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Participants on BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting

Here is what participants of the first BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting have said about the school:

Frederique Petit, The Netherlands

The lectures have taught us a lot on how you can do your job better. I find the classes a great motivator that has already given me a lot of tools. Now, I am constantly thinking of new stories that I can get into in the Netherlands.

Sebastjan Pikl, Slovenia

Even though I am not a journalist by profession (I run a political foundation), I find tools which are used, or taught here, really useful in my work. All these in depth analysis and examples which were given here will definitively make my job, or make my days easier and I’ll definitively come back next time.

Andrea Caprescu, Romania

It was a little bit hard for me as I am not an investigative reporter, so when I came here I said “God, I’m gonna have trouble because I know nothing about this. What am I gonna do?”. But, when I met so many great people and when I saw how things are working I was very relieved and very glad that I have the opportunity to learn so many things about journalism.

Vladimir Locev, Macedonia

I saw it as a great opportunity to meet the colleagues from other countries, who are doing things I am doing in my country and this is what investigative journalism is. I have been also taking the Computer Assisted Reporting class, and was very surprised that we, journalists, basically, know very little about Internet and ways how to inquire information through internet. So, the class about the hidden web yesterday, was really great… I didn’t have no idea that those things exist on the web.

Vlad Ursulean, Romania

I really did not know what to expect [from the school], but it’s been really great because you don’t really learn these things in regular schools. So, it was very useful!

Vacusta Bogdan, Romania

I am very interested in developing my skills in order to do what Paul Radu said – to follow the money. There are a lot of companies dealing with very strange transactions, the connections with politicians, and so on, and it is quite difficult sometimes to get the right point and to discover the right information between companies, between different individuals, between different persons and extract the final report and analyse or finalise your report.

Helen Darbishire: How to Use FOI Laws

Access to freedom-of-information laws is a key way for investigative journalists to unearth stories, a human rights professional Helen Darbishire has told reporters attending BIRN’s Summer School of Investigative Reporting.

With more than 80 countries in the world with access-to-information laws, the right can be used to gather material and write better and more exciting stories, Darbishire, the Executive Director of Access Info Europe, told a group at the school in Novi Sad.
“Human rights mean that you have a right to ask for any government records, in any country,” she said.
“You just write a very simple letter, you mention the name of the law and you ask for the document with information you are looking for,” Helen explains.
There was a case in Britain of the expenses scandal of the members of Parliament. “It was a fantastic news story and it all started with an access of information request,” Darbishire said.
She has also presented a legal leaks toolkit, available online, aimed at helping journalists to file request s for information. 

Mark Lee Hunter: Investigative Story is Dead Without Emotion

Investigative journalists don’t have to cut emotion out of their story as the story is dead without emotions, journalist and trainer Mark Lee Hunter told reporters attending BIRN’s Summer School of Investigative Reporting.

He explained this by saying that world is garbage and that is on journalists to clear it up, a little bit at least. 
“We are not going to do that if nobody cares. If we want it to care, we have to give them some emotion. This is the way it makes me want to do the job,” Hunter explains. 
It is believed that investigative reporting takes too long and is too expensive. Hunter, however, believes it is true but it doesn’t always have to be true. “One of the reasons for that belief is because we work in inefficient ways… Our processes are terrible, we do not have professional processes for the most part but personal ones. So it is very hard to go faster,” he said.
Pointing at some methods the journalists should develop in order to do their job faster, Hunter added: “I promise that if you develop personal method and you are conscious about reproving it, you will also go faster. 
He has also talked about using hypothesis and chronologies to frame and advance a project.
“Journalists make chronologies all the time and every time you get a piece of information, you add it to the chronology,” he said.
According to him, the chronology can help journalists in two ways:
1. It keeps track of all journalist’s information, it keeps all the stuff together.
2. It suggests relationships between the facts, what to look for next.

Nick Thorne’s Art of Interview at BIRN Summer School

Addressing participants of the BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting, BBC journalist Nick Thorpe has explained the techniques for making people talk and how to work with anonymous sources.

Under the name The Art of the Interview, Thorpe has played a TV documentary he had done entitled Kosovo Civilians Abuses Revealed and then discussed it with the participants.
“We talked how I went investigation and evidence I was able to get for that as well as about the two follow-ups I made afterwards,” Nick explains.
“The more emphasis on good quality reporting and the more emphasis on good investigative journalism, the better, as far as I can tell,” he pointed out.
Screening of the documentary has raised various questions among participants with some claiming that the story did not bring anything that wasn’t already known in public. Thorpe on the other side has insisted on saying that sometimes stories are much bigger than a journalist can tell and that some things cannot be proved. The journalist can only get to the stadium to believe that it was true, he added. 
Final version of his story has been reviewed and confirmed by BBC’s lawyer team.

Media Experts Discuss Attacks on Journalists in Balkans

Journalists in the Balkans are coming under increasing pressure from politicians and business people, media experts have told participants of the BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting.

Speaking at a panel discussion named Journalists Under Attack that was organised as part of the BIRN summer school, Dragana Nikolic Solomon, OSCE Head of Media Department, said that according to the research of the OSCE for 2009, the number of physical attacks on journalists has dropped down but what is also worrying is the increasing influence which comes from the fields of politics and business.
According to her, after attack on a journalist of the Serbian weekly newspaper Teofil Pancic, police stance towards journalists has changed in the country.
“It’s certainly a good sign, but what is worrying is that the attackers on Pancic were young, 18-20 year old guys,” she added. 
Teofil Pancic of the weekly magazine Vreme, was attacked while travelling on a public bus in the Zemun district of Belgrade July 24.
As for Montenegro, Ivanovic said that there is a strong government’s influence on the media and that solidarity exists only among non-regime media houses in the country. 
According to Jeta Xharra from BIRN Kosovo, solidarity in Kosovo exists while drinking in cafe but in public… there is very little.
“The government goes so far as to exercise influence on journalists’ organisations so that they are politicised,” Jeta explained. 
“They [journalists’ organisations] react only when it comes to a journalist they like while some do not react at all or turn them to a lot of time, as was the case with us [BIRN Kosovo], continues Jeta. 
According to Jeta, there are no attacks on journalists in Kosovo so the biggest problem of Kosovo journalists is the fact that the ccountry’s government is
discrediting journalists in every possible way by publishing lies about them and so on. 
Case of Ivo Pukanic, who was publisher of the Croatian weekly Nacional that was murdered in 2008, has also been at the table of the discussion.
   
Hrvoje Appelt said that the Croatian police had reacted but it was necessary for Pukanic to be killed in order for that to happen. 
“I have to say that, not only in Croatia but also throughout the region… for which I’ve been working on statistics of attacks on journalists…three years ago attacks on journalists on daily basis were happening. In 99 per cent of these cases, the attackers have not been found yet,” Appelt said. 
Cvorovic from the Serbian media outlet B92 has been talking about the case of
Brankica Stankovic, who is author of the show Insider that had received death threats posted on Internet websites after airing of the show on the Serbian hooligans last December. 
Since then, Stankovic is under 24/7 police protection. However, according to Cvorovic, B92 has found a solution and a new concept so that the airing of the programmes could continue.

Paul Radu Explains How to Track Offshore Companies

As part of BIRN’s Summer School of Investigative Reporting, Paul Radu has tried to explain, by going through personal experience, how to track organised crime over borders and offshore.

“What we’ve been trying to do these days is to explain that offshore doesn’t necessarily needs to be an island but an offshore type of company can be established in countries like Austria, Delaware in the US or in some other country in the world. 

Radu went on to explain that there are still ways of getting information on offshore heavens.

Therefore, he has presented his new project named the Investigative Dashboard as useful tool for getting the information.

“The Investigative Dashboard is service which provides information to journalists but also provides access to experts,” he said. 

The experts hired by the Investigative Dashboard would, according to him, provide information on what journalists can and cannot do when it comes to obtaining information from offshore heavens. 

As owners of the companies are usually hidden being replaced by proxies, Radu has suggested some tricks on how to get name of the real owner. One of the ways is to ask a proxie how to spell his/her name correctly in order not to make in mistake since the name would be published in a story. In such situations, the proxie would usually point to real owner of the offshore company.

BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting – Overview of Day 3

How to track organised crime and corruption, to deal with victims of trauma  and how to outsmart Google were some of the main topics of the third day of BIRN Summer School of Investigating Reporting held in the Serbian town of Novi Sad.

Wednesday’s session on how to use documents led by Drew Sullivan and Rosemary Armao, focused on individuals, what they own, where they work and who they associate with. 
Don Ray and Paul Radu have then joined Sullivan in explaining how to use documents to investigate companies and institutions.
Going through personal experience, the trainers explained how to track business deals and expose wrongdoing by regulators and public officials working with businesses as well as how to track organised crime over borders and offshore.
“Knowledge of the offshore company system or the so-called fiscal havens is very important because it happens very often that journalists run into offshore company that cannot track,” Paul Radu said.
As part of a programme on organised crime and corruption, Manuela Mareso, the Editor of Narco Mafia Magazine, presented a case study on investigating Montenegrin connections with Italian Mafia. 
Gavin Rees from Dart Center Europe and Milorad Ivanovic, Dart Center Western Balkans, opened a session named Dealing with Victims of Trauma providing reportage without opening new wounds for victims of war, violence and crime.
 
Meanwhile, some participants led by trainer Luuk Sangers worked on uncovering the “hidden web” in a session on computer-assisted reporting.
Sangers presented his latest tricks to “outsmart” search engine Google. 
“You have to give a very specific assignment to Google, but still Google … can’t find everything,” Sangers said.
A lot of interesting information for journalists is hidden on the Web, he added, suggesting other search engines and
ways to find things out.
In recent years journalism has topped the lists as one of the most dangerous professions in the world.
The BIRN summer school has organised a discussion named Journalists Under Attack. Panellists of the discussion includes: Oliver Vujovic, SEEMO; Dragana Nikolic Solomon, OSCE Head of Media Department; Miodrag Cvorovic, B92, Serbia; Hrvoje Appelt, Croatia; Zeljko Ivanovic – Vijesti, Montenegro; Jeta Xharra, BIRN Kosovo.

BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting Kicks Off

Leading journalists and trainers from all over Europe have gathered in the Serbian town of Novi Sad to take part in the first BIRN Summer School of Investigative Reporting.

The one week programme kicked off on Monday with introductory speech of Gordana Igric, BIRN’s regional director, and guest trainers who are renowned investigative journalists including Don Ray and Drew Sullivan.
“We are pleased with the candidates and very excited to be organising this programme for the first time. I hope this school will become our annual tradition,” Gordana Igric said. 
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Don Ray, who is a multi-media producer, writer, author, journalist and lecturer has then tried to define investigative reporting – what makes it different from other types of journalism. This has been shown in a case study presented by Besar Likmeta, the editor for the BIRN in Albania, who has been talking about his investigative story named World Bank Demolished Albania Village.
Further insight on the investigative process – from getting a lead, formulating the investigative hypothesis to writing the story, fact and legal check, airing and publishing the report, follow up – has been given by Don Ray with Randall Joyce explaining how to do it for TV. 
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The OCCRP team has started its four-day programme on organised crime and corruption in order to show what are the schemes and scams that mark organised crime’s plunder of Balkan regions.
Meanwhile, another group of participants have uncovered a new world of Microsoft Excel while being trained in computer-assisted investigative journalism by Luuk Sengers.
With main focus on reporting on organised crime and corruption for print and broadcast media, the BIRN summer school is also aimed at covering the changing face of Balkan media ownership and violence against media professionals.

Summer School Application Close on August 9th

Places are still available for the BIRN summer school for an all-inclusive course fee of €549, which covers tuition, accommodation, meals and activities. However, the August 9th deadline is approaching fast, so please submit your application without delay.

BIRN’s summer school includes a range of specialist programmes, exercises and round-tables covering the changing face of Balkan media ownership, violence against media professionals, and more. Internationally famous journalists, trainers and presenters Don Ray, Mark Hunter, Luuk Sengers, Gavin Rees, Milorad Ivanovic, Manuela Mareso and the OCCRP training team with Drew Sullivan, Rosemary Armao and Paul Radu make up the training team along with BIRN’s in-house experts.

 

The programme is intensive but there will also be some time to tour the beautiful orchards, vineyards, monasteries and forests of the nearby Fruska Gora National Park, with visits scheduled to the Grgeteg, Hopovo and Krusedol monasteries in Fruska Gora, wine tasting in a 300-year-old wine cellar, and honey tasting in the Museum of Honey.

For full details of the programme and to submit your application go to https://birn.eu.com/en/1/340/28746/

Free Places for Balkan Journalists Still Available

Journalists from South East Europe still have time to apply for full scholarship to attend BIRN’s unique Summer School of Investigative Reporting from August 22 to 28 within the Petrovaradin Fortress, in the stunning Fruska Gora National Park.

The deadline to apply for a full scholarship is July 25, while those paying the full course fee have until August 9 to sign up. The course fee of €549 and is all-inclusive, covering tuition, accommodation, meals and extra-curricular tours.

BIRN is looking for mid-career journalists from the Balkans to apply for the scholarship..

BIRN is gathering leading journalists and trainers, both from the Balkans and internationally to provide informative, insightful and entertaining training focused on investigative, computer-assisted and organised crime and corruption journalism, in print and broadcast media.

Confirmed speakers include renowned trainers and presenters Don Ray, Mark Hunter, Luuk Sengers, Gavin Rees, Milorad Ivanovic, Maunela Mareso and the OCCRP training team with Drew Sullivan, Rosemary Armao and Paul Radu.

The summer school will offer a full programme including exercises and round-tables on the changing face of Balkan media ownership, violence against media professionals, and more.
All applicants selected to attend the Summer School will get BIRN’s newly published textbook “Digging Deeper: A Guide for Investigative Journalists in the Balkans” free of charge.

There will also be time to tour the beautiful orchards, vineyards, monasteries and forests in the Fruska Gora National Park.

Finally, all participants will receive a BIRN Summer School certificate.

BIRN will provide all necessary documentation and assistance for applicants that required visas or travel documents.