BIRN Hub News and Events

More than 20 journalists from the Balkan region and elsewhere gathered last weekend in the coastal resort of Becici, in Montenegro, for the first Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence Alumni Meeting.

An Investigative story, written by 2009 Fellow Adrian Mogos received an honorable mention at the Global Investigative Journalism Conference, held in Geneva in April 2010.

The Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence programme 2010 has been launched this Monday, April 26^th, at the opening dinner attended by this year’s fellows and representatives of the Robert Bosh Foundation, Erste Foundation and BIRN.

A regional cultural conference dubbed “The Balkans, Media and Culture – Time for Change” was held on Tuesday in Skopje and marked the start of the forthcoming three-year project: Balkan Initiative for Cultural Cooperation, Exchange and Development, BICCED.

The regional conference “Balkan, Media and Culture – Time for Change” will be held on April 20, 2010 at the Kaproš hotel in Skopje, as part of the three-year project “Balkan Initiative for Cultural Cooperation, Exchange and Development” – BICCED, which will be implemented by the Balkan Investigative Regional Reporting Network and its partners, and funded by the Swiss Cultural Programme in the Western Balkans (SCP).

We are very pleased to announce the names of the ten journalists selected for the 2010 Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence. This year’s competition was very tight as proposals received depicted the most interesting taboo issues throughout the Balkans. The Selection Committee has chosen the ten most exciting, interesting and relevant proposals from the 150 ideas submitted by journalists from across the region.

Outdated laws in the field of culture, delays in adopting new legislation a lack of transparency, insufficient budget for cultural activity, partitocracy in cultural institutions – election of leaders based on political affiliation rather than expertise, a lack of tax benefits for investment in culture, poor regulations of the art market, vague criteria for the award of funds finance in ‘open competition’, a lack of long term financing for projects and institutions, marginalisation of productions in the independent cultural scene.

Balkan Fellowship team members are engaged in selecting the best candidates for this year’s programme, on the topic of ‘Taboo’. The exact number of eligible applications received per country is the following: Serbia 42, Romania 27, Croatia 19, Bulgaria 15, Albania 12, Bosnia & Herzegovina 10, Kosovo 6, Macedonia 6, and Montenegro 6.

Maja Hrgovic, winner of the 1st Fellowship for jounalistic exellence prize for 2009, has recently published her first book, complilation of fiction stories.

At the beginning of 2010 BIRN network published Digging Deeper – A Guide for Investigative Journalists in the Balkans, written in cooperation with Sheila Coronel, Director of the Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism and professor of professional practice at Columbia University, New York.

The Robert Bosch Stiftung and ERSTE Foundation, in cooperation with the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, announce the launch of the fourth year of their prestigious fellowship programme for journalists in the Balkans.

As part of the project recently awarded to BIRN  by the Swiss Cultural Programme in the Western Balkans, Balkan’s Initiative for Cultural Cooperation, Exchange and Development (BICCED), BIRN brought together some of the most active players the cultural scene in Sarajevo and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Danis Tanovic, the movie director, Amra Kresevljakovic from Deblokada, Nihad Kresevljakovic from the festival MESS, Elma Tatarevic from the Sarajevo Film Festival and Amila Ramic from the ARS AEVI shared their views and knowledge of the cultural scene in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the problems facing the creative industries.

The Balkan Investigative Regional Reporting Network, BIRN, is delighted to announce the signing of a three-year contract with the Swiss Cultural Programme in the Western Balkans, SCP.

The Ten fellows taking part in the 2009 Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence programme, submitted their in-depth reports on August 31. Their reports were produced as a result of research and travel across both the Balkans and the EU during previous 4 months.

On March 23rd a Selection Committee chose ten proposals from the nearly 120 ideas submitted by journalists from across the region.