News and Events Archives - Page 186 of 264

BIRN Debates Role of Transitional Justice in Serbia’s EU Talks

As part of its Balkan Transitional Justice project, BIRN is holding a one-day conference on November 14 in Belgrade to examine what part the issue of transitional justice will play in Serbia’s forthcoming membership negotiations with the European Union.

The first panel will examine two topics, ‘EU efforts and the Institutional Framework for Achieving Transitional Justice in Serbia’ and ‘Achievements and Obstacles in Transitional Justice in the Region’.

The panel will consist of Pierre Mirel, director for the western Balkans at the European Commission Directorate for Western Balkans, Cedomir Backovic from the Serbian justice ministry, Vladimir Vukcevic, Serbia’s chief war crimes prosecutor, Ivan Jovanovic from OSCE Serbia, Marijana Toma from the Humanitarian Law Centre, Jelena Jovic from Documenta, Maja Micic from the Youth Initiative for Human Rights and Erna Mackic from BIRN Bosnia.

The second panel will also tackle two topics, ‘The Role of Civil Society in Serbia’s Negotiations with the EU in the Field of Transitional Justice’ and ‘Monitoring of War Crime Trials’, and will include Ivana Cirkovic from the Serbian government’s Office for Cooperation with Civil Society alongside representatives of civil society and media.

The conference, entitled ‘Achievements and Position of Transitional Justice in Talks Between Serbia and the EU’, will be opened by BIRN’s regional director Gordana Igric.

The conference is part of BIRN’s Balkan Transitional Justice project, which aims to improve public understanding of transitional justice issues in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

The full agenda can be downloaded here.

BIRN Produces Documentary About Missing Persons

BIRN Bosnia and Herzegovina is making a film about people who have been missing since the 1990s war, inspired by a conference in The Hague last week hosted by the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP).

The documentary will deal with the worldwide challenges and different practices involved in the process of accounting for missing persons. It will also highlight the role of the ICMP in the identification process in BiH.

The film will feature interviews with some of the most prominent practitioners in the field, including forensic experts and rights campaigners.

Set to appear are Andreas Wigger of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Queen Noor of Jordan, Kathryne Bomberger of the ICMP, Ronald K. Noble of Interpol, Radwan Ziadeh of the Damascus Centre for Human Rights Studies, Jose Antonio Lorente of the Department of Forensic Medicine of the University of Granada, Olgica Bozanic of the Regional Coordination of the Family Association of Republic of Serbia, and Sister Consuelo Morales of Citizens in Support of Human Rights from Mexico.

The film’s production is being supported by the Civil Rights Defenders and the OSCE Mission to BiH. Its release is expected at the end of the year.

BIRN Serbia launches research on media financing

BIRN Serbia has begun a new project to research current practices in media financing, which will result in the development of best-practice recommendations as well as proposals for the monitoring and evaluation of future practice in the area.

The overall aim of the project is to protect the public interest through the provision of independent and quality media production and more transparent public spending.

According to government-adopted Media Strategy and the new Draft Law on Public Information and Media, public funds should be allocated to the media outlets only through open-call procedures. Currently, the majority of funds for media are allocated directly, while a smaller portion are allocated based on open calls for projects and through tenders.

The project strategy is intended to develop a non-discriminatory, consistent and transparent system of financing media production in order to enable citizens to exercise their right to complete, timely and objective information.

Within the project, BIRN will analyse the existing practice of financing, develop proposals for future practice and organise a series of round table discussions in five cities.

The project research will start by December 2013 and will last until October 2014.

This research is part of BIRN’s ‘Enhancing media independence through development of sustainable and competitive financing model’ project, conducted under the auspices of the Embassy of the Netherlands in Belgrade.

Belgraders pack cinema to see BIRN documentary

About 200 people attended the screening on October 31 of BIRN’s Balkan road-movie documentary ‘The Majority Starts Here’ in Belgrade.

The Dom Omladine cinema was packed for the screening and warm applause greeted the end of the film documentary about young people and the legacy of war in the former Yugoslavia.

‘The Majority Starts Here’ follows six young people from the former Yugoslavia who make a journey through the region, examining how the conflicts of the past, which they were too young to understand fully at the time, have influenced both their present and their prospects for the future.

Along the way, they come face-to-face with some of the ghosts of the past in the shape of impoverished wartime refugees, military veterans and unrepentant nationalists.

They also see how nationalist ideas which led to war have been reflected in the region’s economy, culture and even architecture, as they muse on how genuine tolerance and reconciliation can develop in places which have endured such divisive violence.

The film was premiered in Skopje on September 26, and then screened in Belgrade, Zagreb, Pristina, Sarajevo, Novi Sad, Podgorica and Tuzla.

A three-episode version of the documentary has been shown on television stations across the region including Macedonian cable TV station 24 VESTI, Sarajevo-based Al Jazeera Balkans and Montenegrin TV channel Vijesti.

‘The Majority Starts Here’ was produced by BIRN and directed by award-winning film-maker Lode Desmet. In 2006, Desmet and BIRN also produced the film ‘Does Anyone Have a Plan?’, about the future status of Kosovo.

The documentary is part of BIRN’s Balkan Transitional Justice project, which aims to improve public understanding of transitional justice issues in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

BIRN Serbia holds debate on EU’s 2013 progress report

BIRN Serbia held a debate on Tuesday about whether the government has been successful and efficient in implementing reforms in the context of European Commission’s recently-published 2013 report on Serbia’s progress.

The debate focused on four key areas – the economy, health, education and the fight against corruption – in which BIRN Serbia has been monitoring government policies for the past year and a half.

The speakers were Dragana Zarkovic-Obradovic, director of BIRN Serbia, Jasminka Cekic Markovic, director of the Centre for Education Policies, Predrag Stojicic, director of Serbia on the Move, Kori Udovicki, director of the Centre for Advanced Economic studies and Nemanja Nenadic, programme director for the watchdog organisation Transparency.

More than 40 media, NGO and public administration representatives took part in the conference.

Dragana Zarkovic-Obradovic said that BIRN’s latest research showed that, even though European Commission report was generally considered “historically positive”, the real effects of the government’s reforms only range from semi-successes to failures.

Kori Udovicki stressed that the government’s economic promises were populist and that it is necessary to follow priorities and plan strategically in order to increase productivity.

She said that tightening up financial discipline and the rationalisation of the public sector were the main mechanisms for the recovery of Serbian economy.

Nemanja Nenadic said he believes that the EC report corresponded to real reforms in Serbia, but that it did not cover all the important issues – problems that repeat themselves from year to year, which Serbia has not done enough to solve.

He added that Serbia is entering another pre-election campaign period even though issues that came up during the previous election still haven’t been solved.

All participants in the debate agreed that the EC’s ratings are better than in previous years, but noted that Brussels is never too severe with the authorities.

The debate was part of the BIRN Serbia ‘Accountability Tools for Monitoring Government Performance’ project, which was conducted under the auspices of the British Embassy in Belgrade.

Novi Sad students quiz BIRN on transitional justice

Petar Subotin of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network gave a lecture on journalism and transitional justice at the Jovan Jovanovic Zmaj high school in Novi Sad on Monday to coincide with the first screening of BIRN’s documentary The Majority Starts Here in the northern Serbian city that evening.

More than 30 students attended the one-hour lecture and afterwards posed questions about topics like investigative journalism and news writing procedures, but also about transitional justice and reconciliation processes in the Balkans.

Picking up on the topic of BIRN’s film, they were eager to find out if people of their generation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Kosovo knew about the crimes that happened in each country in the region during the 1990s wars.

They were also interested in how the six young people featured in the documentary reacted when faced with difficult situations and tough stories from the conflicts.

When asked if they would agree to participate in such a project, many said that they would, mostly because they felt that they would not experience any difficulties when sitting at the same table with youngsters from neighbouring countries.

Questions were also asked about studying journalism, whether it was hard to become a good journalist and whether it was difficult to find a proper job outside tabloid newspapers.

The lecture was one of the first steps in a new BIRN initiative to bring transitional justice issues closer to young people.

BIRN Documentary Airs on Al Jazeera Balkans and TV Vijesti

The first episode of BIRN’s documentary series The Majority Starts Here was screened on Al Jazeera Balkans on Sunday evening.

This was followed on Monday evening by a screening on Montenegrin TV channel Vijesti as part of the show ‘Bez Granica’, along with an interview with BIRN regional director Gordana Igric.

BIRN launched its promotion of the documentary last month with a premiere of the full film in Skopje, Macedonia, followed by inaugural screenings in Belgrade, Zagreb, Pristina, Sarajevo and Novi Sad. The film’s premiere in Tuzla is scheduled for Friday, while screenings in Podgorica, Kraljevo and Subotica will follow.

“The film documents the journey of six young people through the region and their encounter with nationalism, ethnic tensions, prejudice – key ingredients in the bloody menu of the Balkan wars,” the head of BIRN Macedonia, Ana Petruseva, told the audience of journalists, diplomatic and NGO representatives before the Skopje premiere.

A three-episode version and six-episode version of the documentary is being aired on TV channels across the Balkans.

In the film, the six young people from six Balkan countries examine how the conflicts of the past have influenced both their present and their prospects for the future.

Along the way, they come face-to-face with some of the ghosts of the past in the shape of impoverished refugees, military veterans and unrepentant nationalists.

They also see how the nationalist ideas that led to war have been reflected in the region’s economy, culture and even architecture, as they muse on how genuine tolerance and reconciliation can develop in places that have endured such divisive violence.

The Majority Starts Here was produced by BIRN and directed by award-winning film-maker Lode Desmet. In 2006, Desmet and BIRN also produced the film Does Anyone Have a Plan?, about the future status of Kosovo.

Find out more at: http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/page/balkan-transitional-justice-movie-home

BIRN Kosovo Journalist Wins Reporting Prize

Kaltrina Rexhepi, a journalist for the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Kosovo, has won first prize in awards for reporting on poverty given by the United Nations Kosovo Team and the Association of Professional Journalists of Kosovo.

Rexhepi’s video report, ‘Collective Apartments in Magura Have No Access to Water’, published on BIRN Kosovo’s online portal, GazetaJNK, explores how 22 families in a public apartment in Magura, a village in the Lipjan municipality, have not had running water suitable for drinking or bathing for the past seven years.

In the report, the Institute of Public Health tells GazetaJNK that the health of the villagers is at risk; however, the authorities have not taken any action to provide them with water.

In 2013, GazetaJNK began publishing video reports in addition to text-based articles.

BIRN Serbia publishes ministries’ 2012 discretionary expenditures

BIRN Serbia has published a database of the discretionary expenditures of the country’s ministries for 2012 on its portal Javno.rs.

The database contains information on how the ministries spent public funds on budget lines 423 and 424, contracted services and specialised services for 2010, 2011 and 2012.

The Serbian government has announced savings in the area of goods and services and discretion rights as one of its planned measures for economic recovery. This measure is intended to deliver savings up to four billion dinars for the state budget.

BIRN’s research has shown that the ministries have increased discretionary expenses during the past three years and paid 53.6 billion dinars in total for various contractual and specialised services.

In 2010, ministries spent 2.6 billion dinars on specialised services and11.6 billion dinars on contracted services.

According to data for 2011, the costs of specialised services were reduced and total expenditures of ministries on these were 1.5 billion dinars, while the costs of contracted services increased by five billion dinars compared to the previous year.

The data that BIRN collected for 2012 showed an opposite trend in the spending of public money on these two budget lines. The ministries spent much more money to pay for specialised services, nearly 19 billion dinars, while on contracted services, they spent only 2.1 billion.

All the information contained in this database was based on requests for access to information of public importance and it took up to six months to collect all the answers and two more months to make easily accessible and searchable.

Javno.rs is an open and fully searchable database containing thousands of documents on public expenditure. The databases that have been created will be supplemented every year while new ones will be developed, covering fields of interest that we assess as murky areas of public expenditure or as potential generators of corruption in Serbia.

For which specific services and with which individuals and legal entities ministries closed contracts worth up to tens of millions of deinars, see the website http://javno.skockajtebudzet.rs/index.php.

The idea for Javno came from BIRN but our many partners helped to implement it, from the British Embassy in Belgrade to IREX.

BIRN Screens Youth and War Film in Novi Sad

After premieres in Skopje, Belgrade, Sarajevo, Zagreb and Pristina, BIRN’s new road-movie documentary The Majority Starts Here was screened in the Serbian city of Novi Sad.

The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network’s new documentary, which follows six young people from six Balkan countries as they travel across the region examining how the conflicts of the past have affected their lives, was screened on Monday in Novi Sad.

BIRN’s regional director Gordana Igric said that the film showed that young people from former Yugoslav countries could still establish friendly relations.

“We were surprised how these young people were not burdened by the war and how they managed to overcome the ethnic differences. They even played paintball in Kosovo, without any resemblance to the war in the 1990s,” Igric said.

The event was attended by 120 people from including journalists, civil society representatives, students from the media studies department of Novi Sad philosophy faculty and general public.

The film was first shown in Skopje in late September, then in Sarajevo and Belgrade, followed by screenings in Zagreb and Pristina.

A three-episode version of the documentary will also be aired on TV channels across the Balkans.