Tag: Serbia

The Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia

DONOR
The Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia is the ministry in the Government of Serbia which is in the charge of culture and information.

The Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia is in charge of:

  • development and improvement of culture and artistic creativity;
  • monitoring and research in the field of culture;
  • providing a material basis for cultural activities;
  • development and improvement of literary, translation, music and stage creativity, fine arts and applied arts and design, film and architecture in the field of other audio-visual media;
  • protection of immovable, movable and non-material cultural heritage;
  • library, publishing, cinematographic and music-scenic activity;
  • endowments and foundations;
  • public information system;
  • monitoring the implementation of laws in the field of public information;
  • monitoring the work of public companies and institutions in the field of public information;
  • monitoring the activities of foreign information institutions, foreign media, correspondents and correspondents in the Republic of Serbia;
  • informing national minorities;
  • registration of foreign information institutions and providing assistance to foreign journalists and correspondents;
  • cooperation in the field of protection of cultural heritage, cultural creativity and information in the language and script of the members of the Serbian people in the region;
  • establishment and development of cultural-information centers abroad…

Web: http://www.kultura.gov.rs/en/

Danas

PARTNER
Newspaper Danas is a privately owned media outlet with pro-democratic editorial orientation and high appreciation for professional journalistic standards.

Danas has a long list of international awards, including International Press Institute Media Freedom Award (2002) and the most recently an award of the Austrian Foreign Ministry for Inter-culturalism and tolerance (2015), and is often regarded as the only independent national daily.

Web: danas.rs

Under the Spotlight: Criminal Justice in Serbia

BIRN Serbia

Promotion of judicial transparency and accountability through investigative reporting.

Summary

BIRN will provide comprehensive public insight into the capacities of the judicial system to fight against the corruption through the newly-established mechanism of special courts and prosecution offices in charge of the abuse of funds, money-laundering and tax evasion.

BIRN plans to increase its content production and publishing on BIRN Serbia’s flagship website javno.rs, providing citizens with accurate and unbiased information about cases of corruption, access to justice and abuse of public funds or posts.

BIRN will produce at least four journalistic stories in different formats – investigative, data-journalism and/or analytical content, published on the javno.rs platform, with follow-ups on the reported cases. Additionally, two online databases will be created, establishing an evidence base for tracing the work of the special anti-corruption departments and their effectiveness in processing the cases of high corruption..

Information Sheet

Main Objective:
To promote judicial transparency and accountability through investigative reporting.
Specific Objectives:
  • To promote the accountability of the judiciary and other state institutions through investigative journalism and professional media reporting
  • To put the spotlight on newly-established judicial instruments and their contribution to anti-corruption efforts, by scrutinizing their work and exposing potential cases of the abuse of funds, money-laundering and tax evasion

Main Activities:

  1. Content production
  2. Creation of online databases
  3. Online promotion and awareness-raising

Target Groups:

Journalists, experts, the public
Highlights: 
Investigations, Analysis, Data bases

Digital Media Action

BIRN Serbia

The overall objective is to reinforce the role of media in democratic processes in Serbia by enhancing the reach and impact of quality, public-interest oriented journalism that strives to make government more accountable to citizens

Summary

The Digital Media Action project involves independent media through a small grants scheme and innovative training approaches, responding to their needs and motivations, giving them expertise, tools and resources, including the opportunity to publish and efficiently promote and start monetizing their work.

The project will demonstrate the power of quality media and journalism to bring to the public eye sensitive and underreported issues and steer debate about them.

This will have a positive impact on the Serbian public, who will be better informed and thus able to hold authorities accountable, and also on the participating media, as their profile and influence will be strengthened, creating the basis for their future sustainability.

Information Sheet

Main Objective:
The overall objective is to reinforce the role of media in democratic processes in Serbia by enhancing the reach and impact of quality, public-interest oriented journalism that strives to make government more accountable to citizens.

Specific Objectives:

  • Make independent media more financially stable, producing regular, high quality and professional content that meets citizens’ demands
    There is a considerable need and space for improvement in journalistic, technical and managerial terms in order to expand their influence and create the basis for sustainability in a fast-developing digital arena, currently dominated by questionable and highly politicized, externally influenced journalistic standards and practices.
  • Enable citizens to increasingly understand and debate the performance of public institutions, contributing to raising public accountably
    Citizens’ informed decision-making is significantly reduced by the lack of relevant and unbiased information and debate, especially on potentially controversial issues such as the rule of law. This is exacerbated by the political capture of the mainstream media environment, which leaves large parts of the population deprived of reliable information.

Main Activities:

    • Organise and carry out cutting-edge training, online mentorship, provide expert know-how and technical support to selected independent media;
    • Create a basis for sustainable business model development by providing technical solutions and digital services;
    • Strengthen capacities in development of revenue streams;
    • Provide grants for quality journalistic and multimedia production on issues of public concern that would otherwise remain unreported;
    • Provide editorial mentorship to media awarded with small grants;
    • Coordinate content syndication, exchange and promotion for all participating media;
    • Foster public debate and stakeholders’ involvement over the reported issues through debates, conferences, consultations and online campaigns.

    Target Groups:

  • Local media, independent institutions, experts, communities, authorities, general public

Highlights: 

  • News, analysis, investigations
Partners:
Juzne Vesti

New Partners for ‘Public Money’ Project in Serbia

Three civil society organisations were selected on June 11 as partners on the ‘Public Money for Public Interest’ project which is being conducted by BIRN Serbia, the Independent Journalism Association of Serbia (IJAS) and the Slavko Curuvija Foundation, funded by the European Union.

The organisations selected were the Nis Committee for Human Rights, the Omnibus civic association from Pancevo, and the Sumadija Centre for Civil Activism ‘Res Publika’.

Over the next year, these organisations will have the opportunity to determine what is in the public interest in their communities.

After a restricted call for five local civil society organisations that attended a training course in April, three of them were selected to continue working on the ‘Public Money for Public Interest’ project as sub-grantees.

The overall objective is to contribute to the participation of civil society in changing public policies related to media financing to reflect the rights and interests of the country’s citizens.

Serbian ‘Alternative Report’ Responds to EU Media Assessment

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 European Commission’s 2017 report on Serbia rightfully states that negative trends are restricting media freedoms in the country, but an additional emphasis on the depth of the problem in this field is needed, in particular the inadequacy of the legal framework and problems in the implementation of legislation, says the Alternative Report.

The Alternative Report says that EU monitoring of the progress of media freedoms under Chapter 23 and its ‘Freedom of Expression and Media’ section has proved to be insufficient as issues of public procurements, state aid, advertising and other areas effectively affecting media freedoms are not covered in it.

It points to not only stagnation but also “obvious deterioration of the situation with media freedoms which are very much under threat”.

Pressure and attacks on journalists and media outlets, control of media by way of financial pressure, and the dysfunctional state of the independent institutions which are supposed to enforce the laws in these fields are the principal causes of threats to media freedoms, the Alternative Report adds.

The report provides a range of recommendations both for indicators to be taken into account in future EU reports and for the Serbian authorities in charge of establishing the conditions for freedom of expression and the media in the country.

The Alternative Report was compiled by Civic Initiatives, Balkan Investigating Reporting Network – BIRN Serbia, the Independent Journalists’ Association of Serbia, PG Network, Educational Centre and Transparency Serbia.

The whole report is available here.

BIRN Regional Meeting Held in Bucharest

Directors, board members, partners and donors of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN, met in the Romanian capital Bucharest on June 2-3 for the network’s latest regional meeting of its governing bodies.

At the meeting, the BIRN Network’s activities and achievements in 2017-2018 were presented and the plans for the upcoming period discussed.

The annual Steering Committee meeting and Assembly session were held, and regional social media guidelines were adopted at the event.

In recent times, BIRN has operated in an environment marked by illiberal tendencies in the region, media freedom decline in several countries, captured states, and unresolved issues from the past.

Nevertheless, its online publishing, TV and video production reach growing numbers of people; its journalists have won a number of local and international awards, and its reporting has produced tangible social and political changes.

BIRN’s longstanding donors and partners from Konrad Adenauer Stiftung and ERSTE foundation attended the meeting.

BIRN Cited in International Reports

Monitoring reports produced by BIRN and articles published in its regional publication Balkan Insight continue to be quoted in international reports about media, human rights and politics in the region.

Freedom House’s annual country reports for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Moldova, published in Nations in Transit 2018 under the title ‘Confronting Illiberalism’ in April this year, quote Balkan Insight articles on transitional justice, inter-ethnic relations, politics, the economy and the situation in the media

The Media Sustainability Index for 2017 published by IREX in May, in its Europe and Eurasia section, mentions BIRN when describing the media situation in the region, specifically media freedom, lawsuits against media organisations and journalists, as well as BIRN’s reporting on corruption and its training programmes.

The US State Department report for 2017 on human rights in Albania, published in April, quotes BIRN Albania’s research about media censorship in the country. The report also mentions that in 2017 a member of the High Council of Justice, Gjin Gjoni, filed defamation lawsuits against two BIRN journalists and two journalists from Shqiptarja.com for their coverage of his asset declaration, which was being investigated by prosecutors.

In the Media Landscape – Serbia report, published by the European Journalism Centre in May, the results of the Media Ownership Monitor carried out by BIRN and Reporters without Borders Germany, as well as articles related to media published by Balkan Insight, are quoted throughout the.

Read more:

BIRN Articles Quoted in International Reports

BIRN Cited as Source in International Reports

BIRN Reports Nominated for Investigative Awards in Serbia

Two BIRN reports have been nominated for this year’s Investigative awards from the Independent Journalistic Association of Serbia in the categories for on-line media.

The first is The Coyote’s Trail – A Machine Gun’s Path from Serbia to Syria, produced within BIRN Hub’s project Paper Trail for Better Governance and in cooperation with OCCRP, and written by Ivan Angelovski, Jelena Cosic, Lawrence Marzouk and Maria Cheresheva.

It explores how heavy machine guns travelled from a Serbian state-owned factory to Syrian rebels, via a Bulgarian arms tycoon and a Saudi training camp.

The second is BIRN Serbia’s investigative story (part one and two) about illegal construction at the Kopaonik National Park, written by Slobodan Georgiev.

The report shows that a building under construction did not fall into line with the directions of the Institute for Nature Conservation of Serbia.

The report initiated a rapid-response inspection by the Ministry of Construction, Transport and Infrastructure of Serbia, which ordered the investor to knock down the building and clean up the area, which lies at the highest point of Kopaonik mountain. A restaurant was built at the site despite the order, but the case is still ongoing.