BIRN Serbia News and Events

Investigative reports by nine BIRN journalists exposing alleged corruption and official malpractice have been shortlisted for awards by the Independent Association of Journalists in Serbia.

Adam Santovac, Jelena Veljkovic, Aleksandar Djordjevic, Nemanja Rujevic, Sanja Kljajic and Ajdin Kamber were announced on December 29 as the winners of this year’s EU Awards for Investigative Journalism, given for stories published in 2019 in Serbia.

BIRN Serbia published a new report on financial media sustainability in the digital environment on December 24 as a part of a project entitled Where is the Place of Media in New Internet Governance Policies?

Human Rights House in Serbia, marking International Human Rights Day on December 10, awarded BIRN journalist Natalija Jovanovic for her outstanding commitment to the protection, respect and promotion of human rights.

Natalija Jovanovic wins top award for her groundbreaking story on the number of COVID-related deaths in Serbia, which President Vucic initally rubbished, only for it to be confirmed later on.

Confirming the substance of BIRN reports on this issue, a Government Crisis Staff member has admitted that the COVID-19 death toll in June was far higher than was officially reported, blaming a new information system.

As a part of a Strengthening Quality News and Independent Journalism in the Western Balkans and Turkey project, Thomson Media has launched an online course on mobile journalism.

A department of Serbia’s finance ministry tasked with tackling money laundering and terrorism financing has asked banks to hand over data about the transactions of dozens of individuals and NGOs known for their work on human rights, transparency and exposing corruption.

Aleksandar Vucic said BIRN report on the real number of COVID-19 victims in Serbia relies on data that are ‘not authentic’ – and again attacked the outlet over its 2015 investigation into the Tamnava mine clearance.

BIRN Serbia  journalists Jelena Veljkovic and Aleksandar Djordjevic have won this year’s Dejan Anastasijevic Investigative Journalism Award in the online media category for a series of articles about the father of the Serbian interior minister’s involvement in arms trading.

Organised crime and corruption are regular topics in the Serbian media, but BIRN Serbia’s monitoring, carried out in cooperation with the Centre for Judicial Research (CEPRIS) NGO shows that only a small number of articles reported on the court cases, indicating that the media often do not follow such cases to their judicial conclusion.

Investigative articles by BIRN journalists Ana Curic, Jelena Veljkovic, and Aleksandar Djordjevic have been shortlisted for the Dejan Anastasijevic Investigative Journalism Award in the online media category.

To mark World Press Freedom Day on Sunday, campaign group Reporters Without Borders Austria awarded the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network with its annual Press Freedom Award – A Signal for Europe.

A database of Bosnian government official vehicles, a project of the Balkans Investigative Reporting Network in Bosnia and Herzegovina, has been shortlisted for the 2020 Sigma Awards for data journalism. The BIRN BiH project was shortlisted in the Open Data category. Ana Curic, a BIRN journalist from Serbia, has been shortlisted in the Young Journalist category for her overall work in 2019.

A journalist from BIRN Serbia has contributed to a major worldwide investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists into the safety of medical devices such as implants.