Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
Six civil society organisations in Serbia, including BIRN, have prepared a comment and Alternative Report on the findings on freedom of expression and media pluralism in the European Commission’s recently-published Serbia Country Report for 2017.
The whole report is available here.
BIRN’s journalistic work produced in 2017 some very tangible social and political changes, both within the region and internationally, showing that non-profit media can influence the work of public institutions and authorities when applying high professional standard to their work.
Please click on the pinned locations on the map to read about the impact of BIRN’s reporting.
The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Albania has published two new manuals, which aim to give civil society and activists the necessary knowledge to advocate their causes in the media.
The first guide focuses on advocacy through the traditional and social media, while the second guide deals specifically with the various uses of photography as a medium for advocacy.
The drafting and publication of the two manuals was supported by the Balkan Trust for Democracy, BTD and the Swedish International Development Agency, SIDA.
Both manuals are part of BIRN Albania’s efforts to bridge the gap between civil society and the media in order to strengthen the fight against corruption and impunity, reinforce the rule of law and promote the respect of human rights and minorities.
They come on the heels of dozens of workshop between journalists and civil society organized over the last four years by BIRN Albania, which have guided the focus themes for investigative stories in its award winning publication Reporter.al.
The manuals cover an array of topics crucial to media advocacy, which range from making the difference from advocacy to propaganda, to tips and tools to produce a viral photo and how to distribute it.
These publications not only aim to strengthen the presence of civil society in media but also enrich the diversity of voices and opinions that comment on issues important to society in local media outlets.
To download a copy of the manual on “Advocacy through traditional and social media: A guideline for CSOs and activists” in Albanian, click here.
To download a copy of the manual on “Photography and Advocacy: A practical guideline” in Albanian, click here.
The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and Internews Kosova, for 12 years, have monitored the Kosovo judicial system at all levels in order to assess its performance in respecting legality, work ethics and judicial proceedings.
The monitoring also included cases targeted for visa liberalisation in all court instances where the judicial procedure takes place. In order to have a situation analysis on the fulfillment of the second criterion for visa liberalization, BIRN and Internews Kosova drafted a report with detailed data on the status of the targeted cases.
For 12 years, the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) and Internews Kosovo have monitored the Kosovo judicial system at all levels in order to assess their performance in respecting legality, work ethics and judicial proceedings.
A particular focus of this report is on corruption cases, including criminal offenses that are of interest to society, monitored during 2017, but it also addresses other issues observed during the work of monitors in the field. Moreover, the report highlights procedural violations by judges, prosecutors and other parties during court proceedings, observed by court monitors in courts of the Republic of Kosovo. The report contains procedural violations, ranging from failure to hold court hearings, changing of witness statements, failure to schedule court hearings, unreasonable delays in trials, failure to comply with the legal deadlines for the initial hearing, holding trials without the presence of the accused, disorder at trial, poor preparation of prosecutors for the trial, and failure to hold hearings due to the lack of court interpreters as one of the basic principles of justice, for trials to be in a language that is known and spoken by the defendant in the proceedings.
On May 8th, 2017, BIRN and Internews Kosova marked a decade of monitoring Kosovo’s judicial system with the launch of the 2016 Court Monitoring Report.
This project has been implemented for ten years now, and each year it has provided an overview of the situation in Kosovo’s justice system and has offered recommendations on how to increase transparency and accountability at all levels of the system.
This year’s report reflects the monitoring of 600 court hearings across 26 courts in the country throughout 2016, including basic courts, the Supreme Court, and the Court of Appeal. Panel participants included BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra, Internews Kosova Executive Director Faik Ispahiu, Chief Prosecutor Aleksandër Lumezi, as well as representatives from the Supreme Court, the Prosecutorial Council, and the Judicial Council.
The report shows what the organisation did to offer high quality journalistic work and to provide citizens with reliable, timely and in-depth reporting as well as BIRN’s contribution to improving media freedom and openness of public institutions.
It also highlights the instances in which BIRN’s work had a strong political and social impact, showing that—despite difficulties—professional journalistic reporting can conclude in tangible results.
The whole report is available here [link].
Audience and market concentration distorts the Albanian media market. The resulting lack of plurality can be detected in television and radio but also with the printed press. This is one of the results of the three-months-long investigative research that the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Albania (BIRN Albania) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) have jointly carried out.
The results of the “Media Ownership Monitor Albania” are presented in Tirana in March 2018. They shed light on the Albanian media market by disclosing who owns and ultimately controls mass media.
The results of the project are accessible in Albanian and English on albania.mom-rsf.org. The site offers comprehensive information about the media landscape in the country, including a database of major media outlets, companies and their owners, as well as their economic and political interests, to the general public.
A regional comparison of how media report on cases of organized crime and corruption in Bosnia, Kosovo and Serbia analysing the main obstacles faced by reporters.
BIRN’s project “Exercising the Freedom of Expression and Openness of State Institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Serbia” supported by the German Federal Foreign Office Stability Pact fund, was a regional, 10-month long project with aim to contribute to professionalizing media reporting on legal proceedings related to organized crime and corruption.
The project also intended to increase public awareness on the issues of access to justice and contribute towards more transparent and more responsive institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Serbia.
The project resulted with three unique country-based and one cross-regional analysis, the first of its kind offering a regional perspective on this topic.
Aside from the looking at how media report on the topic, the study also sought to unpack why media report on organized crime and corruption in the way they do. Specifically, the study sought to identify the challenges and constraints faced by media organizations across the region when it comes to reporting on organized crime and corruption.
Download reports in English
Bosnia and Herzegovina country report
Download reports in Albanian
Download reports in BHS
E-book entitled ‘Ratko Mladic: From Battlefield to Courtroom’ was published in November 2017, ahead of former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic’s war crimes verdict.
The book is downloadable free of charge, contains all BIRN’s reports on the case. The e-book contains more than 500 articles and runs to more than 600 pages. Mladic’s trial, which began in 2011, lasted for 530 days and heard evidence from 591 witnesses, of whom 377 appeared in court.
