist, militant or sectarian newspaper will not find it.” He also outlined what his priorities would be at the head of the daily. Among them, he highlighted the need to expand the delivery of the publication’s content via new digital platforms and consolidate the paper’s presence in Latin America.

Beforehand EL PAÍS chairman Juan Luis Cebrián said goodbye to the outgoing editorial team and welcomed the incoming one. He thanked Caño’s predecessor, Javier Moreno, for his “great management over the past eight years, during which time the newspaper underwent a crucial adaptation to a digital format, which leaves it very well situated at the current time.”

He also emphasized the globalization of the publication and its opening up to new markets. In recent months EL PAÍS has launched two dedicated online editions in Latin America, one in Spanish and one in Portuguese in Brazil.

Moreno will now be in charge of coordinating the management and development of print, radio and television content, in digital format and in Latin America, for EL PAÍS’ parent company, Grupo Prisa. He thanked his team for its dedication and work over the past years. “Without your loyalty it would have been impossible for me to make this paper every day,” said Moreno, who established the basis for the newspaper’s expansion in the Americas and the digital market.

Caño championed those actions as “the essence of EL PAÍS,” which he defined as “the will to break new ground and innovate,” something that, he added, will continue.

Caño joined EL PAÍS in 1982 and has served as the paper’s correspondent in Mexico and Central America, as well as in the United States for several years. “The values of EL PAÍS will go on being the same as always, those that have turned it into a publication of great prestige around the world. We will go on being a newspaper committed to its past, to democracy and progress,” he said.