Author: birnEU

PM Vows Response After BIRN Serbia Reveals Airline Deal

Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic promised to publish the text of a previously confidential deal between Serbia and United Arab Emirates airline company Etihad Airways on Friday, a day after BIRN Serbia published an article revealing the content of the agreements that appear unfavourable for the country.

BIRN Serbia revealed that, for a 51 per cent stake in the newly founded company Air Serbia, the country paid several times more than its UAE partner. Details of the contract have remained unknown since it was signed on August 1, 2013. 

The documents published on BIRN’s website provoked widespread debate in the country and reactions from the ruling and opposition parties.

According to the information in the agreements, Serbia had to pay over $90 million in 2013 alone the UAE paid $40 million, in the form of a loan, for a 49% stake in the company.

In addition to this, the state has yet to pay all the debts that the former Serbian state-owned airline Jat Airways built up before it became Air Serbia – estimated at more than $230 million, according to the agreements published by BIRN.

However the government committee responsible for approving such state aid made its decision to supply the funds confidential. This was the first time since the committee was set up in 2010 that it failed to make public such expenditure figures, despite the fact that public money was involved.

The BIRN article is available in Serbian on the javno.rs website.

BIRN Albania Seeks Three Monitoring Experts on How Media Report Corruption

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Albania launched an open call on Wednesday for media monitoring experts for a study on how corruption is reported by local media outlets.

The call is part of the programme ‘Exposing Corruption in Albania’, supported by the Open Society Foundation in Albania (OSFA), the Balkan Trust for Democracy (BTD) and the National Endowment for Democracy, NED.

The purpose of the programme is to contribute to overall democratization processes in Albania by bridging the gap between civil society organizations and journalists, building their capacities and creating common ground for joint action in exposing corruption cases in the country, by providing journalists with necessary reporting skills, and regular reporting in the Albanian language on the misuse of power in the country. 

BIRN Albania seeks three monitoring experts, who will be engaged for a three-month period, starting August 20, 2014, to monitor six media outlets, three newspapers and three national television stations.

The successful candidates should fulfill the following requirements:

–          University degree, preferably in communications or journalism;
–          Excellent Albanian and English language skills;
–          Previous experience in media monitoring or media development;
–          Excellent communication skills and willingness to work as part of a team.

The candidates who are chosen will have the following responsibilities:

–          Daily monitoring of articles on corruption in selected media outlets for a three-month period;
–          Preparing daily reports on published or broadcast stories;
–          Contributing to data analysis for a monitoring study;
–          Contributing to the writing of the media monitoring study.

Deadline for applications is August 12, 2014.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

Interested candidates should send a CV and a letter of interest to [email protected]

BIRN Albania is an equal opportunity employer.

Serbian Govt Falls Short on Reform Pledges

In its first 100 days, the Serbian government has only fulfilled a handful of the tasks it set itself when taking office, a new report by BIRN shows.

Research conducted by BIRN Serbia shows that out of 29 promises that Serbian government pledged to meet while taking office, only two have been completely fulfilled.

The government adopted a new Labour Law in July and has introduced stricter control over public procurements.

The research monitored the government’s action on the promises made in five areas that citizens perceived as crucial – public finance, the economy, corruption, education and health.

While some progress has been made in fulfilling about half of the promises, in the fields of education and health, nothing has been done, or started, the research says.

“Although there were some reform efforts, mainly regarding legislative changes, matters are far from ideal,” BIRN Serbia report states.

Jelena Bojovic, from the National Alliancefor Local Economic Development, NALED, said the first 100 days of the government had been marked with “great instability”.

“The period was marked by constant changes in regulations, new drafts and new proposals of the laws, new people at the forefront of the ministries. Great instability is a problem for the economy,” Bojovic said on August 5 at a conference organised by BIRN Serbia.

Nemanja Nenadic, programme director at Transparency Serbia, the local branch of international watchdog organisation, said the fight against corruption had not been kept in due focus.

“When it comes to fight against corruption, the period has been marked by lack of transparency regarding government’s deals with investors. This refers not only to deals made by this government, but also to deals made before 2012,” Nenadic said.

He added that a lack of transparency concerning the government’s business operations with foreign partners was worrying as the constitution grants inter-governmental agreements high legal status than local laws.

“The issue is that the constitution does not set boundaries on what can be determined in inter-governmental agreements,” he said.

Nenadic said the government had been using inter-governmental agreements to make deals between Serbian national carrier Jat Airways and Etihad of the United Arab Emirates, for example, as well as for the deal for real estate in the Belgrade Waterfront project.

In this way, the government bypassed Serbian law on Public-Private Partnerships, as well as Privatisation Law and Law on Public Companies.

The full report is available on this link, while follow-ups on the government’s measures are available on the website www.meravlade.rs.

BIRN Energy Investigation Makes Waves in Albania

BIRN’s hard-hitting series of investigations into energy deals in Albania has generated widespread interest in the country.

The revelations have hit the front pages of most of the country’s newspapers in recent weeks, have been aired by leading television stations and have led to calls for a tax investigation to be opened into the family of former prime minister Sali Berisha. 

The investigation was also picked up in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Kosovo where it was republished in more than 20 media outlets.

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network has revealed how Berisha’s daughter Argita Malltezi, and her husband and colleague, made huge profits from selling worthless land to Bosnian businessman Damir Fazlic.

Fazlic, a friend and adviser to Berisha, then made millions of euros when the premier designated the land an “energy park”, paving the way for massive investment.

BIRN also traced the origin of the investment to controversial Serbian tycoon Vojin Lazarevic and revealed the extraordinary number of foreign energy investors who employed Malltezi as their solicitor as they attempted to launch businesses in Albania.

Fazlic has denied any wrongdoing while Malltezi and her father have yet to comment.

In an editorial for the newspaper Tema, journalist Mero Baze, a vocal critic of Berisha, lauded BIRN and Lindita Cela, the lead journalist in Albania on the investigations.

The story also sparked a reaction from Erion Brace, Socialist MP and chairman of the Parliamentary Commission on the Economy, who called on the tax authorities to investigate BIRN’s findings.

The stories are the first to be published as part of BIRN’s “Power Games” project, a detailed investigation into the energy sector in the Balkans.

BIRN has spent nine months looking at the key companies, players and state officials involved in this lucrative, secretive and critical sector of the economy.

Power Games is part of “A Paper Trail to Better Governance” project financed by Austrian Development Agency to hone investigative journalism in the Balkans, hold officials to account and improve the implementation and use of freedom of information laws.

BIRN Macedonia Wraps up Workshops Linking Journalists and NGOs

BIRN Macedonia in partnership with the Center for Civil Communication has concluded a series of ten workshops aimed at boosting cooperation between journalists and the NGO sector.

The Project for Investigative Journalism and Cooperation between the Media and Civil Society, supported by USAID, ran the ten workshops between February and June 2014.

Each was designed to empower NGO representatives with skills and techniques to increase their visibility and establish long-lasting cooperation with the journalists. At the same time, journalists gained an opportunity to learn more about investigative journalism and about the benefits of working with NGOs as partners.

The workshops brought together representatives of civil society and journalists working in ten pre-determined thematic areas of common interest.

These were quality of life, healthcare and rights of patients, environment, cultural policy, education and youth, inclusion of marginalized groups, human rights, EU accession, good governance and ethnic relations.

Some sessions were intended to provide an open platform for discussion between the participants, sharing the latest information and insights from the work of the NGOs, so that journalist could later on report on it and produce stories from the information presented at the workshops.

Toni Dimkov, a journalist in the news portal MKD.MK, said the most important aspect of the workshops for him was the opportunity to share his experience with other journalists and with representatives from the non-governmental sector.

“Communication between those two, which often is based on sending and receiving press releases, was now transferred to the same room, allowing all participants to interact between each other and discuss their latest activities,” he said.

Velimir Savevski, from HERA, the Association for Health Education and Research, took part in the workshop on health policy and quality of life held in Strumica in February. The workshop helped him meet journalists that were interested in these fields and explore ways for further cooperation, he said.

“These workshops were helpful in detecting relevant stakeholders for each of the selected common issues and sharing contacts between the participants, so that both sides can get access to relevant sources and expertise for their work,” he added.

 “Journalists cannot always get hold of relevant sources and information, especially when it comes to public institutions, so… cooperation with NGOs that are specialized in a specific area is more than welcome,” Biljana Stojanovska, a journalist from the daily Nova Makedonija, said.

For Ana Dimovska from Step by Step, Foundation for Education and Cultural Initiatives, it was useful to work on mapping and sharing the contacts of the key stakeholders in her respective field with the other participants at the workshop.

“I shared my experience from the workshop with colleagues afterwards and I believe that more workshops like this will follow, which will allow joint work with journalists and will result with stories in the media inspired by our work as civil society,” Dimovksa said.

Around 100 participants were involved in the events, with 47 representatives of local and national NGOs and 50 journalists, coming from different media outlets. Each workshop was organized in a different part of Macedonia, making them accessible for many correspondents, local journalists and representatives of local organizations as well. 

Zoran Madzoski, a correspondent from Gostivar, a town in western Macedonia, concluded that the cooperation unfortunately remained at a far from satisfactory level – and one reason for that was lack of knowledge and communication skills.

He ended with the hope that this problem would be solved by workshops such as these. He said he was most impressed by the session on investigative journalism and data-journalism.

With the last workshop held in Berovo, on June 28-29, the Project for Investigative Journalism and Cooperation between the Media and Civil Society successfully concluded the ten workshops.

In future, the project will continue to organize smaller, more frequent ad-hoc debates, which will help both journalists and NGOs collaborate, increase their influence in society and increase the number of stories published in the media.

BIRN Kosovo Presents Report on Access to Public Documents

Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN Kosovo) published its report on access to the public documents on Monday. 

 Access to Public Documents

BIRN submitted 125 official requests to access public documents to the majority of public institutions in Kosovo. From these requests 68 were denied, 50 were approved and seven were partially denied. This shows that the institutions fulfilled only 40 per cent of requests.

To launch and discuss the report, BIRN organized a roundtable with representatives of public institutions from the local and central governments.

The report found that the implementation of the law on access to public documents has not improved since the year prior. The report also identified transparent and non-transparent institutions.

The roundtable included:

Zekirja Shabani – Association of Professional Journalists of Kosovo,

Arianit Bytyqi – Prime Minister’s Office,

Fidan Kalaja – Open Government Partnership,

Mentor Hoxhaj – National Agency for Data Protection,

Florent Rrahmani – Office of the President of Republic of Kosovo.

Arianit Bytyqi from the Prime Minister Office congratulated BIRN for the work conducted so far, which, he said “is a great help on going on supporting further more an efficient implementation of the law on access to the public documents”.

Fidan Kalaja said BIRN is supporting his work in Kosovo on the Open Government Partnership, a global initiative to promote government transparency.

Download full report.

“Missing you…” Premieres in Sarajevo

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Bosnia and Herzegovina premiered its first feature documentary film entitled “Missing you…” at Sarajevo’s Meeting Point Cinema last night. The film addresses the difficulty that families have to face on their quest to find their missing loved ones.

“The film draws attention to the issue of missing persons not just as a result of armed conflict, which was the case in the former Yugoslavia, but organized crime and human trafficking as well,” said Anisa Suceska – Vekic, the director of BIRN BiH and the film’s executive producer.

The film shows the process of the search for a missing person in detail, its key actors and their roles. It underlines the importance of DNA analysis for speeding up the process of identification.

“Painful though it is, it must be seen, and we have a duty not to look away,” says the deputy head of the OSCE Mission to BiH, Nina Suomalainen.

One of the main characters of the film, Fikret Bacic, has spent 22 years looking for the remains of his wife and two children who were executed in Prijedor during the war.

“I came back to BiH not just to find my family’s bodies but to make sure those who killed them are brought to justice,” said Bacic.

Alongside OSCE and Bacic the crowd had a chance to hear from the ICMP’s General Director, Kathryn Bomberger, at the Q&A panel that was held right after the screening.

“The issue of the missing is a global problem, many countries are facing it as people disappear almost every day,” said Bomberger.

The film is dedicated to all those who are still looking for their family members, regardless of their ethnicity, their national background or the cause of the disappearance.

BIRN Legal Adviser Lectures on Media Law

BIRN’s legal advisor, Flutura Kusari, gave a lecture on media law at Prishtina School of Politics on June 2.

Flutura Kusari

Through concrete case law from Kosovo and European Court of Human Rights she explained to participants the importance of knowing about defamation, privacy, access to public documents and copyrights and the impacts on freedom of expression.

During the lecture, participants from different backgrounds such as public institutions, non governmental organizations and the private sector raised many questions related to media regulation.

The Prishtina School of Politics was founded in 2003 as a joint initiative of the Council of Europe and a group of young Kosovar activists, aiming to promote a new political culture and social life based on the common values of tolerance and open dialogue.


Legal Advisor Gives Journalists Primer on Document Access

BIRN Kosovo legal advisor, Flutura Kusari, attended a roundtable in Gjakova titled “Ethics and Professionalism in Media” on June 26.

Kusari discussed how access to public documents remains a challenge in Kosovo. Public institutions often do not disclose sensitive documents out of the fear they will reveal wrongdoings, she said.

Kusari focused on raising awareness among journalists from Gjakova and Peja on the importance of getting the access to public documents and how to file official requests. The event was organised by Kosovo Press Council.