Category: News and Events

Adrian Paci Discusses “Centro Di Permanenza Temporanea” at Reporting House

An airport in San Jose, CA, where a crowd silently lines up towards an aircraft boarding staircase, is the very first image of the film that the renowned Albanian artist from Shkodra, Adrian Paci, presents to his audience, inviting them to rethink the conception of migration.

His film, titled “Centro di Permanenza Temporanea”, which is Italian and translates to “Temporary Detention Center”, refers to the Italian temporary camps for undocumented immigrants, evoking a paradox between temporary and permanent existence.

On the 2nd of October, Adrian Paci joined BIRN Kosovo at Reporting House, in an inspiring work, which explores themes of identity, migration, and political transformation, reflecting Paci’s own journey of displacement.

Paci’s work challenges viewers to contemplate the state of those waiting for a fight to nowhere, trapped between the transitory and the fixed. It symbolizes the broader dislocation experienced by migrants worldwide. His work has been featured at the Venice Biennale and in major collections like MoMA and the Guggenheim.

Currently his work is exhibited at Reporting House. His work is significant as displacement and migration is a constant outcome of conflicts and wars.

The discussion with Paci, provided a unique opportunity for over 60 participants, especially in the field of arts, to engage with Paci’s insights and work, and a very personal story of the journey of an artist of displacement and rediscovery.

“Centro di Permanenza Temporanea” is being screened at Reporting House and is open for visitors – from Tuesday to Saturday, starting from 10 am to 6 pm – at the former Germia Department Store Building in the center of Prishtina/Kosovo.

25 Years of German-Kosovar Partnership Marked at Reporting House

On October 2, 2024, BIRN Kosovo hosted an event at Reporting House to commemorate 25 years of a strong and evolving partnership between Germany and Kosovo, through a panel discussion that explored the past, the present, and the future of this relationship.

The panel discussion “25 Years of German-Kosovar Partnership Marked at Reporting House”, organized in partnership with the German Embassy in Prishtina, gathered hundreds of participants from politics, media, civil society, and diplomats.

Moderated by Michael Martens, from the renowned German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the panel included key voices on this discussion, such as Manuel Sarrazin, the German Federal Government Special Representative for the Western Balkans; Donika Emini, Senior Security Expert and Researcher, and publicist Veton Surroi.

The discussion highlighted Germany’s crucial role during the Kosovo War and the state-building process, its significant financial and political investments, and the ongoing challenges and expectations that have shaped the partnership between the two nations since 1990.

As the focus shifted to the future, the speakers stressed the importance of continued collaboration to tackle current European challenges, including the integration process for the Western Balkans.

Border Graves Project Wins Investigative Award

An investigation project into unmarked graves of migrants in Europe, which included a BIRN investigation, has won a top journalism prize.

A major cross-border journalism project that identified hundreds of unmarked graves of migrants has won the Impact Award at the annual Investigative Journalism Award for Europe (IJ4EU). 

The Border Graves Investigation, a cross-border project that confirmed over 1,000 unmarked graves of migrants across Europe over the last ten years, included a story by journalist Barbara Matejcic for BIRN about state-linked refugee deaths in Croatia.

The ceremony was held on September 26th at IJ4EU’s annual UNCOVERED Conference, hosted at the iMEdD International Journalism Forum in Athens.

Barbara Matejcic’s investigation, ‘Nomen Nescio: Dying En Route to Europe, Buried Without a Name,’ was published on BIRN’s flagship outlet, Balkan Insight. She worked on it with seven freelance journalists in countries along the European Union’s borders. The team wanted to investigate how these deaths occur, especially when they are the result of the EU border regime.

“For me, it’s important that the research for which we were awarded raises the question of the causes of death at the borders of the European Union,” Matejcic said BIRN.

“People die not because of impassable rivers or mountains, but because of border regimes. If your life is threatened in Afghanistan or Pakistan, you have no other way to claim protection in the European Union than to go on a deadly journey.

“It is also important to me that it is known that the violent behaviour of the police at the borders is directly responsible for some of these deaths, as I showed in my part of the investigation that concerned Croatia and the Croatian police. Professionally, this award is a confirmation that even small research teams of freelancers can win this kind of award in competition with large media houses and significant funds invested in their research.”

An independent jury consisted of Maltese investigative journalist Paul Caruana Galizia, pioneering documentary maker Christopher Hird, deputy director of the Global Investigative Journalism Network Gabriela Manuli, award-winning Kosovo journalist Saranda Ramaj, and media freedom advocate Nik Williams, who co-chairs the UK Anti-SLAPP Coalition.

“This project is a perfect example of how to do investigative journalism with boots on the ground, while shining a light on individual stories and humanising victims,” Manuli said.

“What makes it more exemplary, is that it was conducted by a very small cross-border team. Out of the eight reporters, six of them are full-time freelancers, and the other two are affiliated with small newsrooms. And all this significant reporting was done with very little resources, in a period of over six months.”

The jury was unanimous in its decision. The winning teams received cash prizes of €5,000 each.

The award is organised by Investigative Journalism for Europe, a fund that supports cross-border watchdog journalism in and around the European Union.

Western Balkan Journalists Trained in Data Analysis and Data Visualization

Journalists from six Balkans countries were given training in vital modern newsroom techniques by BIRN.

A group of 38 journalists from six countries across the Balkans have been trained in data analysis and visualisation by BIRN.

Between September 23-30, the journalists, from Albania, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, took part in three online training sessions.

Run by BIRN as part of the Western Balkans Media for Change project, the training focused on sessions to enhance journalists skills in data analysis and visualisation – key skills required in today’s evolving newsrooms.

Training sessions on data analysis were led by Besar Likmeta, editor-in-chief of BIRN Albania, in the Albanian language, and by Milica Stojanovic, an investigative journalist with Balkan Insight, in Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian.

These sessions focused on showcasing ways to analyse crowdsourced data collected via BIRN’s Engaged Citizens Reporting (ECR) tool using spreadsheets. The ECR tool, developed by BIRN through the Media for All project, allows citizens to contribute with their testimonies, forming a valuable data source for journalistic stories.

Additionally, Azem Kurtic, also an investigative journalist with Balkan Insight, provided insights into data visualisation techniques. Kurtic introduced participants to various data visualisation tools, including Knight Lab, Flourish, and Datawrapper, which help enhance storytelling through interactive and visually engaging elements.

This training complements a previous session held in June by Jonathan Stoneman, a data journalist and trainer with extensive career in BBC.

The Western Balkan Media for Change project is funded by the UK government and implemented by the British Council in partnership with BIRN, the Thomson Foundation, and INTRAC. The project supports the work of media outlets and individual journalists across the Western Balkans.

Journalists Awarded For Top Investigative Journalism in Montenegro

Six journalists were handed awards at the EU Investigative Journalism Awards on September 30th.

Stories on water pollution, banned pesticides and the mass shooting in Cetinje were some of the subjects for which six journalists have received awards for outstanding investigative journalism in Montenegro.

Tatjana Asanin, Nikola Milosavic Aleksic, Svetlana Djokic, Milica Babic, Djurdja Radulovic and Andrea Perisic were announced as winners at the 2024 annual EU Investigative Journalism Awards at Europe House in Podgorica on September 30th.

First prize was shared between Tatjana Asanin and Nikola Milosavic Aleksic from TV Vijesti for their series about sewage, “In Murky Waters, and Svetlana & Milica from TV E for their series, “Massacre of Responsibilities’, which revealed new details about the Cetinje massacre in which 10 people were killed.

The second prize went to Djurdja Radulovic from Balkan Insight for the investigation titled “Nobody Checks: Bying Banned Pesticides in Montenegro,” a compelling piece that reveals the dangerous consequences of unregulated sales of banned pesticides in Montenegro, posing serious risks to health and the environment. The story has been developed as part of the BIRN’s Summer School.

The third prize was awarded to Andrea Perisic from the Center for Investigative Journalism for her powerful exposé, “Smuggling of Montenegro archaeological treasures: They blow up, sell and destroy heritage without punishment”.

The jury consisted of Branko Cecen, an experienced journalist who led the Center for Investigative Journalism of Serbia (CINS) to international acclaim; Olivera Nikolic who now heads the Montenegro Media Institute; and Mileva Malesic a founder of the Women’s Forum Prijepolje and the TV Forum. More about the jury members can be found here.

European Union ambassador to Montenegro, Mr. Johann Sattler, handed out the awards certificates.

BIRN Kosovo Holds Terrorism and Extremism Workshop

Local groups were informed by experts and officials about how Kosovo is monitoring the threat from terrorism and extremist violence.

BIRN Kosovo held a workshop for local groups on how to effectively monitor terrorism and violent extremism.

The workshop, in Prishtina on September 30, was attended by local NGOs and representatives of local civil society organisations (CSOs).

It began with participants from CSOs giving an overview of their work and interest in the field of preventing and countering violent extremism. There was a short presentation on the current situation regarding terrorism and extremism in Kosovo. This was followed by an explanation of the National Strategy for Preventing and Countering Terrorism, with a focus on developing monitoring and research projects on this topic.

During the workshop, Kreshnik Gashi, Managing Editor of Kallxo.com, an online platform which exposes corruption, discussed how the national strategy, which runs from 2023 to 2028, is being implemented at a local level.

Milot Sfishta, from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, provided an overview of how and where terrorism and extremism were impacting Kosovo, and how the government could collaborate with CSOs in addressing these issues.

The workshop was part of the Resilient Community Programme funded by the Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund (GCERF). 

Overmatter 

focused on the development of monitoring and research projects in the fields of terrorism and extremism. A total of 12 participants took part in the one-day, focused workshop focused on the field of preventing and countering violent extremism, out of which 4 were women.
During the workshop, the attendees were engaged and expressed their opinions that such workshops are very important for them as they continue working in the civil society sector in the local level.

Lala Meredith-Vula Opens the “A Journey With My Father” Exhibition at Prishtina Hamam

On the first day of October, Reporting House welcomed the British-Albanian artist, Lala Meredith Vula, as she opened her exhibit “A Journey with My Father”, featuring selected works from her “Bathers” series.

The opening event was held at the historic Hamam of Prishtina and included a discussion with the artists on her photography, which captures the social life from different regions of Kosovo during the 1980s and 1990s.

The artist explained to the audience that her series of photography “Bathers” is a very personal series, as it reflects her reconnection with her father from whom she was separated when she was 4 years old.

“This series of photographs is very poignant for me because it was a journey I undertook with my father and he was sharing his love of architecture with me in the 1980s and 90s. What I saw was his enthusiasm and joy in architecture. What I experienced are these photographs”, said Meredith Vula.

Her father worked in Kosovo’s Institution for Protection of Monuments, specializing in preserving old hammams. As he introduced her to this world, Vula began documenting the disuse of the Prishtina Hamam, later photographing bathers at a functioning Hamam near the Albanian-Macedonian border and photographed those bathers who are returned to a hamam today, as they experienced it then, four decades ago.

In “Bathers,” Vula challenges traditional artistic representations of women bathing, offering a modern, spontaneous perspective.

“In my research, I stumbled into a hidden dream world of calm and purity, a safe place of mysterious beauty. These photographs are dedicated to the hope and beauty which I found amongst these women” said Vula.

This event gathered artists, civil society representatives, architects, and media.

Lala Meredith Vula’s exhibition will be open at Prishtinas Hamma, during October, from Monday to Saturday.

E-Government in the Balkans Still a Work in Progress: BIRN Report

A new BIRN report says a lack of funds and political will means that e-government services and open data provision in the Balkans remain very limited.

E-government is becoming the norm around the world, but people in the Balkans are not benefitting in full because of a lack of political will in some cases and a shortfall in institutional capacity in general, a new report on open data and digitalisation published by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network shows.

The idea of ‘electronic government’, or e-government, is to eradicate queues, reduce paperwork and provide users with quicker, more convenient access to public services, from health to taxation and schooling.

In the Balkans, however, the roll-out has only been partial and faces a range of challenges, according to BIRN’s report, Open Data and Digitalisation in the Western Balkans: The State of Play,

“There remains a significant gap in their capacity to fully leverage digitalization across various dimensions, including skills development, system integration, cybersecurity, and user-centric solutions,” said an Albanian digital security expert.

Limited services

BIRN’s report highlights how Balkan countries are performing badly in e-government development; the online offering of public services remains limited.

In 2022, Serbia ranked 40th on the UN’s E-Government Development Index, ahead of Albania, Montenegro and North Macedonia in 63rd, 71st and 80th place respectively. Bosnia and Herzegovina came in at 96. Kosovo was not listed.

The governments of all six Western Balkan countries covered by the BIRN report have specialised e-government websites and all e-government portals analysed by BIRN are active and up to date; new services are created on a regular basis.

Serbia launched ‘eUprava’ in 2010. A decade later, the portal was updated with a new design and functionality adapted for mobile and tablet devices. The address remained the same – euprava.gov.rs.

Serbia offers 186 unique e-government services, enabling users to access documents, certificates and services concerning education, family, healthcare, employment and urban planning.

Montenegro’s e-government system claims to provide over 500 services under the jurisdiction of 50 public institutions, but 349 of these are instructions on how to use government services.

North Macedonia’s offers services from 170 public institutions, out of a total of roughly 1,300.

Bosnia and Herzegovina has three separate e-government portals – one for each entity and a third for the autonomous district of Brcko. But there is no information on how many services these offer.

The e-Albania portal offers 1,237 online services and boasts a total of almost 3.2 million registered users. The portal, which is managed by the National Agency for Information Society, AKSHI, is accessible in web, iOS and Android mobile app versions, with more than 415,000 users also registered on the mobile app.

Kosovo’s portal, e-Kosova, offers more than 30 e-government services and also makes possible online payments.

Cybersecurity concerns

With increasing digitalisation comes greater scrutiny of digital security given the amount of sensitive, personal data carried on such portals.

“E-Kosova is managed by a private company which does not have a security clearance,” a civil society digital expert told BIRN. “There are no certified security officials because we have no laws that classify information, classify who got access, etc… the security behind e-Kosova has been the main problem.”

Montenegro has already paid dearly for lax security, after its e-government portal was one of the targets of a major ransomware attack in 2022. Services have not yet fully recovered.

In a report published in June, BIRN urged Montenegro to upgrade its cyber security institutions to tackle potential threats, as well as increase public awareness about private data protection, digital rights and online security.

The same year, Albanian government systems, albeit not on the e-Albania platform itself, were hit in July and September by large-scale cyber-attacks, which led to the temporary disruption of most online public services.

An FBI-aided investigation pointed the finger of blame at Iranian hackers, saying they had accessed the Albanian system 14 months earlier.

Lack of financial resources

Digitalisation and the accompanying security requirements do not come cheap. Balkan countries are particularly limited in how much they can invest.

“State budgets for digital transformation are often limited and insufficient to achieve comprehensive progress,” a representative of the institution in charge of e-government services in Bosnia and Herzegovina told BIRN. “Budgetary allocation priorities are not always focused on digitalisation, resulting in a lack of funds for digital transformation projects.”

EU and international actors such as the UNDP and German GIZ provide some financial support for e-government projects but one expert told BIRN that these are project-based and not long-term solutions.

Additional funds are required to promote e-government services once they are developed.

A 2023 survey by NALED in Serbia found that 61 per cent of Serbian citizens lack proper information on the eUprava portal and how it works.

Read the full report here.

BIRN Albania Holds Training on Project Management

The Balkan Investigative Reporting in Albania held a training on September 24 on project management for representatives of civil society organizations, grantees of the EU-funded project: “Strengthening Media Freedom, Professionalism and Journalists’ Safety in Albania”.

The project was launched in January 2024 and is being implemented by BIRN Albania in partnership with the Science for Innovation Development Centre, SCiDEV, and Qendra Faktoje.

The goal of this project is to strengthen the resilience of local media and journalists to provide independent and fact-based information in order to foster people’s understanding and inform participation in public debate.

In the framework of this project, BIRN Albania has provided grants to three organisations/ local media.

The training session focused on the main aspects of the project’s management, such as the monitoring and evaluation process, record keeping, narrative and financial reporting procedures and visibility standards for the sub-grantees.

The sub-grantees will also receive training on fact-checking, provided by Faktoje, and on digital security and safety of journalists, provided by SCiDEV. Each training session will be followed by on-the-job mentoring for each of the media supported.

The training session included representatives from Community Reporters Albania, CRA, Kujri Center and the Information Network & Active Citizenship, INAC.

EU Awards for Best Investigative Journalism for 2024 in Kosovo Presented

Behar Mustafa, Kreshnik Gashi, Alberta Hashani, Dardan Hoti, Aulonë Kadriu and Dafina Halili were selected from many colleagues as 2023’s winners of awards for best investigative stories in Kosovo, for stories that exposed corruption in building premits, judicial misconduct and online and image-based sexual abuse and harassment.

The ceremony took place in Europe House in Prishtina, Kosovo on September 25.

The jury consisted of Imer Mushkolaj,a  veteran journalist, columnist and opinionist who has led the Kosovo Journalists Association (KJA) and now heads the Press Council of Kosovo; Amra Zejneli Loxha, director of RFE/RL’s Kosovo Service; and Darko Dimitrijević, Editor-in-Chief at Radio Goraždevac since 2005 and a founding member of the Kosovo Media Association (KOSMA). More about the jury members here.

First prize went to Behar Mustafa and Kreshnik Gashi from Kallxo.com for their series of investigations into corruption with building permits in Brezovica.

Second prize went to Alberta Hashani from Betimi për Drejtësi for her story revealing judicial misconduct involving a bribed prosecutor.

Third place went to two stories from the same media outlet, Kosovo 2.0. The first, by Dardan Hoti and Aulonë Kadriu, focused on the consequences of online harassment and the victims of image-based sexual abuse.

The second, by Dafina Halili, was for her investigation of sexual harassment at the University of Pristina.

Hoti and Kadriu produced their awarded story as part of their project included in the Media Innovation Europe project – Audience engaged grants. This was their third award.

The Head of the EU Office in Kosovo/EU Special Representative, Ambassador Aivo Orav, handed the awards to the winners, highlighting the key importance of journalistic work in every society.