BIRN Hub About

About

BIRN Hub is an umbrella entity that coordinates the work of the BIRN Network, an alliance of domestic non-governmental organisations promoting freedom of speech, human rights and democratic values. While each country organisation addresses domestic needs, BIRN Hub, registered in Bosnia and Herzegovina, implements regional programmes.

BIRN Hub is in charge of dealing with editorial, training, operations and development, as well as the development of, fundraising for and implementation of regional programmes. BIRN Hub trains at least 100 journalists annually from across the Balkans and beyond, both on-the-job and through formal workshops, in areas such as news reporting, analysis and investigative journalism. It has a special focus on corruption and organised crime; the use of freedom of information laws; data journalism; transitional justice and court reporting.

BIRN Hub is responsible for editing BIRN’s regional publication Balkan Insight, a news and current affairs site covering the Western Balkans and featuring news, investigations, comment and analysis from the region. The website has built a reputation as the most comprehensive, professional and independent source of news in English in the Balkan region, providing the public with relevant and insightful reporting on key regional issues. As well as reporting the current affairs in the region, Balkan Insight has become source of information for academics and scholars studying or writing about the Balkans .

BIRN’s editorial team is widely spread across the Balkans and includes a network of journalists and editors in Montenegro, Croatia, Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey, and recently Moldova and Ukraine. BIRN has a wide media presence – online, in print, on TV, and on radio. Balkan Insight, one of 15 sites in various language run by BIRN s, is read in more than 200 countries worldwide, and has over 6.5 million page views annually.

BIRN Hub runs multiannual programmes focusing on investigative and in-depth reporting and  transitional justice, such as the Balkan Transitional Justice Initiative, the BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting, the Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Initiative.