Author: birnEU

Culture Watch Award Shortlist Made

Four journalists from the region have made it to the Culture Watch Award shortlist.

Among the shortlisted candidates are Vullnet Krasniqi (Koha Ditore, Kosovo), Irfan Hosic (Dani, Bosnia and Herzegovina), Gordana Popovic (Politika, Serbia) and Valentina Milenkovic (Novine Vranjske, Serbia).

The award will be given to the best investigative and analytical story dealing with some aspect of cultural policy in the region, which has been published between September 1, 2011 and August 31, 2012.

The Culture Watch Award is launched by the Balkan Initiative for Cultural Cooperation Exchange and Development, BICCED, and funded by the Swiss Cultural Programme in the Western Balkans.

During the past three years over 30 journalists from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Serbia and Kosovo took part in the BICCED project.

 The journalists gained new skills in reporting on cultural policy in the region and their articles were published on the Balkan Insight’s focus page “Culture Watch“.

The Culture Watch Award is the next step in strengthening analytical and investigative approaches to reporting on cultural policy.

Applications received from the journalists were evaluated by a jury comprised of six experts on cultural policy in the region and one internationally awarded journalist.

The winners will be announced at the final event of the BICCED project – the regional conference „What is (to be) done“ that will take place in Dom Omladine in Belgrade on November 28.

Romanian Journalist Wins 2012 Balkan Fellowship Award

Sorana Stanescu, a journalist from Romania, takes first place in the 2012 Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence for her story about the job restrictions that have left migrant construction workers underpaid and vulnerable to exploitation.

The top prize in this year’s Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence has been won by Sorana Stanescu for her article, Cheap and Far from Free: The Migrants Building Britain.

Stanescu, a reporter for the Romanian public broadcaster, won 4,000 euros in prize money.

Second place and a 3,000-euro award went to Saska Cvetkovska from Macedonia for her article, Want to Work? Join the Party: Contacts Trump Merit in Balkan Job Market.

Aleksandra Bogdani took third place, winning a 1,000 euro prize, for her investigation entitled, Secrets and Lies: Victims of Albanian Communism Denied Closure.

The winning articles were selected by an independent panel of judges, including Florian Bieber, a professor and director of the Centre for Southeast Studies at the University of Graz; Remzi Lami, the executive director of the Albanian Media Institute, Milorad Ivanovic, executive editor of the Serbian weekly, Novi Magazin; Markus Spielman, editor of the Swiss newspaper, Neue Zeitung Zuricher; and Adelheid Wölfl, Zagreb correspondent for the Austrian daily, Der Standard.

All members of the committee stressed that it had been “extremely difficult” to choose the three winners. They noted that the winning article covered a highly relevant and complex topic, demonstrating great mastery of detail.

Stanescu said she was grateful that the fellowship had allowed her to carry out an in-depth investigation on a subject that she had been researching for a long time.

“The best part of the programme was the opportunity to work with a very scrupulous editor, an experience you rarely get in Romania, and one that can only enhance one’s storytelling,” she said.

The winners were announced on the evening of Friday, 23 November, at a ceremony at the Holiday Inn Hotel in Skopje. Besides fellows and jury members, a further 30 journalists from the region who are alumni of the fellowship also participated in the event.

The theme for this year’s competition was “communities”. Journalists on the programme reported on topics ranging from football fan groups, the environmental movement, radical Islamists, youth unemployment, orphans and the exploitation of immigrant workers within the European Union.

Initiated by the Robert Bosch Stiftung and ERSTE Foundation in 2007, in cooperation with the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, the annual fellowship provides financial and professional support to foster quality reporting in the Balkan region.

Additionally, the programme encourages regional networking among journalists and provides balanced coverage of complex reform issues that are central to the region and the European Union.

This year’s ten fellows were selected from more than 120 applicants from nine Balkan countries. Next year’s programme will be open for applications from early 2013.

Balkan Fellows Meet in Skopje

Ten fellows from the region met in Skopje for the final seminar of the Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence.

Following the opening dinner on Wednesday night, on Thursday the agenda included a panel on social networking and the media with Filip Stojanovski, program coordinator at the Metamorphosis Foundation for internet and society.

Stojanovski gave the fellows valuable insight as well as practical tips into how journalists can use social networks to promote their work, but also how they can gather information and double check on facts. The fellows exchanged views and examples of journalists’ use of social networks throughout the region.

The second panel on the state of media in Macedonia included Goran Mihajlovski, editor-in-chief of Vest daily, Tamara Causidis, president of the Journalists’ union and Petrit Saracini of the Macedonian Media Institute. The panelists discussed the deteriorating state of the media and of journalistic standards in the country, and other challenges that journalists face.

The panelists and the fellows discussed issues of media freedom, the media’s struggle to survive in the market and alternative ways for the media to survive and resist pressures coming from political or business interests.

On Thursday the fellows had a guided tour in the centre of Skopje and visited all the new building and monuments erected as part of the Skopje 2014 project, a government project to revamp the city.

The Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence, funded by the Robert Bosch Stiftung and the ERSTE Foundation, in cooperation with the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, has been running since 2007.  Each year, ten Balkan journalists are competitively chosen to receive funding and professional support to conduct their own research projects.

Selected journalists receive a fellowship of 2,000 euro, a travel allowance of up to 2,000 euro and a chance to participate in a seven-month programme for professional advancement. In addition, the independent Selection Committee awards bursaries of €4,000, €3,000 and €1,000 to the authors of the three winning articles.

This years award ceremony will take place on November 23 in Skopje.

Balkan Cultural Policies – What is (to be) Done

The regional conference “Balkan Cultural Policies – What Is (to be) Done” will be held on November 28, 2012 in the Dom Omladine Beograda in Belgrade as the closing event of the three-year project “Balkan Initiative for Cultural Cooperation, Exchange and Development” – BICCED.

BICCED was implemented by the Balkan Investigative Regional Reporting Network, BIRN, and SEEcult.org, and was funded by the Swiss Cultural Programme in the Western Balkans (SCP).

The conference will be an opportunity to review the cultural policies implemented in the Balkans over the past three years, based on more than 300 analytical pieces produced as part of the project. BICCED aimed to map the main problems and tendencies in the field of culture in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia and Serbia, and to present them to decisions makers and the public, thus contributing to finding solutions for problems and initiating needed reforms.

The question that was formulated at the beginning of the BICCED project – Is there political will for changes in culture and when will the importance of culture be acknowledged in the region? – is still open, as confirmed by the investigations conducted and texts published within the BICCED project.

The conference will bring together the representatives of cultural institutions and media from the region, including journalists trained during the project.

In the first part of the conference Jelena Knežević, executive director of BITEF from Belgrade; Lutfi Dervishi, executive director of Transparency International in Albania and media lecturer at the University in Tirana; Nihad Kreševljaković, director of SARTR theatre from Sarajevo; and Robert Alagjozovski, independent cultural consultant, art and culture critic from Skopje, will give an overview  of cultural policies in the region and the main problems faced by cultural organisations and institutions over the past three years.

In the afternoon session, the focus of the work during three panel discussions will be on the financial crisis and its consequences, new networks and initiatives in independent cultural scenes and lack of culture in the media and possibilities for improving this situation. 

Panelists and participants in the event include Lola Joksimović (Cultural Contact Point Serbia, Belgrade), Amila Ramović (Ars Aevi, Sarajevo), Josif Papagjoni (Center for Art Studies, Tirana), Dimitrije Vujadinović (Balkankult Foundation, Belgrade), Sašo Stanojković (artist, Skopje), Albert Heta (Stacion – Center for Contemporary Arts, Pristina), Milica Pekić (Kiosk/Kooperativa, Belgrade), Darka Radosavljević Vasiljević (Remont/ Independent Culture Scene of Serbia, Belgrade), Iskra Gešoska (Kontrapunkt/Jadro Assotiation, Skopje), Dražen Crnomat (UNSA Geto, Banja Luka), Marija Đorđević (Politika, Beograd), Janja Sesar (Kurziv/Kulturpunkt, Zagreb), Jasmin Duraković (Depo.ba, Sarajevo), Nebojša Ilijevski (Center for Media Activities, Skopje), Ben Andoni (Gazeta Shiptare, Tirana) and Nataša Novaković (blogger, Banja Luka).

The sessions will be moderated by Aleksandar Brkić (University of Arts, Belgrade), Gordana Igrić (BIRN) and Vesna Milosavljević (SEEcult.org), and will be followed by questions from the floor and discussion. 

The conclusions of the conference and its panel discussions will be used for a common appeal and recommendation letter to all decision-makers and other relevant stakeholders in the region, as well as for the BICCED project follow up.

The end of the conference will include a presentation of the Culture Watch Award, established by the BICCED project with the aim of promoting an investigative and analytical approach to journalism in culture.

For more information on the BICCED program please go to:

http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/tag-group-topics/culture-watch

Information on organisers – BIRN: www.birn.eu.com, SEECult.org: www.seecult.org

Information on donor – SCP: www.scp-ba.net/

Jeta Xharra

Jeta Xharra is a renowned journalist in Kosovo and Balkans, hosting the award-winning current-affairs TV programme, Life in Kosovo.

Since 2005, Xharra is the Country Director of BIRN office in Kosovo and the editor-in-chief of Kosovo’s most-watched current affairs TV programme, Life in Kosovo.

Xharra got into journalism working as a fixer/local producer for BBC News and Channel 4 in 1998 and later became the Manager of the BBC Kosovo Bureau. In 1999 Jeta worked for BBC News in Albania and Macedonia.

She graduated with an MA in War Studies from King’s College London (2000) and an MA with Distinction in Screenwriting from the London College of Printing (2002).

She has published a front-page article in ‘The Independent’ and other texts in The Economist, Sunday Telegraph and Jane’s Intelligence Review. While in the UK, Xharra worked for the Foreign News Planning Desk at the BBC World Service.

In 2003 Xharra became the project director for IWPR Kosovo office, where she made most impact with vigilant and challenging moderation of popular current affairs programmes broadcast on the main Kosovo TV channels, RTK and KTV. Under Xharra’s supervision, Kosovo was the first office in the IWPR

Balkan project to develop a three-month journalism training programme, which attracted over 200 people for 20 places.

‘Warless’, a play that Xharra wrote in English, was chosen as one of the 10 best plays among 550 that competed in the Young Writers Festival in Royal Court Theatre in London where it had a public reading on December 10 2004.

Steps against Anonymization

The Association of Court Reporters, AIS has agreed to visit four local communities by the end of the year and continue advocating against anonymization of legally-binding court documents referring to war crimes.

During a meeting held in Sarajevo on Wednesday, September 12 AIS members repeated their earlier allegations that they found it more difficult to report from war-crimes trials than before, because the State Prosecution no longer provided indictments to public and because the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina adopted a Rulebook in March, restricting access to information.

As said at this meeting, a complaint about the violation of the Law on Access to Information, which AIS and the Balkans Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, filed with the Human Rights Ombudsmen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, was in its final phase and the mentioned institution would announce its conclusion soon.

AIS participants said that they believed that the conclusion would be favourable for transparency and journalists and that the reporting from courtrooms in Bosnia and Herzegovina would be made easier.

AIS members said that, in case of need, they would file a suit with the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, pointing to insubstantiality of “the Rulebook on access to information under the control of the Court and cooperation with the community” of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina and “Instructions on anonymization of court decisions, audio/video recordings from trials and other informational material” adopted earlier this year, which limit access to war-crimes trials.

Considering the fact that these decisions fully anonymize verdicts for war crimes, AIS members have agreed to prepare an analysis, in the upcoming period, on how many verdicts have been pronounced during this year, which only contain initials, instead of full names of convicted persons, making it impossible to determine who the war crimes perpetrators are.

Also, AIS members have agreed to visit four local communities – Orasje, Brcko, Trebinje and Eastern Sarajevo, in the coming three months. Meetings between journalists and judicial institutions will be convened in those towns in order to discuss the anonymization of court decisions.

The meeting concluded that those meetings would be of great use, considering the fact that they would help improve the collaboration between entity judicial organizations and journalists and find out whether courts in Republika Srpska, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Brcko District intended to anonymize their decisions as well.

As agreed, the first meeting will be held in Orasje in late September this year. Besides representatives of judicial organizations from the Posavina area, representatives of courts and prosecutors’ offices from Tuzla Canton will be invited to attend.

A meeting with the media and judicial institutions from Brcko District will be convened in October, while similar meetings will be held in Trebinje and Eastern Sarajevo in November.

At the end of the year AIS, with the help from BIRN, will organize an annual conference to which representatives of state judicial institutions will be invited. The conference participants will exchange arguments about the anonymization and recommendations arising from the decision of the Ombudsmen of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Brcko: Recommendations for better cooperation

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN BiH, in collaboration with the Association of Court Reporters, AIS, held a workshop in Brcko with the aim of increasing transparency of judicial institutions and the responsibility of the media when it comes to reporting on court processes and investigations.

During the workshop held on October 30 this year it was concluded that journalists faced major problems as they were unable to obtain information about the work of the Basic Court of Brcko District and the Appellate Court of Brcko District.

Several recommendations were made with the aim of improving the existing co-operation. Journalists, as well as representatives of judicial institutions and police, agreed with those recommendations.

Journalists would like to see hearing schedules uploaded on the Court’s website, so they can be familiarize themselves with the timing and attend the hearings. Also, announcements issued by the Court should not be overloaded with legal terminology. Besides that, journalists request that second instance verdicts also be published on the website. 

Judicial institutions in Brcko have had to deal with the anonymization issue for nearly two years. Representatives of the Brcko District Prosecution have tried to solve the problem by revising the relevant legislation in an attempt to facilitate the work of both the media and prosecutors.

However, the initiative has not been a successful one. They had to conform to the rules set by the Agency for Protection of Personal Data, which stipulate that all official documents, including verdicts and indictments, can only mention initials of individual’s names, instead of the full first and last names of indictees and convicts, as well as other parties mentioned in them.  

Despite the anonymization, the Brcko District Prosecution says that the media can obtain indictments confirmed by the Court, so they could report more easily and know what charges are pressed against a certain person.

Additionally journalists pointed out that they also need copies of a second instance verdict – even though they contained initials only – particularly when they conducted  research or analysis.

The electronic media in Brcko face problems with obtaining audio or video recordings, because no possibility for obtaining them from judicial institutions exists.

The President of the Basic Court sometimes approves a request for recording at the beginning of the trial, but the recording can last for a couple of minutes only. Journalists say that, in most cases judges keep quiet while the cameras are in the courtroom. They point out that this causes problems from them, as they are not able to produce quality reports from judicial institutions. 

Journalists commended their co-operation with the police spokesperson, but they consider that police should hire “a professional” to make recordings during police operations, because the current recordings are most often not usable.

Representatives of judicial institutions consider that they need to be trained on the collaboration with the media. At the same time, journalists say that they require additional knowledge, given the fact that reporting on court processes is a specific field. Journalists point out that editors should be trained as well, because they frequently fail to understand some of the legal terms they use, so they replace them with incorrect terms while editing the articles. 

The workshop participants concluded that regular press conferences at which journalists could obtain information from judicial institutions or brief monthly meetings at which journalists could become familiarised with the results achieved in the judicial system should be held.

The workshop was attended by: Dragan Djukic, Edina Djogo, Branislav Ribar, Hakija Karic, Samir Beganovic, Halid Emkic, Zdravko Popovic, Mirsad Arnautovic, Admir Kadric, Rade Grbic, Novak Tanasic, Erna Mackic, Zlatan Music and Muamer Selimbegovic.

The meeting in Brcko is one in a series of meetings organized by BIRN BiH in collaboration with AIS in local communities throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina where war crimes are being processed. The meetings aim at improving collaboration between the media and judicial institutions, enabling objective and timely information to reach the general public.

Orasje: A need to ensure transparency

The Balkans Investigative Reporting Network in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Association of Court Reporters, AIS held a meeting in Orasje on November 6 this year with the aim of increasing the transparency of judicial institutions and heightening the responsibility of media in the Posavina and Tuzla Canton.

The meeting resulted in several recommendations as participants concluded that the transparency of judicial institutions was not at a satisfactory level. This is primarily caused by the fact that the judicial institutions do not have spokespersons who can collaborate with the media and provide them with information.

Considering the fact that representatives of judicial institutions pointed out that they lacked resources for hiring a spokesperson, participants concluded that managers of judicial institutions should therefore invest additional efforts in ensuring the transparency of law implementation activities.

In order to achieve this, it was proposed to the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council to send an announcement to all cantonal, district and judicial institutions of Brcko District, telling them that they are obliged to increase transparency of their work by organising press conferences, sending announcements to journalists or organising briefings at which journalists can familiarize themselves with their work.

Besides that, representatives of judiciary and the media from the Posavina and Tuzla Cantons agree that the practices relating to the anonymisation of documents should be harmonised, since it is not clear what is being anonymised and how, or introduce other practices related to the publishing of indictments and court documents.

When it comes to co-operation between the media and police, the meeting participants concluded that it was at a satisfactory level and that the police spokesperson can serve as a role model for judicial institutions in terms of good communication with the media.

Media say that they receive information about cases while they are still handled by police, but, as soon as the Prosecution or Court take over and an indictment is filed or confirmed, it becomes difficult to obtain information about what is happening or what stage the case is in.

The Posavina Cantonal Prosecution points out that they are ready to co-operate with the media, but they are often not able to implement it in practice due to a lack of personnel, because prosecutors deal with concrete cases.

Also, it was pointed out that some media were unprofessional and often superficial when it comes to reporting on the work of judicial institutions.

Representatives of the media think that they perform their job in a correct manner, but they cannot influence editors, who draw certain conclusions that are not in line with professional and ethic standards, since they are not familiar with judicial terminology.

The meeting held in Orasje was one in a series of meetings organised by BIRN and AIS with the aim of improving the collaboration between media and judicial institutions, particularly given that numerous cases have been transferred to cantonal, district and Brcko District courts for further processing as part of the implementation of the State War Crimes Processing Strategy.

NGO Partnership Launches Campaign on Civic Education

In partnership with six NGOs in Kosovo, BIRN Kosovo participated in the launch of the “Merr Pjese” campaign for civic education for elections.

The campaign aims to foster basic democratic values, including participation, individual voting, voter registration, and action against electoral fraud. It is being implemented from October through November 2012, and covers all the municipalities in Kosovo. As part of the campaign, BIRN Kosovo is also organising community meetings in schools with first time voters to inform them of forms of electoral fraud and penalties that follow.

At the project’s opening conference, Kaltrina Hoxha, BIRN Kosovo Project Coordinator, presented the activities that BIRN Kosovo is carrying out as part of the campaign.
“The main focus of these interactive meetings is to raise awareness on violations during electoral processes, ways to report fraud, responsible institutions and their roles and responsibilities, in order to prevent fraud in future electoral processes,” Hoxha said.

BIRN Kosovo has extensive experience in election monitoring and has carried out follow-up activities on violations during electoral processes held in Kosovo. BIRN Kosovo has also filed 20 complaints which have resulted in the annulment of problematic polling stations around the country. At the same time, the organisation has produced lengthy televised reports covering the findings of its monitors in the field.

Increased Transparency and Education Needed

Journalists and representatives of judicial institutions in Trebinje, BiH are satisfied with their mutual co-operation, but they agree that it could be further improved by educating journalists on reporting court proceedings.

Also, representatives of judicial institutions agree that they should increase their transparency, by announcing information even if the particular pieces of information have not been requested by the media.

Bojan Stevic, President of the District Court in Trebinje, said that no regular press conferences were held, but he had a yearly meeting with journalists, at which they could receive an explanation of certain issues of which they had not been previously aware.

Despite the good collaboration, Stevic points out that journalists and editors should be further educated in order to be able to report from courts in a correct, objective and professional manner.

The District Court in Trebinje does not have a spokesperson, but an information officer who decides whether certain pieces of information will be distributed or not. The Court President explains that a judge, who, at the same time, is President of the Crime Section, addressed journalists in most cases, because he is the one having most pieces of information that can be shared with the public.

Journalists admit that they often fail to follow a proceeding to its very end, which means that they lacked consistency in sharing information. Considering the fact that they claim to have very good collaboration with the spokesperson of the Safety Service Station in Trebinje, they say that the sharing of information about a certain case or proceeding usually ends at that point.

They think that this is caused by the fact that war-crimes trials should be followed by journalists working with public broadcasting stations, rather than those employed with commercial stations. However, they do admit that citizens are certainly interested in war crimes trials, as well as other trials closely related to their local communities.

When it comes to the District Prosecution in Trebinje, journalists point out that they can obtain limited information, but they are aware of the fact that the Prosecution is conducting investigations, which they do not want to undermine. Having all this in mind, they consider their co-operation with the Secretary, who also acts as an information officer, good.

The workshop in Trebinje was held on November 13 with the aim of increasing transparency of judicial institutions and responsibility of the media. The workshop was organized by the Balkans Investigative Reporting Network in collaboration with the Association of Court Reporters with support from Konrad Adenauer Stiftung.