Tag: Kosovo

First TV Debate aired

BIRN Kosovo aired the first in its series of TV debates, “Life in Kosovo,” on October 19 on the public service station RTK.

Four politicians from different parties were invited to debate and answer citizens’ questions on final-status negotiations for the province in light of the recent report on standards by the UN special envoy Kai Eide.

They were Lutfi Haziri, minister for local government, Enver Hoxhaj, of the Democratic Party of Kosovo’s parliamentary caucus, Teuta Sahatcija, head of the ORA party parliamentary group, and Oliver Ivanovic, leader of the Serbian List for Kosovo and Metohija.

BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra, chaired the debate in which question were put to the guests in the form of short reportages by various concerned citizens. The next debate in the series will be aired on 9 November, and will look into the issue of Kosovar identity.

This project is supported by the Balkan Trust for Democracy. For further information, contact BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra.

Work on regional TV documentary on Kosovo continues

Work continues on BIRN’s documentary film project, which explores the regional context for, and consequences of, determining Kosovo’s final status.

Over the past four weeks, producer Lode Desmet has worked with BIRN country directors in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia and Kosovo itself in filming, research and interviewing.

Interviews have been conducted with a range of stakeholders in Kosovo’s forthcoming talks. They include Adnan Terzic, the Bosnian Prime minister, Dragan Cavic, President of the Republika Srpska, Sali Berisha, Albania’s Prime Minister, Edi Rama, mayor of Tirana, leading Macedonian Albanian politicians Arber Xhafferi and Teuta Arifi, and Artemija, Serbian Orthodox Bishop of Raska-Prizren.

For more information, please contact Anna McTaggart.

BIRN Kosovo TV Debate Opens Oxford University Seminar

A discussion on Kosovo’s future at St Antony’s College, Oxford University, opened on 8 December with a screening of the first debate in BIRN’s “Life in Kosovo” TV series, in which a number of high profile politicians answered citizens’ questions on final status negotiations.

Dr Richard Caplan, Lecturer and Official Fellow at the university’s Department of Politics and International Relations wrote to BIRN that:

“There happened to be a delegation of some 25 deputy permanent representatives to the EU visiting Oxford and they watched the debate and took part in the discussion that followed. Many of them commented on how impressed they were with BIRN’s high level of journalistic
professionalism.”

The “Life in Kosovo” debate series, aired bi-weekly on RTK and sponsored by the Balkan Trust for Democracy, aim to open up a discussion on taboo issues in Kosovan society, such as the question of Kosovan nationality versus Albanian ethnicity, the existence of party-affiliated intelligence structures and the presence of corruption and nepotism in public institutions.

For more information, contact BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra.

BIRN Kosovo Documentary Completed

The final edit of BIRN’s documentary film on the regional context for Kosovo status negotiations is now complete.

Post-production, narration and sub-titling will be finished by the end of the month, with premier screenings scheduled for January 2006.

More information will be forthcoming on these screenings, due to take place in the countries/territories covered by the film – Kosovo, Serbia and Montenegro, Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Screenings are also being organised in Brussels, London and Sofia.

The film will be broadcast by TV stations throughout the Balkans, while distribution further afield is also being arranged.

This project is supported by the Swiss Foreign Ministry. For more information, contact BIRN Regional Network Director Anna McTaggart.

Balkan Voices: What next for Kosovo?

A documentary reflecting the concerns and hopes of Balkan citizens on the eve of crucial talks over the final status of Kosovo is to be screened at the Front Line Club in London on January 9.

Produced by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, and directed by the award-winning film-maker Lode Desmet, the 85-minute documentary – entitled Does Anyone Have A Plan? – focuses on seventeen ordinary people from Kosovo, Serbia and neighbouring countries in the run-up to the negotiations.

In the film, the subjects’ questions about the implications of the talks – which, it is hoped, will go a long way to finding a solution to the conflict between Serbia and the Kosovo Albanians, and stabilising the region as a whole – are put to important local and international political figures.

The latter include EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, senior US state department official Nicholas Burns, Serbian president Boris Tadic and Kosovo premier Bajram Kosumi.

Kosovo is the last unresolved dispute in the Balkans. In the summer of 1999, Serbian troops left the entity and NATO forces moved in. Since then, it has been largely administered by the UN, although still formally part of Serbia and Montenegro.

Serbian, Kosovo Albanian and international officials are to start negotiations on the future of the region in early 2006, with the Albanians wanting independence and the Serbs prepared to concede no more than a high degree of autonomy.

The film is subtitled in English and all local languages. It will be broadcast throughout the region by leading TV stations in January and February. International distribution is also being planned.

This project was supported by the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, Political Affairs Division for Human Security.

BIRN Kosovo hosts hot debate on violence against journalists

A BIRN Kosovo TV debate aired on January 18 saw police and other public officials argue vigorously with local journalists on the issue of recently increased violence against the latter.

For the first time in BIRN’s Life in Kosovo series, aired on RTK, a live audience of 40 people participated in the debate, challenging guests with questions raised by concrete cases of violence against journalists.

Panellists included Fatos Bytyci, President of the Association of Professional Journalists of Kosova, AGPK, Rekfi Morina, spokesperson for the Kosovo Police Service, KPS, Fatmire Terdevci, an investigative journalist from daily Koha Ditore, Afrim Ahmeti, head of command for the central Pristina police station, Petrit Selimi, Director of MediaWorks, and Sabit Rrustemi, spokesperson for the Gjilan municipal authorities.

For a full report on the debate, click here.

This project is supported by the Balkan Trust for Democracy. For more information, contact BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra.

‘Does Anyone Have a Plan?’ Premieres in Pristina, Kosovo

More than 200 people attended the Pristina premiere of the BIRN documentary Does Anyone Have a Plan? on February 10 in Kino ABC.

Guests included Kosovo’s Prime Minister Bajram Kosumi, representatives from the US, Swiss, Swedish and Finnish government offices in Kosovo, a range of local politicians and a large contingent from the media and civil society sectors.

The film was introduced by Tim Judah, the well-known British Balkan analyst and regular contributor to BIRN’s Balkan Insight publication, and Jeta Xharra, BIRN Kosovo director and a producer of this documentary.

Ivana Enzler, local representative of the Swiss foreign ministry, which supported this project, invited the audience to ‘open your eyes and ears and enjoy the challenge,’ as they watched the film.

The documentary, which delved into many issues still painful for Kosovar Albanians, was in fact received very well by its Pristina audience, which seemed to enjoy it thoroughly.

Agim Zatriqi, director of the national broadcaster, RTK, found the film very informative.
‘It’s like medicine. All medicines are bitter, but they are healthy,’ he said.

‘It was very interesting to see the comparison with other parts of former Yugoslavia, not just Kosovo,’ said Margaret Sejdiaj from the Swedish office.

Lea Nimani, a marketing consultant for IPKO, a local internet company, also considered the documentary very informative, and a real eye-opener.

UNMIK official Nicholas Guinard praised the documentary, welcoming ‘at last a very frank film, which hides no aspect.’ He believed if would ‘feed the debate in a very constructive manner.’

‘The movie’s timing is just perfect, coming out exactly as the talks intensify,’ said Muhamet Hajrullahu, a KTV journalist, finding it particularly useful in demonstrating ‘how diametrically opposite the opinions of Serbs and Albanians are.’

Alex Anderson, from the International Crisis Group, had seen the film before, and was therefore more interested in observing viewers’ responses to it.

‘The audience was good humored,’ he found.

The film was aired at 22:00 the same evening on RTK, Kosovo’s public service broadcaster.

Next TV Debate to Focus on Women

BIRN Kosovo will present the next in a series of televised debates on March 15 at 22:00 on RTK, focussing on successful women of Kosovo.

Mimoza Kusari, executive director of the American Chamber of Commerce, Shejnaze Bekteshi, who has quintuplets, and Adelina Ismaili, a well known singer, will discuss their achievements and the paths they took to arrive at them.

For more information on this project, contact BIRN Kosovo Director Jeta Xharra.

This project is supported by the Balkan Trust for Democracy.

Kosovo: The Minority Perspective

Seven articles were published on June 1, resulting from journalistic training for Kosovo minorities organized by BIRN SaM in northern Mitrovica in April.

Kosovo Special: The Minorty Perspective can be read in Balkan Insight no. 37, < http://www.birn.eu.com/bihome.php >.

All the articles were written by trainees who attended an earlier BIRN training workshop.

The second part of the primary level training for Kosovo minorities is scheduled for September, and will also be followed with a special edition dedicated to the most relevant topics.

These reports, training and debate events are all part of BIRN SaM’s Minority Training and Reporting project, which is supported by the British Embassy in Belgrade .

For more information on this project, contact BIRN SaM Director Dragana Nikolic-Solomon.

Who leads the LDK?

The death of Kosovo’s president Ibrahim Rugova created several vacuums in Kosovo’s political scene – not least in the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), the party that he led for 16 years.

BIRN Kosovo director Jeta Xharra recently hosted a debate on the LDK, examining its internal turmoil and speculating on who will emerge to lead the party – and when they will be elected to office.

The panel included four LDK members – its vice-president Eqrem Kryeziu; Besa Gaxherri from the Women’s Forum of LDK, Lulzim Zeneli from the Youth Forum and Ali Lajci, head of Peja/Pec municipality, representing the municipal divisions of the party.

The debate was preceded and advertised by two articles written in the Express daily newspaper as the first time that the LDK leaders would have the opportunity to raise their differences in a public forum since the death of Rugova.

Trying to define who is actually leading the LDK, Eqrem Kryeziu said that “based on the statute of the party, at the time when there is no president, the party is leaded by three vice-presidents and the secretary general”.

Kryeziu believes that internal party elections should be postponed. “We need more time to fill the gap after Rugova’s death,” he said, adding that the leadership also needed time to explain its reasons for removing high-profile party members Nexhat Daci and Adem Salihaj in the wake of Rugova’s death.

Kryeziu also said that the “LDK is not looking for an iconic leader, but for a leading mechanism” – an idea that was supported by all panelists in this debate.

Commenting on the creation of two factions within the LDK – one led by Kryeziu, Fatmir Sejdiu, Kole Berisha and Sabri Hamiti, and the other led by the discharged Daci and Salihaj – Kryeziu said that “these groups were made due to major institutional changes that happened recently, they are not factions of the same party but rather more like two different alternatives”.

Sitting next to Kryeziu, Besa Gaxherri described him as “hurried” when explaining the recent institutional changes, which she believed were “wrong” and “not according to the party protocols”.

Gaxheri said that she would not agree with the postponement of the party elections, stressing that the field operators of the LDK like herself expect elections to be held in already set time of early June and not be delayed further. She also expressed dissatisfaction with Kryeziu’s interim leadership.

“I have no idea [where the party stands on] important issues, such decentralisation and Mitrovica for example. Do we have a policy on that?” she asked Kryeziu.

Although the panelists tried to give an impression of unification, they seemed to split into two groups during the debate – those who want party elections to happen now and those who want to delay them after the deadline of June 2006.

Lulezim Zeneli said that if elections are postponed, the structures of LDK will be illegitimate. “With the election process we will [impose] legitimacy on the LDK leadership,” he said.

Commenting on the recently created divisions within the party, Ali Lajci described them as just alternative opinions. “There are no factions within LDK since there is no more than one programme and one platform,” he said.

In the other hand Lajci pointed out that LDK has its executive bodies such as general council and that “all these issues should be discussed and decided there”. But he stressed that the party hierarchy should decide soon if elections are to be held in June, or later in the year.