International Press Institute Belgrade 2008 · 2 Congress Report 2008 Congress Report 2008 Be in...

Congress Report 2008 1

International Press Institute World Congress and 57th General Assembly

Belgrade 2008Congress Report

Congress Report 20082 Congress Report 2008

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Vienna: Harmony of Old and New

One in two companies choosing a business location in Austria opts for Vienna. No wonder:

international surveys confirm our city’s outstanding quality of life. The Austrian capital offers high

technology and high culture, ample green space as well as safety and security in daily life. Combining

this with the flair of a former imperial city, Vienna is a unique place to live and work — both comfortable

and cosmopolitan. For more information, go to www.wien.at

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Contents

Programme 4

Editorial6

Opening Ceremony9

Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe 15

When the Guns Fall Silent: An International Perspective on Fostering Reconciliation

19

New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats23

Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe) 27

Congress Snapshots32

Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism

35

IPI Open Forum: The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 39

Closing Ceremony: IPI Free Media Pioneer 200843

Resolutions48

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International Press Institute

ChairmanPiotr NiemczyckiPublisher, Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw

DirectorDavid Dadge

Congress Coordinator and Editor, IPI Congress ReportMichael Kudlak

Assistant Congress CoordinatorChristiane Klint

Congress TranscriptsMaureen Patricia MacNeill

Photos by Božidar Petrović

Cover photo by Petar Vujanić

International Press Institute (IPI)Spiegelgasse 2/29A-1010 Vienna, AustriaTel: + 43 1 - 512 90 11Fax: + 43 1 - 512 90 14E-mail: [email protected]

Belgrade Host CommitteeHari ŠtajnerMilica ČubriloMirjana MiloševićBojan StanojevićDragan JanjićGoran PitićRadomir LičinaJasna DimitrijevićOliver Vujović

Media centerTerazije 3/1, Belgrade, Serbia Tel: +381 11 33 49 541www.mc.rs

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10:00 Opening Ceremony Parliament BuildingWelcome Hari Štajner, Chairman, IPI Belgrade Host Committee Mirjana Milošević, Director, Media Center, BelgradeOpening Remarks Piotr Niemczycki, Publisher, Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw, and Chairman of IPI David Dadge, Director of IPIKeynote Speaker Boris Tadić, President of the Republic of Serbia

13:30 “Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe” Sava CenterModerator Tim Judah, Balkans Correspondent, The Economist, and Author, LondonPanelists Vladimir Gligorov, Senior Economist, Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, Vienna

Drago Hedl, Editor, Feral Tribune, Split Senad Pećanin, Director, Dani, Sarajevo Biljana Srbljanović, Playwright, Belgrade

15:30-17:00 “When the Guns Fall Silent: An International Perspective on Fostering Reconciliation” Sava CenterModerator Denis Murray, BBC Ireland Correspondent, BelfastPanelists Munther Dajani, Director, Issam Sartawi Center for the Advancement of Peace and Democracy, Al Quds University, Jerusalem Daphna Golan, Director, Partnership for Social Change, Hebrew University of Jerusalem Barney Mthombothi, Editor, Financial Mail, Johannesburg

19:30 Opening Reception and Dinner City Hall and Skadarlija Bohemian Quarter

09:00-11:30 Parallel Session: SEEMO Regional Meeting: “Private News Agencies in South East Europe” (Part II) Media Center

09:30 “Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism” Sava CenterModerator Galina Sidorova, Editor-in-Chief, Sovershenno Secretno, MoscowPanelists Stefan Candea, Co-Founder, Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism, Bucharest Misha Glenny, Journalist and Author, London Daniele Moro, Editor-in-Chief, "Tg5", Canale 5, Milan

11:30 “Reporting America”Moderator Alison Smale, Managing Editor, International Herald Tribune, ParisPanelists Hafez Mirazi, Vice Chairman, Al Hayat TV, Egypt; former Washington Bureau Chief, Al-Jazeera, Washington, DC Gene Policinski, Vice President and Executive Director, First Amendment Center, Nashville, TN Matthias Schepp, Moscow Bureau Chief, Der Spiegel, Hamburg

14:30 IPI Open Forum: “The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”Moderator Joe Treaster, Knight Chair for Cross-Cultural Communication, University of Miami School of Communication, Miami, FLAPanelists Robert Russell, Executive Director, Cartoonists’ Rights Network International, Washington, DC Sawsan Zaidah, Radio Director, AmmanNet, Amman

16:30 Closing Ceremony Presentation of the “Free Media Pioneer 2008” awarded to Talking Points Memo, New York, NY David Kurtz, Managing Editor, Talking Points Memo, New York

Presentation of the 2009 IPI World Congress in Helsinki, Finland

19:30 Farewell Dinner Belgrade Fortress

09:30-18:30 SEEMO Regional Conference: “Media, Marketing and Business (Focus on New Media)”

09:30 “New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats” Sava CenterModerator Roy Greenslade, Media Commentator and Columnist; Professor of Journalism, City University, LondonPanelists David Kurtz, Managing Editor, Talking Points Memo, New York, NY Dejan Restak, Website Director, B92 FM, Belgrade Christoph Schultheis, BILDblog, Berlin

11:30 “Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)” Sava CenterModerator William Green, Editor, TIME Europe, LondonPanelists Vuslat Dogan Sabanci, CEO, Hürriyet, Istanbul David Montgomery, CEO, Mecom Group plc, London Michael Ringier, Chairman of the Board, Ringier AG, Zurich

13:00 SEEMO Human Rights News Agency Photo Award Sava CenterPresented by Oliver Vujović, Secretary General, South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO), Vienna

14:30-17:00 SEEMO Regional Meeting: “Private News Agencies in South East Europe” (Part I) Media Center

15:30-17:30 IPI General Assembly Sava Center for IPI Members only

19:30 Cocktail Reception White Palace

19:30 Welcome Reception and Dinner Ušće Tower

Sunday 15 June 2008

Monday, 16 June 2008

Saturday, 14 June 2008

Programme Programme

Tuesday 17 June 2008

Wednesday, 18 June 2008

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Editorial

Tumultuous TimesMichael Kudlak, Congress Coordinator and Editor, IPI Congress Report

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Between 14 and 17 June 2008, some 400 editors, media executives, and leading journalists from 62 countries gathered in Belgrade for the IPI World Congress and 57th General Assembly. It was the second time – after Ljubljana in 2002 – that IPI held its annual general meeting in the former Yugoslavia. It was also the first IPI World Congress to be convened under the leadership of the new IPI Director, David Dadge.

The weeks and months leading up to the Belgrade Congress were tumultuous ones for Serbia.

In February, Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia led to demonstrations in the streets of Belgrade and other parts of the country. In March, Serbia’s coalition government, torn over policy on Kosovo and the European Union, was formally dissolved, opening the way for early parliamentary elections. The re-election of Boris Tadić as president of the Republic of Serbia in May was welcomed by the international community and regarded as a clear sign that the country had voted for a European future.

Given IPI’s history of holding its annual congress in countries and regions of the world during times of great political, economic or social change – from Berlin in 1989 to Cape Town in 1994 to Jerusalem in 1996 – we felt strongly that the 2008 IPI World Congress should go ahead as planned in Belgrade, thereby supporting this democratic transition.

Over the three days of the Congress, participants were able to discuss the implications of the events in Serbia and the region, other issues of global concern, and topics dealing specifically with IPI’s core purpose – to further and safeguard press freedom and the free flow of information worldwide.

On 15 June, at the Opening Ceremony held in the Parliament building in downtown Belgrade, President Tadić spoke about Serbia’s difficult challenges. “Not only the identification of the murderers of journalists, but also the search for those accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and the cooperation with the Hague Tribunal, are preconditions for democracy building,” he said. “They are fundamental preconditions for reconciliation among the nations that share this Southeast European region with us.”

The Opening Ceremony was followed by a session titled, “Neighbours, Partners, Rivals – Perceptions of South East Europe”, in which prominent panelists from Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia discussed how the countries in the region, particularly in the former Yugoslavia, perceive each other, how the countries of South East Europe are perceived in the rest of Europe, and the role of politicians, the media and civil society in improving cooperation and exchange between these countries.

In the next, related, session, “When the Guns Fall Silent: An International Perspective on Fostering Reconciliation”, panelists examined the media’s role in peace building and reconciliation processes around the world.

The second day featured a session titled, “New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats”, in which a panel of prominent online journalists and bloggers talked about how the emergence of new media has not only paved the way for tremendous new opportunities, but also led to new efforts by governments to repress or regulate the media.

In a lively session titled, “Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)”, speakers and the audience engaged in a debate over whether the new media owners in Europe treat newspapers as an investment in a commodity like any other, ready to dump them when profits sag, and whether the “future of news itself” is at stake here. The session was intended as a “companion piece” to the session at the World Congress in Istanbul, “Who are the New Owners of the Media?”, which focussed on the pressures faced by newspapers in the U.S. by private equity companies and other large shareholders.

In parallel sessions after lunch, delegates had the opportunity to actively take part in meetings of the newly-established IPI Regional Networks, which discussed press freedom developments in Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), respectively.

On day three, in a session titled, “Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism”, prominent investigative reporters discussed how journalists around the world can help each other by sharing newsgathering techniques and sources in the often dangerous pursuit of reporting on corruption, organised crime and multinational companies.

Panelists in the next session, “Reporting America”, discussed America’s poor image around the world and whether the fall in U.S. popularity can in part be traced to foreign coverage of the United States, its actions, policies and motives.

Finally, in a special IPI Open Forum, participants engaged in an interesting debate on “The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the UN Declaration of Human Rights”.

This was followed by the presentation of the 2008 “IPI Free Media Pioneer” award, which went to Talking Points Memo (TPM), a political blog created and run by U.S. journalist Joshua Marshall. Headquartered in New York City, TPM focuses on investigative reporting of political corruption. Its coverage of the politically-motivated firing of eight U.S. attorneys by the administration of President George W. Bush resulted in the resignation of several high-level government officials and later led to the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

“We are at the cutting edge of trying to figure out what a new business model for investigative journalism will look like in the United States,” said managing editor David Kurtz, who accepted the award on behalf of TPM. “We don’t yet know what it will look like

in the end, but every day that we continue at it is another day down that road towards a new way of doing things, incorporating the best traditions of muckraking, as the term is used in the U.S., with the new opportunities that this technology provides us. The recognition from IPI only helps in that regard, as it encourages us to go forward and I think it helps pave the way towards that new model.”

The Belgrade Congress also featured two successful regional meetings, organised by IPI’s affiliate, the South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO), on “Private News Agencies in South East Europe” and “Media, Marketing and Business (Focus on New Media)”.

In the end, the IPI World Congress in Belgrade proved to be a great success, thanks in large part to the efforts of the Belgrade Host Committee, in particular Hari Štajner, chairman of the Host Committee, Radomir Ličina, chairman of the SEEMO Board and senior editor of Danas newspaper,

and Mirjana Milošević, director of the Media Center in Belgrade.

The Belgrade Congress also provided a useful meeting place for delegates to exchange views, discuss common problems, and establish new contacts.

A post-congress tour to the medieval monasteries, Manasija, Studenica and Zica, and to Tara National Park, among other places of interest, provided an opportunity to enjoy the hospitality of the Serbian people and for further informal networking.

In 2009, from 6 to 9 June, the IPI World Congress and 58th General Assembly will be held in Helsinki, Finland, where further interesting panels and events are being prepared to inform and entertain IPI’s members and guests.


Opening Ceremony

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in favour of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you are in favour of free speech, then you are in favour of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise.”

Aside from the serious discussions awaiting us, I hope that you will have a chance to acquaint yourselves with my country, which is now going through another political crisis, after the dramatic events in October 2000, when we toppled the autocratic regime of Slobodan Milošević. As was recently described by a local professor, since the earliest days of its history, Serbia has always been a point of confluence, interaction and clashes of various, often contradictory influences and ‘models’: civilizational, religious, political and ideological. The same situation persists today, as you will witness yourselves, especially if you take one of our post-congress tours around Serbia.

I warmly recommend you to use your free time to get to better know the host city of our Congress, situated at the intersection of Eastern and Western Europe and at the confluence of two big European rivers. Right now we are in one of its most monumental buildings, whose construction began in 1936, the House of the National Assembly. In the following days, you will see some other points of interest, like the Old Court, built at the end of the 19th century, the Royal Palace, parts of Bohemian and Medieval Belgrade, as well as the Sava Center.

Belgrade has been destroyed more often than most other cities in Europe and some of the most recent devastations are still visible in the centre of the city. However, it has always been rebuilt, in an incredible variety of styles, and after a millennium of exciting and often difficult history, Belgrade was recently nominated as the “City of the Future in Southern Europe.” Dear IPI members, the Host Committee and the IPI staff have done their best to make your participation in the Congress and the time you will spend in Serbia memorable and enjoyable. I hope that in the following days you will have a chance to see this for yourselves, that your stay in Belgrade will be an unforgettable experience and that you will not regret having accepted our slogan and invitation to “Be in Belgrade.”

Perceptions

Mirjana Milošević, Director, Media Center, Belgrade

When I started working at the Media Center, the biggest task ahead of me and the small but

very professional team was to prepare and organise this Congress. In spite of organising different events every day, there were times when we were wondering if we can live up to the standards set by the BBC in Edinburgh in 2006 and Hürriyet in Istanbul last year. During the last year and a half we have challenged our limits. We have also challenged perceptions we had about ourselves and our abilities, but more importantly our perceptions about Belgrade and Serbia and the people here. By working to bring international media professionals to Belgrade, and cooperating closely with the organisers of other important events in Belgrade, we learned that this city, this country and the people here have much more to offer than we originally thought. We learned that Government, City institutions and commercial companies can work together with media professionals to successfully organise

an event where press freedom issues are to be discussed. Never before have we seen such an interest within the media and the Serbian public for a professional media event.For us, this Congress is all about the perceptions. Many years ago, in his book, “Public Opinion”, Walter Lippmann, American writer, journalist, and political commentator, wrote that “Each of us lives and works on a small part of the earth’s surface, moves in a small circle. ... Of any public event that has wide effects, we see at best only a phase and an aspect.” Media people are not an exception. We often tend to see only parts of the picture and then transfer this aspect of the story, or a simplified version of it, to our readers, viewers or listeners. Events like this one are a perfect opportunity to try and see more than usual.

We have worked hard to give you, our international guests, the opportunity to see and experience different aspects of Belgrade and Serbia first hand and to directly observe the society we live in. We will be very interested to hear if your perceptions have changed after the Congress is over. Our views to what is possible and achievable here have changed and we are certain that the potentials of this country and its people will be seen even more in the future. Nevertheless, discussing and rethinking perceptions of Serbia and the Balkans today is just the beginning of a number of opportunities we will have during the Congress to question images created and challenged by contemporary media – from how the rest of the world reports on America to how the new media contribute to the greater number of sources and information available to citizens worldwide.

Not long ago, if you looked only at media images, it was hard to imagine that an Afro-American could become an American president. It was hard to perceive China as one of the world fastest developing countries. It was very hard to recognise that we live in an interconnected world sharing numerous common problems, including environmental issues, food and oil scarcity, to name only some. Not long ago, it seemed impossible to engage such a distinguished audience in Serbia for the discussion of press freedom topics. The world is changing and the media, if not leading, need to follow. We as media professionals have the obligation to report on the world as it is and not as it used to be.

Let me welcome you once again to Belgrade and thank you, IPI and all the institutions, organizations, companies and individuals who have helped us to make this event possible. I hope that “Being together in Belgrade” in June 2008 will give us a number of memorable experiences and some answers to the increasingly complex question of the role of the media and media professionals in the world.

Hot Topics

Hari Štajner, Chairman,IPI Belgrade Host Committee

Welcome to Belgrade, welcome to Serbia, welcome to the IPI World Congress and the 57th General

Assembly. In the course of my short journalistic career – spanning only half a century – I have been in various places, doing various work, but I have never felt such pleasure as I feel now, having a chance to welcome you here and open this important event. This event is of great significance to us journalists, and I hope that it will also be noticed by the public, one of the reasons for that being the fact that 300 renowned journalists and media professionals from 51 countries and from all continents have come to Belgrade.

IPI was established 58 years ago, dedicated – as we were told then – to the promotion and protection of press freedom and the improvement of the practices of journalism. Those were the post-war years, full of hardship, when the founders, a group of journalists from 15 countries, believed that a

free press would contribute to the creation of a better world. Are we living in a better world today? Probably yes, but also in a world that is much more complicated.

And what is the situation of press freedom? During a recent international event, it was pointed out that press freedom is under serious threat around the world from many sources – gangs and corrupt officials in Latin America, autocratic regimes in the Middle East, conflicts in Africa, hostile governments in Asia, as well as death threats and prosecutions in Central Asia and Europe. This sorry state of affairs is aggravated by the fact that, according to IPI’s statistics, 93 journalists and media staffers were murdered worldwide in 2007, making it the second bloodiest year on record

for journalism. This gives us an unequivocal answer to the question of whether the furtherance and safeguarding of press freedom today should remain IPI’s core issue.

Reading some old documents, I found prescient words from a former IPI director, Peter Galliner, spoken 27 years ago in Nairobi, which sound perfectly true today. These words were cited by our recent director, Johann Fritz: “IPI will continue to play its role in the defence of the freedom of speech and the free flow of information; it will help those who are harassed and persecuted; it will uphold the right to communicate without government influence and restrictions and IPI will not give in to pressures, wherever they may come from.”

Yes, unfortunately, free speech and free media are still hot topics, and therefore we will discuss these issues during our Congress. Also, in the following days we will try to offer answers to other burning issues facing the media in the 21st century. At the same time, of course, we won’t disregard our current geographic location, and will discuss media problems in South East Europe, mostly at the SEEMO Regional Conference.

Considering these freedoms, allow me to offer you three brilliant thoughts I came across on the ubiquitous Internet. in 399 BC, Socrates said to the jury at his trial, “If you offered to let me off this time on condition I am not any longer to speak my mind ... I should say to you, ‘Men of Athens, I shall obey the Gods rather than you.’” John Kennedy: “We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people.” Noam Chomsky: “Goebbels was

Sunday, 15 June 2008

Opening CeremonyWelcomeHari Štajner, Chairman, IPI Belgrade Host CommitteeMirjana Milošević, Director, Media Center, Belgrade

Opening RemarksPiotr Niemczycki, Publisher, Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw and Chairman of IPI David Dadge, Director of IPI

Keynote SpeakerBoris Tadić, President of the Republic of Serbia

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Mirjana Milošević

Hari Štajner

Opening Ceremony

Never before have we seen such an interest within the media and the Serbian public for a professional media event.

Serbia has always been a point of confluence, interaction and clashes of various, often contradictory influences and ‘models’: civilizational, religious, political and ideological.


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A Free Media is Not a Given

Piotr Niemczycki, Publisher, Gazeta Wyborcza, Warsaw, and Chairman of IPI

I wish you a very warm welcome on behalf of IPI to this Opening Ceremony of our World Congress. So here we are in fascinating Serbia and we are particularly honoured to be in the company of Boris Tadić, President of the Republic of Serbia. Mr. President, thank you for taking time to welcome IPI to Belgrade.

The first two sentences of the IPI Constitution read: “World peace depends on understanding between peoples and peoples. If peoples are to understand one another, it is essential that they have good information.”

In accordance with this belief, IPI has been meeting for 57 years at its World Congresses around the globe, to spread this idea. We meet every year to articulate the importance of free and independent media as the fundaments of democracy. Without free and independent media there is simply no way of achieving sustainable democracy. But even in democratic societies free media are facing new challenges. State control over opinion, through different ways, has been the unfortunate reality in too many countries. We always have to remember that a free media is not a given. We have to fight for it every day. Some of us share the same fascination for Serbia. We would like to learn more about Serbian life, politics, culture and history, but we also would like to learn more about the condition of free speech and media in Serbia.

So I would like to thank our hosts for giving us this opportunity. Before I leave the podium I would like to thank the speakers and panelists for accepting our invitation to participate in this event. I would also like to thank all the people that are organising

and supporting this conference. Without them this would not be possible. I would like to thank all of you for supporting IPI by participating in this conference and for spreading the idea of free media across the world and showing its importance. We always have to remember that a free media is not a given.

Concern for Serbia’s Media

David Dadge, Director of IPI

When I look back on IPI’s journey to this Parliament Building, I realise the importance of those first steps

in Budapest in 2005 when the IPI Executive Board agreed to come to Belgrade. I think few of us realised at the time that this decision would take us along a path so familiar to many of my IPI colleagues.

IPI has a long tradition of holding its World Congresses in countries where great change is occurring. We were in Germany at the fall of the Wall, in South Africa during the first democratic elections after apartheid

in 1994, and in Russia in 1998. Now, we find ourselves in Belgrade also at a time of significant events.

Once again, the chosen themes of our World Congress over the next three days are appropriate to the venue. In a series of panels, we will discuss the media situation in the South Eastern region.

Then there is discussion of freedom of the press – the very reason for IPI’s existence. As we move deeper into the 21st century, the world’s media grapples with the dazzling pace of change and the IPI community will discuss new media, as well as the influence of profits on the news. These are the discussions that we do best: leading the way regarding the media, while alert to the dangers to press freedom.

And IPI comes to you at a time of an important anniversary. This year is the 60th Anniversary of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and, in particular, Article 19.

IPI’s Constitution states that “[IPI] defends everyone’s personal freedom, the freedom of expression and, in particular, the basic right of freedom of the media, as stated in article XIX in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, (Dec. 10, 1948).” Therefore, Article 19 is implicit in the work of IPI. In effect, it is our governing statement.

Two years after this document, in 1950, IPI was founded when 34 editors from 15 countries met at Columbia University in New York. Our organisation is therefore born from the hopes and aspirations of a world whose most recent memories were of the carnage and the horror of the Second World War. We exist, because those who gave sacrifice believed that fundamental human rights were key to the rejection of violence.

Despite your best efforts, Mr. President, and all your hard work, I believe there are still shadows from Serbia’s past that reach into the present day.

Mr. President, when I think of these shadows, I am reminded of:

• Slavko Ćuruvija, the owner and director of the daily Dnevni telegraf and the magazine Evropljanin, shot dead on 11 April 1999.

• Or the murder of Milan Pantić, a correspondent in Jagodina for the Belgrade daily Večernje Novosti. Pantić was found dead in front of his home on 11 June 2001.

• Or, Dada Vujasinović, a freelancer and contributor to the Belgrade magazine Duga,

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whose death remains unexplained to this day.

• Or most recently, the case of Dejan Anastasijević, an investigative reporter for the Belgrade weekly, Vreme, who faced an assassination attempt on his life in 2007.

According to my information, no individuals have been formally charged in these cases. They remain unsolved.

Mr. President, I call upon you in fraternity and in our mutual belief in human rights and freedom of the press to encourage the authorities to solve these cases. The impunity of the past must be faced now and those who commit murder must be punished, no matter how long after the fact.

If we fail in this endeavour, if we remain silent, through our own silence we will condemn others to silence. These acts will confirm to the narrow minority that murder may be committed without punishment.

I do not believe that these are the values we wish to see in the 21st century.

However, as my Chairman has said, I am not here to lecture you Mr. President. I raise these cases because of IPI’s 57-year history of dealing with global press freedom violations around the world. Therefore, I speak not from the pulpit, but from the aisle of genuine concern for Serbia’s media.

As I respect your own desire for democracy in Serbia, I hope you will respect IPI’s desire for justice in these cases.

I know also that you desire to bring about beneficial change. Both I and the assembled IPI community wish you every success, and we join with you today in offering you our support.

Serbia’s Difficult Challenges Boris Tadić, President of the Republic of Serbia

I want to thank you very much for coming here to Belgrade and Serbia, which is today a legitimate democracy. I am very

proud to see all of you here. I am sure that you have had an opportunity to see the tremendous progress we have made after the democratic changes in our country and what we have done in the past eight years, but we have to do a lot more in the period ahead of us. We are very optimistic; we are doing well, even though we still face challenges. Some of those challenges were

mentioned by the previous speaker a few minutes ago. I totally agree with you that to find the criminals – arrest them, capture them and create a better society for all of us – is one of the main preconditions in building democracy in Serbia.

Indeed, it is my great pleasure to see you today in Belgrade, in Serbia, a country that is searching for its European future, a country that is building a democracy under the very complex circumstances of recent history in Southeast Europe, especially after the 1990’s – one of the most difficult and saddest decades in our history.

I truly believe that the 90’s are behind Serbia and all the other countries of former Yugoslavia. It was a decade when values and our beliefs were destroyed, and sometimes even civilization itself was threatened in our region. There were many tragic consequences, violence, innocent victims, among journalists as well, in all our societies. That was a decade when the truth was denied, a decade when the value of human life was denied, a decade when the fundamental values of our civilization were threatened.After a whole decade of denying shared

values, any society would need a lot of time to change the way things are and turn them back to a normal state of affairs. After a sudden turn from the rule of law to lawlessness, it takes much more time to take a society back to a system where law is paramount. If we critically analyse the achievements of the countries in Southeast Europe, including Serbia, during these eight years at the beginning of the 21st century, we can conclude that exceptional success has been achieved – especially if we consider the circumstances we were living in during the 90’s, when human lives were threatened every day, when respect for the independence of all individuals was threatened every day, when the freedom of reporting and journalism, the freedom of conveying the truth, was threatened every day.

I am very critical about our reality during the 90’s. But, just like you are free journalists who respect free journalism, allow me to be a free politician who respects free politics and say that, while there was truthful reporting from ex-Yugoslavia and Serbia, as well as correct information about the evil that was happening in the region of Southeast Europe, there was also a lot of untruthful information and stereotyping –an inertia in reporting.

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Piotr Niemczycki

David Dadge

Boris Tadić

Opening Ceremony Opening Ceremony



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14 Congress Report 2008 15

A Time Lag When it Comes to Perceptions

Tim Judah, Balkans Correspondent, The Economist, and Author, London

Talking about perceptions and how perceptions change, it is very fitting that this first particular session should take

place in this very building, because you could argue that in December 1990 the country that was Yugoslavia died at the last session of the Yugoslav Communist Party that took place here. The Slovenes and the Croats left, and the Montenegrin who was in charge then adjourned the session. Later on, he said famously that it was the longest adjournment in history.

But it was at that moment that the country really began to unravel and to descend, as we all know, into bloodshed. What’s interesting of course is how perceptions of this region and perceptions of each other within this region have changed, especially within the region since the end of the wars, 1995 being one of the key dates with the end of the war in Bosnia and also the end of the conflict between Serbia, Bosnia and Croatia, and

1999 another, with end of the war in Kosovo. It is my impression coming from the outside that there is always a time lag when it comes to perceptions, and that really a huge amount of progress has been made here. A few years ago it just was not that easy for people to come from all over the region to sit here and discuss. We even have colleagues here from Pristina, which a few years ago would have been very difficult to imagine. It is still not that easy for them to get here, but they are here. This region has progressed a huge amount, but there is always a time lag and people from outside the region still perceive the region as it was several years back. Having said that, I think that one of the most interesting phenomenon that has taken place, especially here in Serbia, but it affects the whole region as well, is how things like the Exit Music Festival and the Eurovision Song contest, which we may not take so seriously in other parts of Europe, have done a huge amount to change perceptions of this region, to move it beyond the era of the 1990s.

Not Yet Out of the Woods

Vladimir Gligorov, Senior Economist, Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, Vienna

I am happy to be here. I do not know how deep my roots are anywhere, but I was certainly born here, and in a way I have

always lived here. I want to make perhaps three main points at the beginning. First of all, the region has obviously made strong progress, but of course there are still pockets of animosity, or enmity, in this region. This is the first thing we have to assess. What risks does the region face in terms of security? I think people looking at the region from the outside think of the Balkans as some kind of unique, risk-laden region where the risks are the same everywhere, but this is not really the case. At the moment the only serious remaining security risk is between Serbia and

Kosovo. The rest is in a way pacified. That is the first point I want to make. We still have a type of conflict that could result in a serious showdown. It also has repercussions for internal politics in the sense that, especially in Serbia, there is civil animosity which could still end up being or leading to a serious civil conflict. So we are not out of the woods completely.

The second point I want to make is that in the rest of the region the problem is one of constitutional development and democratization. There are no deep ethnic or other types of conflicts existing or threatening on the horizon. We see weak states. Bosnia and Macedonia, which have constitutional problems, come to mind, and in the case of Macedonia also problems of democratization, because they cannot carry out proper elections without having all kinds of conflicts over who gets what. This is the second point I want to make. We still have serious political and constitutional issues. I want to remind everybody that the constitutional conflict was at the heart of the breakdown of Yugoslavia, and these constitutional issues that we still have are basically the remnants of this post-Yugoslav breakdown.

As one of the fighters for democracy in my country, I myself witnessed the way in which facts from Southeast Europe were communicated to the world. I say this because, even today, I am making an enormous effort, together with other democratic representatives of our society, to change the perception about Serbia and the whole of Southeast Europe as soon as possible, since only truth can move us forward. Fighting the stereotypes and inertia – political inertia, journalistic inertia, economic inertia – we are changing our reality each day. It is an enormous and very difficult undertaking. I remind you, we are a society which existed outside the rule of law for a whole decade. And now we must bring this same society back to the rule of law. It takes time to achieve that.

Even today, Serbia, as a European democracy, faces difficult challenges. Not only the identification of the murderers of journalists, but also the search for those accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity, and the cooperation with the Hague Tribunal, are preconditions for democracy building. They are fundamental preconditions for reconciliation among the nations that share this Southeast European region with us. But simple words of apology to the victims of crimes are also necessary for reconciliation. As a president of Serbia, I have apologised to all nations in Southeast Europe that were the victims of crimes somebody committed in the name of my people. But I cannot forget the fact that horrible crimes were committed against my people. That is also the truth, not often enough told by the world media. I am still awaiting an apology from representatives of other nations of ex-Yugoslavia for the innocent victims among my own Serbian people. I did it first, because I believed that it should be done, but it is not hard to apologize if that contributes to our shared civilization.

Today, Serbia is facing other difficult challenges. One of these is the question of the future status of Kosovo and Metohija, our southern province. There can be no doubt that the recognition of the illegally proclaimed independence of Kosovo and Metohija is in violation of international law. There can be no doubt that the Albanians in Kosovo have their legitimate rights, which I respect. There can be no doubt that in the past certain acts were committed to deny democracy and these legitimate rights, but there is also no doubt that Serbian democracy wants a solution acceptable both to Belgrade and Pristina, a solution which would not violate international law, a solution which does not constitute a threat to many other countries with similar problems, and a solution which

respects legitimate the rights of Serbia and the Serbian people.

Just like any other nation and any other country, my nation and my country have their legitimate interests. I want to point out that by defending these legitimate national interests, we by no means wish to threaten the legitimate interests of any other neighbouring nation, including the Albanian nation. Such is the state of Serbian democracy today, at the beginning of the 21st century, and I am deeply convinced that it will remain the same in the future.

Just as we are prepared to face the difficult challenge of cooperation with the Hague Tribunal, which is, I believe, nearing its end, because Serbia has delivered 43 persons out of the 46 accused of war crimes to the Tribunal so far, today we are also prepared to reopen negotiations about the future of Kosovo, taking into consideration the legitimate interests of Albanians, but also defending the legitimate interests of the Serbs, and searching for a peaceful, democratic, European solution in our region.

Ladies and gentlemen, as witnesses of the challenges facing the world today, at the beginning of the 21st century, you have a chance to relate these challenges to those existing in Southeast Europe. Today you are in Belgrade, in Serbia, in a country that is, from a strategic point of view, the central country of Southeast Europe. In this sense, Serbia is the strategic backbone of Southeast Europe. The political stability of Serbia is the necessary precondition for the political stability of all of Southeast Europe. The development of democracy in Serbia is the precondition for democratic development in all the other countries. Every economic and political crisis in Serbia creates immediate consequences in the countries of the region, as we could witness during the 90’s.

Modern civilization faces two great challenges: the lack of an energy policy and the production of food. At the same time, we are facing challenges in our region and

we are going to solve all our problems in the period ahead of us. I am sure that we have the capacity to do that in the next few years. The main precondition for that is full membership of our country in the European Union and I am sure that only the full participation of all Southeast European countries in the European Union is the solution to our common problems: social policy, industrial development, improvement in the technology field. In that sense I assure you that after the presidential and parliamentary elections, Serbia will form a pro-European and democratic government which will be a cornerstone of stability in our region.

At the same time, we will insist on democratic values. When I talk about values, I mean capturing all indictees, full cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), freedom of the media, justice – these are also the preconditions for developing our country and achieving the final strategic goal, a future in the European Union. In that sense, we are going to do everything that is in our power to achieve these results. This is not easy; we are ready to do everything that is possible, but at the same time, I am appealing to all of you to take into consideration the fact that we are facing real challenges today. We are defending our legitimate interests in a normal, European, peaceful way. And in that sense, you can count on us in terms of freedom of the media, in terms of peaceful policy, in terms of building democratic institutions, not only in Serbia but also in the region. This is my policy; this is Serbia’s democracy at the beginning of the 21st century.

Opening Ceremony

As one of the fighters for democracy in my country, I myself witnessed the way in which facts from Southeast Europe were communicated to the world.Fighting the stereotypes and inertia – political inertia, journalistic inertia, economic inertia – we are changing our reality each day.

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“Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe”ModeratorTim Judah, Balkans Correspondent, The Economist, and Author, London

PanelistsVladimir Gligorov, Senior Economist, Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, ViennaDrago Hedl, Editor, Feral Tribune, SplitSenad Pećanin, Director, Dani, SarajevoBiljana Srbljanović, Playwright, Belgrade

Tim Judah

Vladimir Gligorov


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The third point is that when you look at what is going on in terms of cooperation, there is a lot of that going on in the region. Certainly the economic connections are much stronger than they used to be only a few years ago. In fact, what you can see is that since the year 2000, when the last autocratic systems were changed in Croatia and Serbia, there has been steady economic progress throughout the region, not just in Croatia or more recently in Serbia. Basically the whole Balkans is a booming region in economic terms and that is also partly due to the increased trade and investment within the region. You have significant growth in trade and significant investment flows within the region.

The final point I want to make is about what Tim [Judah] said about the lag in perceptions, especially on the part of the EU. I think that is one of the big constraints, because the region is certainly aiming, or should be aiming, at joining the EU. The EU has been very slow in committing itself to enlargement or to integrating this region into the EU, because of the slow process of learning how things are improving here and how the EU could actually help sustain and even speed up the positive processes.

Building Trust

Drago Hedl, Editor, Feral Tribune, Split

The countries and institutions of the Balkans now have the task of establishing trust between neighbours

who still remember the bloody war and its horrible consequences, which are still being felt today. This trust is the foundation not only of every friendly relationship, but also for cooperation. It is difficult to build, but easy to lose.

The peoples of the former Yugoslavia, who lived in the same country and shared the same problems and goals and who, following the

collapse of the country, ended up in a war that left many victims, great damage and oceans of hate, shook the entire region. The international community joined to stop the strife, although too slowly and too late. Even today, this international factor is present in the region in various forms.

Even if its contribution in terminating the war was great, the international community did relatively little to establish mechanisms that would lead to the rapid restoration of trust between the neighbours. This slow and fragile task was for the most part left to the local governments, who, depending on the political atmosphere of the moment and their own interests, now control the peace process.

One of the most important jobs that need to be done is to punish the individuals responsible for committing war crimes. The unwillingness to sentence these individuals, who are present on all sides, although not in equal numbers, and the fact that even some of the most responsible culprits are still free today, is very frustrating for the victims.

It is particularly tragic that individuals who are suspected of war crimes and who have been indicted by the International Criminal

Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia are still seen as national heroes by a significant portion of their people. If this remains so and they are not brought to justice, thus preventing the catharsis necessary for all the nations that participated in the wars in the former Yugoslavia, there will be a new foundation for possible conflicts. The seeds of evil will be waiting for the next opportunity.

Several years ago, when I was working on the documentary, “Vukovar – The Final Cut”, together with my colleagues from Serbian television station B92, I recalled a scene that was filmed after the war in a village in Croatia that had been mostly inhabited by Serbs. Looking directly at the camera, an old man said firmly, “It doesn’t matter how many of us die, we will settle the accounts from World War II.” He said that almost 50 years after the end of the Second World War. The seeds of evil that remained after the war because of the failure to punish crimes and criminals had waited and seized the next opportunity.

The new generations, in a way, continue with a war that was started by their fathers and grandfathers. Many crimes that took place during World War II remain unpunished and unsolved. This created an ideal opportunity to manipulate the number of victims. One side diminished the number, the other increased it. One side dangerously underestimated the number of Serbs, Jews, Gypsies and Croatian anti-fascists murdered in the Ustaše concentration camp in Jasenovac, while the other side dangerously overestimated it. There was no will to objectively and historically investigate these crimes. The problem was shoved under the carpet and remained there for almost half a century. And then the ghost came out of the bottle.

Even today, almost 15 years after the end of the last war, there is no list of victims in Croatia. I live in the city of Osijek, which was heavily damaged during the war. It was estimated that 400 civilians were killed. This is a terribly large number. Still, the facts regarding

the names of the killed, the location and the circumstances of their deaths, have never been published. Local politicians keep adding to this number during their public speeches and the figure has now reached 1,200. There are no names, documents, or facts behind this figure. This is why manipulation is possible and I am afraid it will continue. The number will become progressively larger, not because new victims have been discovered, but because the politicians often find it favourable to make these large numbers even larger.

I am aware that certain non-governmental organisations in Bosnia-Herzegovina have accomplished the great achievement of listing all the victims that were killed during the war in their country. They used a methodology which included the first and last names of the victims, dates and place of birth, place and circumstance of death, and whether the individuals were civilians or soldier. This fascinating database, a product of long hours of labour, has been attacked from all sides. The three nations that live in Bosnia-Herzegovina – Muslims, Serbs and Croats – came up with completely different numbers emphasising their own victims and neglecting others. There are no documents behind their numbers, but the individuals that bring them up are allowed to act publicly and their figures, rather than the ones based on fact, are taken to be true. Thus the manipulation continues.

Building trust between the nations of the region and developing good neighbour relations do not only benefit the individual nations, but the region as a whole. In this the media plays a huge role. Many journalists in the region contribute greatly to the investigation of crimes, particularly those that happened in their own environment and their own nation. Although they are frequently called traitors and enemies, they continue to fight for the truth, even if it this can be embarrassing at times. They continue to move forward while facing threats and physical attacks. The nations in the region will always be neighbours, this is their destiny. The region is not a building from which you can move and go somewhere else if you don’t like your neighbours. It is a building from which you cannot escape. Thus in order to make it hospitable and pleasant, it is important to clean it up, and everyone should first start with their own home.

No Diplomacy, No Vision

Biljana Srbljanović, Playwright, Belgrade

As someone who lives in Paris and Belgrade – who lives in two countries and in two completely different political

orders – I am a position to compare both this region’s view of Western Europe, and how

this region, and especially Serbia, is viewed in France and other countries in the European Union.

First there is the term, “Balkanization”, which is a kind of trademark of the countries of the former Yugoslavia, and has actually entered the political dictionaries everywhere. So today, if you want to describe small conflicts, bloody conflicts, focussing on small, sometimes insignificant problems that could lead to big disasters or catastrophes in the region, this is Balkanization and a term for perceiving the Balkans.

I think that in Western society, we are perceived as those who basically started the First World War, fought the only serious war after the Second World War, and witnessed the only ethnic cleansing and massacres in Europe since the end of the Second World War. This is something which comes along with the term Balkanization.

The main focus of the political discussion in the United Nations during the 1990s was on the region known as the Balkans. The first time the European Union decided to take any kind of political action outside of the EU was with regard to the former Yugoslavia. And last, but not least, the first military action in NATO history was the action directed against Serbia. So all this contributes to the “ocean of hate” that Drago Hedl spoke of, and this metaphor still lingers when the West views this region.

On the other hand, Drago said that the region is not a building out of which you can move, but you can destroy the building and that is what we tried to do. Fortunately, we didn’t succeed, but we still have this epicentre of possible future conflict which is Kosovo, and we still don’t have any solution for that conflict. Our diplomacy and Kosovo’s diplomacy are not moving in the direction of reconciliation or good neighbour relations.When I first came to live in France, I heard an anecdote about General de Gaulle and why the French and Germans were able to work together so soon after World War II. I think it was in 1947 or ‘48, when de Gaulle first visited Cologne, which had been completely destroyed, with only its beautiful cathedral was still standing. As he

was entering the cathedral with his politicians and his military representatives, de Gaulle turned to the people of Cologne, who had assembled as silent spectators of something which was meant to be the starting point for reconciliation. De Gaulle, representing a country that had won the war, turned to the people and started speaking in German to a crowd that represented a country that was not only very guilty, but also in the moment of defeat, which, as we know in Serbia, is the moment that can provoke another war. He started speaking in their own language, and this is something that led to today’s projects of writing common history textbooks for students in Germany and France, for elementary schoolchildren even, so that students in both countries, generation after generation, have an objective, common view of the history of the 20th century, a common view of what really happened.

There are similar initiatives for the same sort of thing in the Balkans, to write history textbooks together, but they are not moving in a very good direction because it’s always the initiative of an NGO or an individual. It’s not organised and it’s not imposed. But it’s something that people need, so we are basically reduced to Eurovision Song Contests where you can see that neighbours are voting for each other. You see that Albania is voting for Serbia, and you say, “Okay, there will be no war.”

Contributing to the vision of an ocean of hate is the fact that we are communicating at the level of kitsch-pop festivals and that the only other level where Kosovo-Albanians and Kosovo-Serbians are communicating and collaborating together is in the identification of the remains in mass graves. We can sing together, we can do DNA tests on whatever is left of the bodies in the mass graves, but in between there is nothing. In particular, there is no diplomacy, no vision, no consensus about what we should do not only to avoid future conflicts, but to try to repair what is left to be repaired.

Biljana Srbljanović

Drago Hedl

If you want to describe small conflicts, bloody conflicts, focusing on small, sometimes insignificant problems that could lead to big disasters or catastrophes in the region, this is Balkanization and a term for perceiving the Balkans.

“Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe” “Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe”


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Nationalism, Reconciliation and EU Integration

Senad Pećanin, Director, Dani, Sarajevo

As of tomorrow, Bosnia will be practically the last in line to have a contractual relationship with the

European Union. In that way, Bosnia will be able to catch up with the train that is supposed to bring all the countries of the region into the EU. Obviously, there are still small differences between the countries in the region and in the past there were even less differences. When we journalists from the region had the opportunity to meet politicians from Western Europe or the U.S. in the 1990s, we were usually faced with three questions. The first was: Do you have a free press in your country? The second was: Is your president really the idiot and nationalist he appears to be? And the third was: Which country do you actually come from? It was possible to talk with us in this way because there were no big differences between Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia at that time. Today, Bosnia is the last in line to have a contractual relationship with the EU, and, as you probably know, Croatia is a frontrunner in that way.

I would like to emphasise four points, which are interesting and important for today’s discussion. First of all, there is the problem

of nationalism in the region, and I would like to illustrate this with something that actually just happened in my country, Bosnia-Herzegovina. Probably most of you, or at least most of the men here, know that we currently have the European Football Championship in Austria and Switzerland. Bosnia, unfortunately, did not qualify for Euro 2008, but there is great interest in Bosnia in the matches and results in Austria and Switzerland. Why? There is very good national football team from Croatia and so far they have played very well. And what is happening in Bosnia? In a small city in

central Bosnia called Vitez, which has a mixed population of Croats and Bosniaks, or Bosnian Muslims, Croats celebrate every victory of the Croatian national team by attacking the properties of their Bosniak neighbours. Police in every city with a mixed population know

they will have problems if the Croatian national team wins. In other cities where there is a mix of Serbs and Croats or Serbs and Bosniaks, the same problems can be expected if the Serbian national basketball team wins. Nationalism is still one of the biggest problems in every country in the region.

You cannot find many journalists or intellectuals or prominent public figures who speak out against nationalism among their own national group. It is not a problem to find in Sarajevo, which is now predominately Bosnian Muslim, hundreds of directors, writers, journalists or professors to speak about Serbian war crimes and Serbian nationalism, or Croatian war crimes and Croatian nationalism. But, unfortunately, there are perhaps a maximum of ten individuals who are ready to speak about Bosnian crimes and Bosnian nationalism, or about the negative role of the Islamic community of Bosnia-Herzegovina among the Bosnian Muslim population.

The second point is about the necessity for reconciliation. After today’s speech by President Tadić, I had the opportunity to have a brief conversation with him and he told me that relations between Bosnia and Serbia were blocked because the Bosniak

leader, Haris Silajdžić, does not want to cooperate fully with Serbia until the indicted war criminal, Ratko Mladić, is handed over to the Hague tribunal. Obviously, that is a very big problem. On the one side, there is the extremely important approach by President Tadić, who came to Sarajevo, where genocide was committed, who apologised and tried to build the foundation for reconciliation. But, unfortunately, there is no similar approach from Sarajevo.

That brings me to my third point, which is EU integration. I think there is a serious problem which Brussels and the EU have failed to give the attention it deserves, namely that more or less all countries in the region are to ready to cooperate fully with Brussels and other members of the EU, but not with their immediate neighbours. Bosnia and Serbia and Croatia have no problems in cooperating with countries like Finland, Luxembourg or Lithuania, members of the EU, but are not ready to cooperate with their neighbours. They think that all problems in mutual relations would be solved with EU integration.

Finally, there is the issue of the media. Some of you do not know about the role that some media in the region have played during the past 18 years. My colleague Drago Hedl, editor of Split-based weekly magazine Feral Tribune, belongs to the media that played such an enormous, brave role and was one of the media which really fought against nationalism and revealed the war crimes committed by Croat forces. Unfortunately, Feral Tribune is now in a very poor position and even faces closing down because of different kinds of pressures, from problems in attracting advertisers to the many defamation court cases they have had. My simple question is: What do you do when the market does not reward great professional journalism? How can media operate in markets that are not big enough to reward their professional efforts? This is, I think, an important issue.


“When the Guns Fall Silent: An International Perspective on Fostering Reconciliation”ModeratorDenis Murray, BBC Ireland Correspondent, Belfast

PanelistsMunther Dajani, Director, Issam Sartawi Center for the Advancement of Peace and Democracy, Al Quds University, Jerusalem

Daphna Golan, Director, Partnership for Social Change, Hebrew University of JerusalemBarney Mthombothi, Editor, Financial Mail, Johannesburg

Promoting a Culture of Peace

Munther Dajani, Director, Issam Sartawi Center for the Advancement of Peace andDemocracy, Al Quds University, Jerusalem

I come from Jerusalem and instead of talking about what happens after the guns are silent, I am going to talk about what we can

do, what can be done, to silence the guns, because we are very, very far from silencing the guns. If you follow the news in the area, you will discover that every day people are killed on both sides, and we are not getting any nearer to silencing the guns. On the contrary, there are new problems which need to be addressed on both sides, and we are getting further and further from reaching an agreement.

In my view, if we want to work toward silencing the guns, there are steps to be taken by both sides. Part of the problem is our leadership. Instead of leaders who lead, we are plagued with leaders who every morning put their finger out the window and see how the wind is blowing and try to cater to the public. By my definition, these are not leaders; they are followers, and they should be

followers not leaders. Since the assassination of [Yitzhak] Rabin, we haven’t had leaders on the Israeli side, and we haven’t had a leader on the Palestinian side, and this is a very serious problem, which is working against the peace process.

The leaders on both sides must make decisions which will be bitter to swallow. For example, if we are to achieve change, we have to stop the smear campaigns; we have to stop the rockets and the killing of people on both sides. We have to switch gears and promote teaching and a culture of peace. We have to talk about reconciliation and coexistence rather than “us or them.” And this hasn’t been done for the past 13 years. The Israelis keep speaking about Judea and Samaria, and the Palestinians keep blaming the Israelis for all their problems. Both sides haven’t been promoting the peace process at all. They haven’t been able to move towards a culture of reconciliation and coexistence. They still have the same agendas, the same lingo. The smear campaigns on both sides are still there.

In my view, we have to start with two very important sectors: one, the media, the journalists, who have the tremendous

responsibility of moving society from a culture of war to a culture of peace, and, two, the educators who go into the classrooms and influence the young generations. This is how you solve the peace process. Not by signing pieces of paper, which are not worth the ink or the paper they are signed on, but by actually moving your public towards reconciliation and promoting a culture of peace, a culture of coexistence, a culture of promoting and advancing mutual benefits for both sides.

Every time I go to a conference, there are 50 Israelis and Palestinians who I call the usual suspects. We always meet, we know each other, we have been to hundreds of conferences together, but these things never really reach the grassroots, who have dug in their heels and are influenced by the old culture of war. With the help of responsible journalism and responsible educators, we have to move both societies from a culture of war to a culture of peace.

Otherwise, we will remain for the next 50 years where we are today.

The Arab-Israeli problem is not any different than the problems we have been listening to for the last three hours. The problem is,

Senad Pećanin

Munther Dajani

Bosnia and Serbia and Croatia have no problems in cooperating with countries like Finland, Luxembourg or Lithuania, members of the EU, but are not ready to cooperate with their neighbours.

“Neighbours, Partners, Rivals: Perceptions of South East Europe”


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“When the Guns Fall Silent: An International Perspective on Fostering Reconciliation”

who is going to start first, who is going to apologize first for what, and for whom? The blame game never ends. I always thought that when going into negotiations you bring with you something called goodwill. But what we have seen in the last 60 years, actually, is the absence of goodwill and each side blaming the other for his problems. This is a very serious problem that we have to get over. Sooner or later, somebody has to say not only sorry, but they have to acknowledge each other. You cannot negotiate with your friends only, you have to negotiate with your enemies, and both sides have to accept whoever is on the other side of the negotiating table. Since when do we have the privilege of saying we don’t negotiate with “X”, we want to negotiate with “Y”? Or, I don’t want to negotiate with “Y”, I want to negotiate with “Z”? This is not the way things are. Usually, you negotiate with your enemy and you go in with a mutual idea, and goodwill for the benefit of both societies, because that is our responsibility for the generations to come – to give them a better life than we have had.

I have lived through four wars and many people have been killed on both sides, and I am sure there are millions of Israelis like me who feel the same way, because always looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life is no way to live. This is what we are talking about when we speak about the achievement of peace. Peace, comprehensive peace, to last for generations to come. I hope we – academics, journalists and committed people – have been trying to do this, have been working towards peace. But it seems that our leaders are not on the same wavelength, and we hope that at one stage or another they will see the light and join the rest of the people who are working towards peace.

Talking About the Truth

Daphna Golan, Director, Partnership for Social Change, Hebrew University ofJerusalem

In the late 1970s, as a first year student at Hebrew University, I took a class on South African history, and the teacher drew two

circles, one inside the other, and he said, “This is South Africa. In this circle inside, about five million whites live in a democracy; they hold free parliamentary elections, have a justice

system, and a free press. In the other circle, some 30 million blacks live with no rights.” I was very young, but it didn’t seem right to me, and I kept asking him questions about how is it possible that two groups could live in one country and one would have democracy and the other would not. Thirty years later I teach at the same university, and I am afraid to say that this is the concept that most Israelis have about their country.

Most Israelis believe that there is an imaginary line between democracy inside Israel and what happens in the occupied territories where there is no democracy. We boast about freedom of speech inside Israel and

we believe that the situation in the occupied territories is temporary. It’s only until we find a political solution. And so, for the last 41 years, the occupation of Palestinian territories continues and Israelis still believe that they live in democracy.

Yes, there is a relatively free press in Israel; journalists are not arrested, they are not shot, at least not when they are Jewish, yet the situation is just getting worse and worse. And so my question is whether we should think about freedom of speech in different terms, and maybe expand the idea and ask ourselves whether we have the imagination, the freedom, to imagine a different world, the freedom to think about Israel-Palestine without borders.

I have prepared a very long comparison between Israel and South Africa, and while there are very many differences, there are also similarities, such as the consistent use of the legal system to normalise a state of discrimination. During Apartheid, not only did millions of people live without minimum rights and in ongoing poverty, but the discrimination was anchored in a complex system of laws; laws that prohibited marriage between blacks and whites, laws that prohibited blacks from living in cities that were declared white, etc. The occupied territories are also governed by a very complex system of laws, hundreds of them. As in South Africa, Israel employs hundreds of lawyers to explain how things may be unjust, but legal. Hundreds of laws do not make discrimination just; they help Israelis believe that they live in a democracy, and deny the very simple fact that of the two groups living on this very small piece of land, one enjoys rights and one doesn’t.

In fact, to be correct, there are in legal terms five different groups in Israel-Palestine. We have Jews, about 5.7 million, who constitute a small majority. We are now reaching the point where the number of Arabs and Jews in Palestine is almost the same. Jews have rights. Palestinian citizens of Israel, some

1.4 million people, enjoy almost full rights, but as a collective they are discriminated against in many ways. Then we have a group of Palestinians in Jerusalem, who are not citizens, but they are residents. We have 2.4 million Palestinians living in the occupied territories, in the West Bank, with no rights at all. And finally we have some 1.5 million Palestinians living in Gaza. They live under siege, in very poor and hungry Gaza. So we have these five different groups; each have very different rights, but interestingly enough, the concept of Israel and South Africa is very different. How we conceptualize the societies is very different. While the political system of white, ethnic dominance in South Africa was seen as unacceptable by the international community, when we look at Israel-Palestine, the whole world agrees that ensuring the system of Jewish ethic dominance within the borders of ’48 is the peaceful target of any negotiation.

I was born in Israel; I grew up in Israel; I raise my children in Israel. I lived through the ‘67 war, the ‘73 war, the ‘82 war, the first intifada of ‘87, the ‘91 or Gulf War, the second intifada in 2000, and the war in 2006. And that doesn’t count all the suicide bombings and other attacks that we lived through. And I am scared. I am scared that what we are going to see is more wars and more bombing and more killing. And I am scared because all these negotiations that we have heard about were never negotiations for reconciliation. There is one question that was never asked. And the question is, “How do we, Jews and Arabs, live together?

Because freedom of expression is less restricted in Israel than it was in South Africa, because there are far fewer limitations on publications of human rights organisations, because of access to global media, Israelis are exposed to information about what happens in the occupied territories, what happens to Palestinians. We know, we hear, we see, but these testimonies are perceived and presented as testimonies of individuals, exceptions, injured parties who are to be pitied. But the broader picture of a collective victim, of a Palestinian people that in its entirety live under occupation, in its entirety are victims, this is denied.

The establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa teaches us that in order to move forward towards a better future, we have to go back to old wounds and to listen to individual testimonies. But most Jews do not want to hear Palestinian testimonies. The dispossession and expulsion of Palestinians in 1948 is still denied. It doesn’t exist in Israeli textbooks, it doesn’t exist in public discourse, and Israelis refuse to speak about

the Palestinian refugees’ right to return. Palestinians deny other parts of the past. They refuse to acknowledge the historical connection of the Jewish people to Israel.

We’ve seen very many failed negotiations, years of peace negotiations that didn’t work out because of the assumption that borders

can be discussed, lines moved, territories exchanged, without recognition that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are refugees. All these negotiations are fruitless if we don’t talk about the truth. Israelis and Palestinians will have to consider the future, not in terms of separation, but also in terms of coexistence.

Last month, here in Belgrade, an Israeli singer participated in the Eurovision song contest. Thirty-three percent of Israelis watched him on Israeli television. In our imagination, Israel is part of Europe. In reality, Israelis play basketball in Europe, we get economic benefits from the European market so that when an Israeli singer sings in Belgrade, Israelis are proud to be part of Europe. We don’t see ourselves as part of the Middle East, where we are situated, and so the question of how we Jews live in the midst of the Arab world is not really asked.

The reconciliation of Jews and Arabs should be part of a larger process of reconciliation with Europe, as both Jews and Palestinians are, in different ways, traumatized first by the colonization of Palestine and then, more importantly maybe, by the persecution of Jews in Europe. If we would imagine a different world, not based on colonial borders, a world of reconciliation, maybe all the people in Palestine and Israel would be part of the EU. Maybe the next time the Eurovision is heard in Belgrade, not only an Israeli, but also an Israeli-Palestinian group would win the song contest.

I am not sure how Jews and Arabs, Israelis and Palestinians, will manage to consolidate a shared vision, or how we will see ourselves in the future, how Jews and Arabs will live together in justice and reconciliation on the same piece of land. How will we atone for

the pain of the past, how will we ask for forgiveness? How will we as Jews live in the midst of an Arab region which never accepted us; a region in which we have done very little to be accepted? I don’t know when we will begin to talk about these issues, but I am sure that we need your help. We need the help of the international community to find a way. The struggle for justice in Israel and Palestine is not only ours to solve. We need your help, and time is running out.

Telling People’s Stories

Barney Mthombothi, Editor, Financial Mail, Johannesburg

I guess the reason I am on the podium is because I am from South Africa, a society that has obviously gone through some

transition, and I think is still going through some kind of transition. The previous panelist mentioned the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. I think it was a very good exercise. Like all compromises, it left a lot of people unhappy and unsatisfied, but we are actually better off with it, than without. I think it is good that it happened.

The point was that you were basically going to get very respectable individuals in society, and get both perpetrators and victims to come forward and tell their stories. And I think Archbishop Tutu had a very good chairman, who was empathetic but also open so that the perpetrators felt that they were being listened to. What then happened was that the perpetrators were going to get amnesty and the victims were going to get some sort of reparation. I think the perpetrators have actually got their amnesty, but the victims are still fighting for some kind of reparation. The irony of the situation is that it is the new government that will actually have to pay them for the pain that was put on them by the previous regime.

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Daphna Golan

Barney Mthombothi

We boast about freedom of speech inside Israel and we believe that the situation in the occupied territories is temporary. It’s only until we find a political solution. And so, for the last 41 years, the occupation of Palestinian territories continues and Israelis still believe that they live in democracy.




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So the struggle continues. But it was actually a very good exercise and I think where the media comes in is making sure that the stories are told. I don’t think it’s the job of the press or radio-television to take sides or to promote reconciliation. I think we promote reconciliation, we promote understanding, by merely exposing the truth, by telling people’s stories and I think that is what happened in South Africa. You had a lot of people, most of them black people, who were given the platform, who spoke in their own languages, who were very graphic in their descriptions of what happened to them and that was carried live on national television. That was a very good thing, because for the first time people realised that they had actually been living a lie for such a long time, because what the regime was telling them was not true, it was a lie. And for the first time, the victims were telling their own story and that was a good thing.

My other point is that the African National Congress (ANC), which was at the forefront of the very popular struggle against Apartheid, had received very favourable media coverage during the years of struggle, and there was an expectation that once they got into power it would be business as usual. I remember we media editors had a two-day meeting with

Mr. [Thabo] Mbeki and the entire cabinet, and the question they posed was, “Why do you people treat us like you used to treat the Apartheid government? We are a government that was elected by a great majority of the people.” In fact, they had something like 75 per cent of the popular vote in the elections. So they wanted to know why we treated them differently now that they were in power. I think now that they are in government, the buck stops with them, and we are going to hold them accountable on behalf of the electorate.The point I am trying to make here is, basically, that tension between media and the government is a given. You can have a media that promotes a cause, and once that cause succeeds and the people fighting for that cause are in government, it is your duty as the media to make sure you keep their feet to the fire, make sure that they deliver on the promises they made.I think the one area that we still fall far short of in South Africa is the question of access to the media by ordinary people. South Africa has 11 official languages, but the language of power, the language of business, of politics, is English. The country has a huge illiteracy rate and most people don’t speak English. So what that means is that the great majority of people are cut off from the day-to-day

discussions and the dialogue that goes on that actually leads to decisions that affect their lives. For instance, parliament is English. If my mother were to switch on the television and watch the proceedings in parliament, she would not understand it, because it’s in a foreign language basically. If you look at recent events in South Africa, at the xenophobia, it is a slow alienation of ordinary people from the establishment, because they are not really a part of the decisions or the making of the decisions that affect their lives. So the point is that I don’t really think there will ever be a situation where those who are in power feel that the media is doing a good job. The media is there to serve its audience, and most of the audience are people who have a bone to pick with those who are in power.


“New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats”ModeratorRoy Greenslade, Media Commentator and Columnist, Professor of Journalism, City University, London

PanelistsDavid Kurtz, Managing Editor, Talking Points Memo, New York, NYDejan Restak, Website Director, B92 FM, BelgradeChristoph Schultheis, BILDblog, Berlin

Transition Stage

Roy Greenslade, Media Commentator and Columnist; Professor of Journalism, City University, London

Yesterday’s session was about truth and reconciliation and I think that we have got to that stage in new media

where we need a bit of truth and reconciliation with regard to the way in which some people believe that newspapers are dead and some people believe that new media is the answer to everything.

Listening to Dejan [Restak] was to really understand how fantastically versatile and accessible everything is when you use the Internet. But at the same time, in the minds of everyone here who are basically content providers, it raises a question about whether or not content providers can be amply rewarded for having started this process by providing the content when it is so available to everyone for free. That is one of the questions I think we’ll need to take up.

I am considered to be a digital missionary and therefore a doom monger about newspapers. That’s rather the wrong way of seeing it.

I work in both print and on-line and I think we’re in that transition stage in which our work goes up on both platforms. Platform is one of those wonderful words which has cropped up in the last ten years; multi-platform journalism, and so on. I am sure

we are all aware of it. It’s one of those things about whether or not we believe the future lies totally on-screen or about whether there is still room for print, and whether print will last.

Listening here today, you can see that you can live out your life informing yourself and being educated and being entertained simply by living on-screen.

Reader and Content Provider

David Kurtz, Managing Editor, Talking Points Memo, New York, NY

I want to start by telling you a little bit about Talking Points Memo and the various sites that we publish in conjunction with

it. Talking Points Memo was started by Josh Marshall, who is a freelance journalist, back in 2000 during the presidential election and the Florida recount. It was started as a way for a struggling freelance journalist to find a home for some of his writings that either weren’t appropriate for magazines or wouldn’t sell in magazines, and to present some of his meandering thoughts. Since then, as a one-man show in 2000 to today, it has obviously evolved considerably. It is still a very small operation, but with a full-time staff of nine and multiple different websites. We evolved slowly in the beginning, building up an audience, developing a solid core of readers.

By 2005, we were able to start TPMCafé, which is a community forum that allows readers to blog, to discuss politics and policy and foreign policy, European issues, American issues. It’s a variety of reader blogs and has become a real stopping point as well for authors of new books in the U.S. who come and blog for a week at our TPMCafé Book Club and discuss their books with other authors and with experts in the field. So it has become a real community that is self-sustaining and a place for readers to interact.

In 2006, with the help of financial contributions from our readers, we were able to hire two reporters to start what we call TPMMuckraker, which is our investigative journalism site. We have one reporter based in Washington,

Roy Greenslade


Denis Murray


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Apart from these threatening developments, it has of course never been easier to publish, and this is due to the Internet which makes it so easy financially and technically. You can even publish anonymously if you want to, or if you need to, which by the way we at BILDblog don’t. But the important thing is that you will find an audience on the Internet. That was one of the major experiences we had at BILDblog.

Four years ago, a colleague and I, both from so-called traditional journalism, started to critically watch over the German tabloid newspaper, BILD, which is owned by Axel-Springer AG, one of the biggest media companies in Germany. With 12 million readers each day, BILD is one of biggest newspaper in Europe. It is unfortunately one of the most influential papers in Germany and maybe the leading paper for political issues as well. Unhappy with BILD, my colleague and I started fact-checking this newspaper and also criticizing the political propaganda, the

commercial involvement, and of course the violations of personal rights, you find in BILD every day.

We wouldn’t have been able to do this without the Internet, because other established media are less interested in criticizing each other for various reasons. So it was a big media company on the one hand, and just two people on the other hand, and within months from its inception, BILDblog became the most-read web log without advertising in Germany, and it still is. So there you see the potential.

I would like to close my statement by saying that, apart from the danger of governmental regulations or governmental control over the Internet, there is also the danger of public opinion being manipulated or dominated by influential media companies. But due to the Internet, we now all have a greater chance than ever before to raise awareness about this or any other issue.

“New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats” “New Media: New Opportunities, New Threats”

another in New York, and we do a considerable amount of original reporting, as a well an aggregation of investigative reporting done around the U.S. by a variety of other media outlets. It was TPMMuckraker that led the reporting on the U.S. attorney general scandal in the United States, which ultimately led to the resignation of U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales last year.

We were also able to start TPMElection Central, our other site which covers U.S. elections and campaigns; obviously a busy year for us there.

All of the sites rely heavily on our readership. We have a core readership that is extremely dedicated to the work we do. They show their dedication through their financial contributions from time to time; they show it by a steady stream of emails and tips, and interactions with us that really make the sites what they are. It would simply not work if we didn’t have the group of well-informed, well-connected people reading us that we do. We have newspaper editors and reporters from around the country who are regular readers; we have political officials, staff officials on Capitol Hill, who are regular readers, and as a result we get a tremendous amount of important

information from these readers that informs our coverage.

That steady stream of information and that back-and-forth we have with them is in many ways what distinguishes the site from other political blogs and online outlets as well as from mainstream media outlets. Just a couple of weeks ago, I attempted to get in touch with an acquaintance at a major daily in the U.S. and didn’t have ready access to his email. So I sent an email through his paper, through the web forum they have to contact reporters. And about a week later I got a response saying, “We are really sorry, but we discovered our server wasn’t working and we weren’t able to read our reader emails”. Well, we would shut down if we didn’t have our reader emails. Within an hour we would start losing that connection we have to readers, we would start losing the feedback that we get, the information that we get, the tips that we get. It is crucial to what we do and we are constantly reinforcing with our staff the need to mine that flow of information for news and for ideas and critiques of our coverage. We are constantly responding in very concrete ways to the feedback that we get from the readers.

Finally, we have started TPMtv, which is a four-instalment-a-week video port on U.S. politics and current events that we produce and distribute on the web. We are moving more and more into video. As Dejan was showing, there is a tremendous amount of opportunity out there for new media expression. We have been able to increase our readership considerably and increase our presence through video in the last year and that’s been another huge component of it. But I will say in closing that the difference I think you see most profoundly right now between online media and traditional media is that interactivity between reader and content provider. The nexus of those two things is only going to continue to grow as there are increased opportunities for readers to provide that kind of input and as you see more traditional

outlets providing blogs and reader forums and other opportunities for readers to contribute content and to interact with the content providers themselves.

Somebody to Watch over BILD

Christoph Schultheis, BILDblog, Berlin

First, I want to thank IPI for inviting me as a speaker to this conference, because for me this shows that even tiny,

independent Internet projects like BILDblog are becoming part of the established media scene.

I would like to focus on the situation in Germany, a country in which freedom of the press is of course guaranteed and has been unquestioned for more than 60 years, and in which there is a well-working and diversified media landscape, excellent journalism and investigative reporters. But when it comes to the Internet, you’ll find that even in Germany there are threatening or at least unpleasant developments.

Let me give you three examples from recent months. First, we learned some weeks ago that [Deutsche] Telekom, Germany’s biggest telecommunications company, was scandalously and of course illegally using or, better, abusing customer data. Second, the German government recently passed a new law requiring Internet providers to retain all customer communication data for several months. Finally, some months ago, one of the major Internet service providers in Germany cut off access to a free pornographic website. The Internet service provider didn’t do this for moral or legal reasons, but because another pornographic website, one with paid content, was successful in forcing the Internet service provider to do so. In this case, it was porn content, but you don’t know what might be next.

Christoph Schultheis

David Kurtz


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“Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)”ModeratorWilliam Green, Editor, TIME Europe, London

Speakers:Vuslat Dogan Sabanci, CEO, Hürriyet, IstanbulDavid Montgomery, CEO, Mecom Group plc, LondonMichael Ringier, Chairman of the Board, Ringier AG, Zurich

At War with the Obvious

Michael Ringier, Chairman of the Board, Ringier AG, Zurich

Are profits killing the news? I could respond by assuming the role of a traditional newspaper boss and rage

against the nouveau riche venture capital hyenas. I could argue that they force the prices up prior to takeover, then load the publishing company they bought with debt, bleed it dry at the expense of the workforce, throw out the older, more experienced journalists and replace them with younger, cheaper ones. And for making these denunciations you would probably applaud me, a publisher whose company has been associated with journalism for over a century. Maybe this scenario has happened in a few isolated cases, but it has nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with the real problem.

I am well aware that I am now assuming the role of an actor and rewriting the script. I hope I am not confusing the chairperson too much. I am assuming that by making this guest appearance today, I was intended to appear as a kind of Robin Hood of the newspaper forest, the saviour of the hard-pressed journalists from

the robber barons. The identity of the person appointed to take on the thankless role of robber baron is probably clear enough; it is Sir David the Voracious Montgomery. And what is this Helvetic Robin Hood of Dufour Castle in Zurich doing? He is riding his horse alongside David the Voracious to do battle with the real news killers. And do you know who they are? It’s those journalists who have not noticed that what they are doing is passé. Before you throw me off the stage, let me tell you what I mean, what has actually happened.

Two new realities have totally transformed the traditional newspaper environment. One of them is new technology, the digitization of the media driven by the Internet. The other is a completely new marketing phenomenon, the free newspaper, a totally new way of getting newspapers into the market. Lots of established journalists, as well we traditional publishers, have taken these realities on board and responded accordingly. They are active Internet users and publish their own free newspapers. But many journalists have forgotten one thing. They have forgotten to redefine their own job description. They carry on doing their jobs as they have always done at the established newspapers where they work, as if the Internet and free newspapers didn’t exist.

So what has changed so much in the work journalists do? Something vital. I will use my tabloid newspaper, Blick, in Switzerland as an example. For years, decades even, we made a living by being a little more light-hearted, a little more aggressive, or simply a little bit different from conventional papers. We turned the same item of news into something we could sell by adopting more of a tabloid approach and using more colour photography. That’s now all gone, for good.

For a start, the traditional media have begun poaching in what we consider our hunting grounds. We have learned to live with this by inserting an explanatory box here and a more innovative headline there. The spread of the Internet, though, has led to the original core of the daily newspaper, the news, losing its former status. News has become a commodity just like any other. And yet, a lot of printed media still treat the news as if it were something valuable or interesting in its own right. The free newspapers have finally signalled the demise of this genre of journalism. Not only that. Even the quickly-researched and well-presented item of news has become an endangered species, because no one wants to pay for it anymore. Not one Swiss franc, not one euro, not even a Czech Crown or a Romanian leu. The Michael Ringier


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globalization of the media industry is affecting every reader and every journalist no matter where he or she works. To be able to make money from printed matter these days, you have to be able to offer nuggets of journalistic gold. Everything else sinks like a lead balloon. That is our principle and the most difficult challenge for a large part of our activities.

Tabloid doesn’t mean to address the more stupid reader; it means to have the better idea. The challenges facing today’s journalists, those who work for tabloids or any paid newspapers, are immense. When it comes down to it, nowadays you can only sell exclusivity. Everything else is not just free, but pointless. Can we still afford this form of journalism? Or put more brutally, can the market afford these personalities in journalism? Are the readers still prepared to pay for their writings? Will advertisers still place their adverts in sufficient numbers given the current climate? My answer is not based by any hard facts or specific knowledge backed by statistics. It is based on the conviction, on the unshakable belief, of a former keen journalist who became a publisher through family circumstances. Ladies and gentlemen, exclusivity is the only form of journalism you can still sell.

People will only be prepared to pay for something that they cannot find on the Internet, or in the free newspapers. They will only pay for thoughts, opinions and ideas that they cannot find anywhere else, only for presentations and pictures not offered by anyone else. And only for minds they are curious to know more about, for journalists and columnists who offer added value and for media personalities whose points of views they have grown to trust. That is what people will want to pay for in future.

There have never been so many brands jostling for position. The newspapers are the main brand; the journalists are the sub-brands without whom the main brand cannot survive. If you are asking people to buy your newspaper, and you have no names and nothing special, you have no future. That is the challenge we have to face; it is also the opportunity we have to grasp. Journalists and photographers have also shown that they can rise to the challenge.

One of the greatest pioneering photojournalists of our time is the American William Eggleston. In the 1970s, he was the first to explore the ugly side of America.

In those days it was mainly in the southern States. He showed the flip side of the American dream, the ordinary trash. “I am at war with the obvious,” was his mission statement. The obvious is not only the enemy of Eggleston, but of all journalists and publishers. The ordinary, the familiar, the banal, indeed the obvious, spell disaster for paid newspapers, whether the owner of the newspaper is a venture capitalist or a traditional publisher.

Profit is a Tool

Vuslat Dogan Sabanci, CEO, Hürriyet, Istanbul

I have a problem with the very question raised as the topic of this panel, “Are profits killing the news?” Let me try to explain

why. Let’s look at some other industries and ask exactly the same question. Do profits kill bread? Do profits kill Air Jordan? Do profits kill the Ferrari F430. Why does it sound so awkward to ask these three questions? Let me tell you why. Because we all know that the baker needs profits in order to continue making bread. Nike needs to earn more money so that it will have the incentive to produce its shoes in the very competitive sports market. And Ferrari needs more profits in order to satisfy the ever-sophisticated needs of its customers.

Then why do we dare ask the seemingly simple question for our own industry so casually? Like every industry, we need profits, and we need profits for two reasons. One, to protect our freedom, our independence, from any source of power, sometimes governments, sometimes advertisers, and so forth. And two, to be able to continue improving our news coverage, and to keep up with the change, which, I hope, is the main topic of the panel.

I can almost see the objections – that I categorize news like a commodity – appearing in your minds. But I disagree with these objections, because I want to ask you if we are taking ourselves too seriously by posing this question.

Let’s look at what they have been saying about our profession over the centuries. In the 18th century, Thomas Jefferson said, “The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.” Henry James, in the 19th century, said, “The faculty of attention has utterly vanished from the Anglo-Saxon mind, extinguished at its source by the big bayadère of journalism, of the newspaper and the picture magazine which keeps screaming, ‘Look at me.’ Illustrations, loud simplifications

… bill poster advertising – only these stand a chance.” Or Normal Mailer in the 20th century: “Once a newspaper touches a story, the facts are lost forever, even to the protagonists.” These words clearly show that we are not able to satisfy these sharpest minds of society. There is a clear imbalance here; our expectations and our image don’t match. The simple reason behind this is the perception of news by the consumers of news; there is always a debate about news and this has been going on for centuries.

The quality of news and newspapers has always been criticized independently of our profitability. This has no relation with the problem our industry is facing today. So what are we facing today? And where is the problem? Since we are not in a philosophical discussion, but trying to deal with a real world issue, instead of the question posed in this panel, I will ask two other questions and I hope that they will lead us to constructive conclusions. One, is news really dead? And two, can we have news without profits?

I can report very confidently that the death of news is greatly exaggerated. News is alive more than ever. Especially the inflow of news, with the unlimited editorial space and the Internet and the proliferation of information sources, shows us that news is alive.

Today, the issue is not the scarcity of news, but the abundance of news. Only 15 years ago, even for a major international story, we would be lucky if we had a single source. Now, from agencies to satellite TV to bloggers

to citizen journalists, we have a huge array of sources for a single event that merits coverage. Which one we choose, how we should pick up the news, are the questions that we ask today. The all-knowing jack of all trades editors and reporters have perished in the minds of our readers and viewers. The newsroom that was a temple is now gone.

The world became the newsroom. The people took part in gathering news and editing. And they love it, let’s face it. We can’t reverse this fact. We have to review our news-gathering processes and our newsroom organisations. So, more creation of news, more involvement in the news-making process from people, keeps this industry alive.

If the news is not the one in danger, is it the newspapers that are in danger? Are the newspapers the ones that are dying? My answer to this question is yes and no. In many markets newspapers are losing circulation. The advertising market is getting smaller for the papers, and newspapers are also losing the role of being the only source of news.

Michael [Ringier] just described a market for newspapers that is much more advanced than the one in Turkey. The industry is clearly going through a transition. We have to accept this fact and face our challenges – survival, redefinition, and how we adapt to it. This is an existential to-be-or-not-to-be challenge for the whole newspaper industry. Now let me take you to my country, Turkey, and to its leading daily, Hürriyet. First published in 1948, Hürriyet has succeeded in keeping its leadership as the most influential media name and the most profitable medium for 60 years. Keeping leadership was possible only with our continuous effort to adapt. Hürriyet is one of the papers that has really changed in what is for some people a very short 60 years and for other people quite a long time.

In Turkey, the newspaper industry is seeing healthy growth. Our advertising has been growing by double digits over the last five years. We have an average of more than 5 per cent growth each year, again over the same period. It seems like we should have nothing to worry about. But we do worry. We are paranoid about losing the position of being the authority on news in Turkey. And we are paranoid about losing this position to any other medium. Our goal is to produce better news and profit is a tool for being a better paper, a better content provider. Profit is not an objective in itself. But only with profits can we sustain our independence and embrace change and cope with the transition.

We have an ongoing plan of transition that will enable us to survive through bad days and invest in better days. When we were making our plan, we asked this very crucial question to ourselves. We asked, “What is our competitive advantage? In the business of news where do we add value that will make us stronger and untouchable?” And we came to the conclusion that we have to get smaller and smaller in some sources of news and invest more and more in other sources of news. This meant a substantial change in our cost structure. In order to invest in other forms of publishing news, we had to be financially strong.

For example, until a couple of years ago, we had an army of reporters covering every hospital, every police station, and every court in order to have strong city news. Now, with

the strong presence of local agencies, we can follow the city efficiently and produce one written exclusive, in-depth stories taking cues from agency dispatchers. On the other hand, we are continuously investing in new technologies, hiring and training editors who can use new technologies in order to give well-rounded news stories. This is an opportunity for journalism and the newspaper business, especially these days when we are trying to redefine ourselves.

This brings us to the Internet. The Internet is a huge wave that’s defining humanity as we speak, and we have to surf on this wave. In order to do that, we need skilful surfers, great surfboards. And profits provide that. In short, the Internet is a fact of life and it cannot be a threat. We started investing in the Internet 12 years ago, and never suspended our investments. We were able to create a strong online presence. Today, Hürriyet.com has 22 million visitors monthly. It is one of the two most-visited Turkish websites. Hürriyet.com, regardless of Turkey’s relatively low Internet penetration, is one of the top ten media sites in the world. We wouldn’t have been able to dream of this achievement if Hürriyet had chosen to remain just the leading daily Turkish newspaper.

A decade ago, we decided that we will use our news skills in every available channel to the reader. We used profits to adapt to our new conditions. Integrated news sources, words, sounds, moving and satellite images converge into a complete news story. This

Vuslat Dogan Sabanci

“Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)” “Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)”

Tabloid doesn’t mean to address the more stupid reader; it means to have the better idea.


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is what the readers want, this is what they love, and we have to provide this in order to continue our existence. If, with a mobile phone, you can write a story, record an audio/video interview and send it to your headquarters with just one click, then you should have one journalist doing all this. It’s not only necessary for the speed of

operations, but because it is demanded of us. Just one gadget like the iPhone is sufficient for information, communication and entertainment. It is a trend we cannot buck and we should confront. We have only one choice. To be part of this transformative period, otherwise it’s “game over.” News has transformed shape. It is alive and kicking and will continue to be so as long as media outlets that are producing news are profitable. Without profits, not only will we not have news, but we also cannot invest in the future of our news industry. We cannot assure independence and independent news.

I want to finish with a food for thought question for all of you. Profits are necessary, they are essential, but they are not sufficient to secure our future. Today, Google is spending a substantial part of its revenues for research and development, Nike is doing the same, and so is Ferrari. What are we as newspapers doing for research and development, for innovation? How many of us around this room have a budget that is saved for researching our future?

Making Journalists into Managers

David Montgomery, CEO, Mecom Group plc, London

I guess my job is to be highly provocative. I prefer really to be more optimistic and positive about the future of news. Like

my colleagues, I reacted with indignation to the headline, “Are Profits Killing the News?”, because it simply isn’t true. Profits are good for the news.

There would be no Fox News, no Sky News today, if it hadn’t been for the tremendous profits generated by News Corporation over the years, which Rupert Murdoch – like him or not – has put back into news organisations and into journalism. My own company launches a news product once a month at the very least, and just two weeks

ago we launched three news products, print and online. Indeed, the consumer is getting greater choices as a result of profits.

News is being developed more aggressively, because of course news today cannot simply be news that people see for the first time in printed form. Therefore, we see our company not so much as a news company, but as a company that is built around not the “One P” for profit, but the “Three C’s”: content, creativity, and consumers.

Basically, I am optimistic about content and creativity being the driving force, and also the change in the approach to news and how content is manipulated to reach a wider audience than merely through print.

We have a fantastic and underestimated resource in terms of newsrooms throughout Europe. The philosophy we have in our company is very much a publishing one, and I think I can give credence to that, because in the last 18 months, we have changed five out of six of our country chief executives, and all five new chief executives are former journalists and editors-in-chief. And as you probably know, we have made some contentious decisions about making journalists into managers. Nevertheless, the ethos of our business is one of journalism, one of news, of content generally, and we have the leadership now in the company to develop that and to spawn new products and new techniques.

I think we are disappointed from time to time with young journalists who are not prepared to adapt to the new circumstances. Three weeks ago, I was in Maastricht where we re-launched our newspaper in tabloid format. There was a tremendous front-page story – and you don’t always get this opportunity when you re-launch a newspaper – about a local lawyer from Limburg, who, it had been discovered, was involved in money laundering. It was an exclusive story, which a young journalist in his 30s had produced. I complimented the journalist concerned, saying it was a great launch story, which would sell newspapers. Although 97 per cent of our copies are sold by subscription, it is nevertheless important that we give value for money in terms of exclusive news, and this was a classic situation where we had a good local story in the fine tradition of regional newspapers. So I asked this young journalist what he had done online. And he said to me, “Well, nothing. Maybe I’ll think about it tomorrow.” He was young, he’s been exposed to the modern approach, but the tradition is very deep-seated where people work for print and for print alone, and nothing else matters. This is a non-

sustainable model. It is non-sustainable to expect one set of people to produce one set of content for one product for one reader. We cannot operate viably under those circumstances in the future.

I also went into the Berliner Zeitung newsroom recently and I talked to the editorial board, three young people, who said to me, “Of course, we do believe in the Internet; the problem is that when someone writes a page-three piece for the Berliner Zeitung, they are much too tired to go online afterwards and produce their content for the online users, or indeed even have a debate with the online users.” Again, this attitude will be buried in short order. It has to be if we are going to have vital content businesses.

Newspapers have to recognise that they have lost the precious monopoly of breaking news. They haven’t lost the resource of the editorial department; they haven’t lost the vast resource of a broad network among the journalists, which cannot be replicated and has taken decades and generations to build up. Between them they have hundreds of years of experience, but it’s wasted in print. It has to be disseminated in a different way across many different platforms.

First of all, we have got to recognise we’ve lost the monopoly of news. We have to recognise also that the consumer is not prepared to accept news dissemination as a one-way street. The consumers of newspapers are thinkers, they are involved themselves in terms of their opinions in news situations; they want to talk back to the content provider. They have a point of view; they want to be participants in the media experience. The success of journalism in the future will be to take advantage of that and therefore we have got to develop new skills in terms of moderating

contributed content, of debating with the users or the readers the subjects of the day, and most importantly recognising that dumping a printed version of the story online simply does not work. Replicating print online is not the answer.

What is required is that journalists recognise they must manipulate content and handle it more creatively to involve the readers. Involvement I would describe as the “Two E’s”: entertainment and engagement; entertainment not in the classic, showbiz sense of the word, but to entertain in a way that you stimulate thought, stimulate participation, and get a reaction from the consumers. Those techniques are very different to what subscription newspapers are used to in Europe. Those techniques are, strangely enough, more familiar to tabloid journalism in the UK, where newspaper editors and journalists are forced every day to make their paper exciting, to make it dramatic, because they sell every copy off the newsstand and people have a choice to pick it up or not pick it up, whereas we have almost 100 per cent of our copies on subscription and those techniques are not honed to the same extent.

The online world depends entirely on creating traffic through creativity, through

the use of content in a way which will entertain, excite, and engage the audience. Those techniques are pretty unfamiliar to some of the journalists in the more serious newspapers, but they can be learned. And when they are learned they are very exciting indeed. Indeed, across our five countries where we are mainly involved, we have quite astounding results. But they are results that have come from a different type of journalist. Our journalists have changed their techniques and learned new approaches to content, and where they are most successful is where the print journalists also contribute to online content, because those are the people with the most experience, those are the people who know their communities intimately.

Going through the countries, Norway I think is undoubtedly in the lead in terms of online traffic. Thirty small papers, some dailies, some three times a week, serving small communities, but they are moving well toward owning those communities online as much as in print. Of course, the brand is important, because people trust the brand, but also the ingenuity of the journalists concerned by constant revision of content, constant involvement of the audience and constant updating. They’ve learned the techniques and the results are clear. Online traffic in our newspapers in Norway

has doubled, and indeed the revenue has doubled as well. And every month we’ve launched a new type of online product as a result of this success somewhere in Europe.

In Poland, we have introduced a slightly different technique. Young journalists launched the online version of the newspaper first. These are weekly free newspapers. They launched the online version first, and after the online version becomes established, we start to do a printed version. It is the same journalists doing both, but initiating the online content first.

So “web-first” is now the philosophy in our organisation, and it demonstrates that rather than being downcast about the future in news, we should be very bullish. We should be optimistic. We should recognise the resource we have, the talent within our organisations.

David Montgomery

“Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)” “Are Profits Killing the News? (Focus on Europe)”

The world became the newsroom. The people took part in gathering news and editing. And they love it, let’s face it.


Congress Snapshots Congress SnapshotsB

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After the Opening Ceremony: Boris Tadić, President of Serbia (second from right), talks with participants

From left to right: Azer Hasret and Umud Mirzayev, IPI Azerbaijan National Committee

Skadarlija Bohemian Quarter: Milica Miletić, IPI Belgrade Host Committee (centre)

From the floor: N. Ravi, Editor of The Hindu, India, poses a question

Skadarlija Bohemian Quarter (from left to right): Yoshio Murakami, Asahi Shimbun; Kiyofuku Chuma, Shinano-Mainichi Shimbun; Hideo Gotoh, Nihon Shinbun Kyokai, JapanDancing at the Farewell Concert

At the White Palace (from left to right): Crown Prince Alexander; Hari Štajner, Chairman, IPI Belgrade Host Committee; Mitja Mersol, Editor-at-Large, Delo, Slovenia

Farewell Concert at Belgrade Fortress: Boban and Marko Marković Orchestra

Opening Ceremony at the Parliament Building

Hollman Morris, TV journalist, filmmaker and writer, Colombia

At Ušće Tower: Former IPI Director Johann Fritz (left) and Hari Štajner, Chairman, IPI Belgrade Host Committee

Charles Eisendrath, Director, Knight-Wallace Fellows at Michigan, USA (left), and IPI Director David Dadge share some thoughts

From left to right: Vappu Virkkunen; Janne Virkkunen, Senior Editor-in-Chief, Helsingin Sanomat, Finland; Gengo Nakashima, Lecturer, International Communications, Meiji University, Japan


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Tuesday, 17 June 2008

“Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism”ModeratorGalina Sidorova, Editor-in-Chief, Sovershenno Secretno, Moscow

PanelistsStefan Candea, Co-Founder, Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism, BucharestMisha Glenny, Journalist and Author, LondonDaniele Moro, Editor-in-Chief, "Tg5", Canale 5, Milan

The Problems We Face

Stefan Candea, Co-Founder, Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism, Bucharest

I work for the Romanian Centre for Investigative Journalism, an organisation that exists since 2001, and I have been

working as a journalist since 1998. Since 2003, I have been working solely as a freelance journalist. Thinking back, I believe it is good that I never worked in Romania for the BBC or the Guardian or any other big news organisation. Instead, I have to thank the Romanian publishers and media owners who were so bad, because thanks to them I am the journalist I am today, involved in so many international investigations and projects.

For each wrong step they made and for each wrong action they took, my colleagues and I had to find a solution. I will try to summarize the problems we faced working for the Romanian media, the same problems that other journalists in the region are facing. The lack of money for such resources as databases is a huge problem. Databases are a very important tool for investigative journalists and for cross-border stories. When investigating stories, we had to go to foreign organisations for help; we had to use databases from the Internet, from legal and semi-legal places.

The lack of money for travelling is also a problem. We had to network intensively. To make up for the lack of money, we had to foster personal contacts with journalists in different countries around the world. I personally know good and reliable journalists in about 50 countries, journalists who I have met in the last eight to 10 years.

We lacked investigative methods and standards. We addressed this problem by applying for workshops and training. We made up for a lack of protection by constantly

networking, and staying in touch with local NGOs or international organisations like Reporters sans Frontières.

We also faced a lack of editorial space and addressed this problem by opening a website, the website of our organisation, posting our articles on the website in Romanian and English, freelancing for Western media, and publishing small booklets for each of our projects.

We were three colleagues at the beginning, and we now have, after seven years, one organisation with about 30 members in Romania and an organisation that sends its people to training seminars, workshops, international conferences, and that participates in international competitions and wins some of them. We have done this without any support from our media companies. In some cases, they actually opposed our activities. Now we are offering the same thing to young journalists in Romania and in the region and we face the same resistance from media companies. They don’t want to let their journalists participate in training seminars or meetings, although they don’t have to pay anything for this. Yesterday, the media owners [in the session “Are Profits

Killing the News?”] spoke about media productivity and the luxury of two month’s research. Well, after hearing what the owners said, I now know why the papers look like they look, especially when they report about news outside the town they are based.

In 2002, after a two-month investigation, we broke a story about the legendary Cosa Nostra boss Bernardo Provenzano, money he had invested in Romania, and his links to Romanian politicians, including our president and the chief of the Foreign Intelligence Service. Following our story, the anti-mafia squad in Italy arrested 50 people. Our publisher did not allow us to travel to Italy because it was too expensive, but out of our story, the paper published 14 cover stories, and the publisher was invited on most of the TV talk shows for a whole week, so he had free publicity. A few months later we broke another story about arms dealer Viktor Bout and his connections to Romania. We could have obtained an interview with him and new information, but back then travelling to Rwanda was too expensive for our publisher, so we didn’t develop the story further. At that time, our paper was co-owned by Bertelsmann, a strong German organisation. The stories were developed by other

• 3 days of World Congress events

• 300 registered participants from 62 countries

• 150 accredited journalists, experts, representatives of institutions

active in the media field etc.

• 34 speakers in 11 sessions

• 23 speakers in the SEEMO Regional Conference

• 13 side events (meetings, parties etc.)

• 4 awards presented during the Congress

• More than 50 people worked in organizing the Congress

• 10 musical performances by 58 musicians

• 12 patrons, sponsors and partners

• 6 media partners

• 4 sightseeing tours of Belgrade, 1 pre-Congress and

1 post-Congress tour of Serbia

IPI Numbers


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journalists, whose media enterprises invested in the stories, and they made international headlines.

I want to give two examples of our recent investigative projects, both of them sponsored by Scoop, a Danish support structure for journalists, and not by media enterprises. The

first one is an investigation on Transnistria, a breakaway republic between Moldova and Ukraine. We worked six months on this story, involving six journalists from Ukraine, Moldova, Russia and Romania, and a photographer. We spent about two weeks in Transnistria as a team of undercover journalists. We had huge language problems because nobody spoke the same language, but we could get along in Russian, Romanian and English. The total cost for the project was about 12,000 Euros. We produced seven big stories that were translated into Russian and English, and we could sell the story in Romania for 900 Euros to a newspaper owned by Ringier. This is just to show you how much regional media invest in such stories.

The second example is an ongoing investigation into Gazprom. It’s a far bigger project, including a network of ten to 12 journalists, meetings, the gathering of information, access to databases, the same language problems.

The most efficient way to break such stories is (a) to have extensive resources for databases and (b) to be able to organise personal meetings with those involved. It doesn’t work only with a phone call or by email. The one week I spent in the newsroom of Novaya Gazeta, where I worked with the Russian journalist Roman Shleynov, was the best journalistic experience I ever had and provided me not only with new information on Gazprom, but also several different topics. But unfortunately those kinds of projects will never be financed by media companies.

Although we now have the money and the network to carry out our transnational projects, we still face two problems in Romania. The first problem is the pressure on newspapers and TV stations not to print or broadcast our work. The second problem is that, even if they want to print out work, there is a lack of editorial space to print big investigative stories. We only have tabloids; we don’t have weekly magazines.

My observation regarding media content is that the media loses quality when it is treated like a mass industry. I can see that in my country, I can see that in the region. That is the difference with the United States, where they have strong and powerful foundations and organisations, who can do what the private media are not doing. There is the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, there is a new organisation for investigative journalism, ProPublica. They have yearly budgets of millions of dollars, they have global networks. We are trying to adopt their methods, their models, in our countries, but it is very difficult because you never know from whom you will get the money.

My opinion is that owners and managers in the media should stop producing on the cheap, because what they will get is a cheap product that eventually will not sell anymore and will not be consumed even if it is given for free. Yesterday, news was compared with bread, textiles and cars. Okay, then let’s outsource the production of news to China and Third World countries, and let’s put the journalists to work as if they were in a factory with low salaries, no vacations, no medical benefits. This is what local and international media owners are doing in my region. They don’t invest in the journalists as individuals, they don’t pay salaries on time, they don’t invest in additional resources. They refuse to invest in the journalistic community by supporting media NGOs, or by supporting training seminars, networks, journalistic prizes and research.

The Pressure is On

Misha Glenny, Journalist and Author, London

I’ve spent the last years, that is from 2004 to 2007, writing my latest book, “McMafia: Crime without Frontiers”. The only reason

I could write this book was because I got, in publishing terms, a very big advance from the UK and the U.S. publishers. About 83 per cent of that advance went on the expenses of investigating this. I visited some 20 countries; you can’t define it precisely, because one of them was, for example, Transnistria, and one doesn’t really know

whether to count that as a country or not.But if I was to put the same proposal to my publishers today at Random House in the UK or the U.S., I would not receive anything like the advance I received in 2004, because there is a very severe downturn in the publishing industry in the United Kingdom and the United States. Basically, had I proposed the book this year, as opposed to 2004, it simply wouldn’t have got written. Resources are of course the key issue for investigative journalism and Stefan’s point I thought again extremely pertinent.

Now, we could all complain about how media bosses don’t invest. This is a problem that we’ve known for a long time, it’s not going to change in its present form. There are still organisations that have the resources, however, to do transnational investigative reporting, the BBC, who I worked for for four years until 1993 is one of them. There are some surprisingly good organisations in Russia doing investigative journalism in my experience; Stefan’s organisation in Romania; South Africa has fantastic investigative journalists. And all over the world you will come across some media organisations that are putting some money into this. But the pressure is really on and the main reason why the pressure is on, to my mind, is the Internet.

Even somewhere like the BBC, which really has exceptional resources and an exceptional editorial strategy, the Internet is now having a profound impact on the way journalism is carried out, because you have so many outlets because of the Internet. The BBC has one of the biggest and most successful websites in the world. But the BBC has a voracious appetite for news. It doesn’t just have the website. It has a 24-hour domestic news channel; it has a 24-hour world news channel; it has a 24-hour talk radio station, 5 Live; it has the World Service; it has Radio 4, and so on.

When I started working for the BBC, the model of the foreign correspondent was still the slightly detached but committed boffin, the Mark Tullys of this world, who knew India back to front, top to bottom, spoke more than one of the local languages and knew everybody worth knowing in the Indian elite. That is all gone. People who know their country are a very rare phenomenon, even with the BBC now. What you need in order to deliver for the various outlets are young, energetic, enthusiastic journalists who are prepared to speak for five

The pressure to deliver is so great that actually going out and doing investigative reporting of any type, even basic reporting, becomes extremely difficult.

Stefan Candea

minutes to the World Service, then knock out 600 words for the Internet, and then go on to 5 Live, all to slightly different audiences, where you have a slightly different take.

The pressure to deliver is so great that actually going out and doing investigative reporting of any type, even basic reporting, becomes extremely difficult. I know this because my wife works as a news reader on the BBC World Service, and increasingly what she is doing is reading Reuters or AP reports, and then interviewing the local BBC journalist on the ground, and what he or she is saying to her is basically culled from Reuters or AP. You really are under immense time pressure now to deliver the news.

So the Internet and the proliferation of new media is a problem in that sense.

Then you have the big problem of audience drift, of the fact that your audience is now getting its news from all sorts of different places, above all it’s getting it from the Internet. And the development of a younger audience, which troubles certainly people at the BBC and ITN and I am sure in other news organisations all the time, is proving to be a particularly tough nut to crack. Young people are less and less inclined to get their news from traditional organisations and they much prefer to get it from things like YouTube. Now there is a real problem here, because the Internet is largely unregulated, and that means there is frequently no guarantee that the information you are receiving from the Internet is accurate in any way, shape or form. Obviously if filtered through a brand name like the BBC, you are going to have a certain confidence in that information. But when I was researching the book on organised crime, time and again I would come across stories in the Internet whose origin I then sought in the country where it was alleged to have happened only to discover that the only place there was any facts or so-called facts about the story was on the Internet, and you could find them circulating and becoming true, as it were, in the recipient’s mind, as this happened.

For me, the Internet as a fallible source of information is one of the greatest problems that we face, because combined with the economic

pressure on media organisations, we are now in a situation where original investigative journalism is under threat. So far you’ve had the management of media organisations desperately trying to think of ways to get around this problem. What you haven’t seen enough of, although there are examples – Stefan’s organisation is one, the Center for Public Integrity in the United States is another – is the coming together of journalists from all different parts of the globe to discuss a strategy to deal with these structural issues that we all face as journalists. It seems to me that some place like the IPI is a very good starting point for this sort of thing, and I hope that we can all get around to do it.

One final point on that, of course, is that it is extremely difficult because we are all individually under great economic pressure. The only reason why I would look up a story on the Internet in, say, Japan, was because with “McMafia I wanted to speak to the people involved in the shadow economy, the gangsters themselves. I would have to find somebody in Japan who had contacts with the Yakuza one way or another. That is incredibly difficult, time-consuming and above all, it’s expensive. And I’m not quite sure yet what the revenue stream model is for us to sustain this type of work, but we must find it.

Misha Glenny

“Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism” “Chasing the Story: The Challenges of Transnational Investigative Journalism”


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IPI Open Forum:The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human RightsModeratorJoe Treaster, Knight Chair for Cross-Cultural Communication, University of Miami School of Communication, Miami, FLA

PanelistsRobert Russell, Executive Director, Cartoonists’ Rights Network International, Washington, DCSawsan Zaidah, Radio Director, AmmanNet, Amman

Joe Treaster: In April, I took over as Knight Chair at the University of Miami and I specialise in issues involving water and problems about world cities. Human Rights are a big part of what we are doing in Miami. We all know about human rights; I think there is a room full of experts on that, and we know that 60 years after the codification of human rights standards, many countries ignore the rights when it comes to journalists. The headline

of our panel is, “The limits of tolerance.” Frankly, we have no idea what the limits of tolerance might be. We know there are lots of violations going on. The good news is that Robert Russell and Sawsan Zaidah are living very special aspects of human rights and they are going to tell you about their own experiences, which I think are illuminating to the broader point.

Sawsan Zaidah: I am right now the radio director of AmmanNet and a media activist. We are an Internet-based radio station and an FM station as well. We started in 2000 as an Internet-based radio station because the laws at that time didn’t allow us to have a licence to broadcast on FM. So we turned around and tried to exploit the Internet, where there aren’t any regulations that prevent you from publishing.

Robert Russell: It’s been a long struggle at Cartoonists’ Rights Network to get the unique perspective and contributions that editorial cartoonists make in the world. Every single country has cartoonists. They all have different styles; they all approach it differently; there are different limits of tolerance in almost every country that they work in. How we got started in this was interesting. I was working in international

development where, you know, we get 50,000 dollars to build 20 wells, but next year you’re going to get 20,000 dollars to build 50 wells. So you’re always looking for efficiencies of scale and ways to save money. You’re also always concerned that people lift up their heads from the immediate problems in front of them and develop some long-range perspectives on life and on their problems.

Joe Treaster

Sawsan Zaidah

Robert Russell


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JT: But you found something quite different with cartoons, didn’t you?

RR: Well, I used to love watching the cartoons, because I had a fine arts background in my undergraduate work. But I read in the paper one day about a cartoonist in Sri Lanka who had been beaten and stabbed and his house ransacked and the editorial room of the paper ransacked.

JT: What’s the point of these editorial cartoons, why do you like them so much? There’s a special impact you told me.

RR: Well, you can kind of undress the head of state legally.

JT: Sawsan, let’s hear a little about how AmmanNet is special, what it actually does.

SZ: The idea is that we try to offer alternative media, more free, independent media, in a part of the world where most of the media is governed, controlled, or restricted by the government. So the first good part is that we operate on the Internet and we have more freedoms than the others. The other thing is that we started with a young group of journalists, new graduates, who were freer from the self-censorship dominant among the other professional journalists. They were very enthusiastic, very open-minded, and less ideological than the others. We just wanted new, independent professional media.

JT: How does this relate to human rights?

SZ: We believe that the main problem with the mainstream media in Jordan, and maybe the surrounding countries in the Arab region, is that it is controlled by political elites, whether governments or the opposition, and ordinary people on the street are not really represented in the media. So this was our role; we wanted to establish more community-based media, give a forum to ordinary people in the street. We also give a forum to civil society organisations. We wanted to present all the views and provide balance and a similar space for everyone.

JT: The way people listen to AmmanNet – is it the Internet exclusively, or can they listen to you on radio or television? How do you do it?

SZ: Actually, we started on the Internet, so you can read everything on our Website. At the same time, on each story there is a small, clickable icon, so you can listen to any story. We also have audio stream broadcasting, so you can listen to everything. Parallel to this, we started broadcasting on FM in early 2006. So, if you

live in Amman, the capital of Jordan, you can listen to AmmanNet on FM. Two or three months ago, we also introduced video clips on our Website. In fact, we are now doing multi-media. The staff is the same staff. We have around ten journalists, who are multi-skilled, doing everything from A to Z. They go to the field, report, meet people, record their stories, go back to the studio, edit it, package it, broadcast it on FM and upload it on the Website as well.

JT: Are most people listening on computers or on radios?

SZ: The majority of the people are listening through the Internet, because it’s available to all Jordanians as well as to Arab speakers all over the world, while FM is available only in the capital, Amman. So in terms of numbers, there are more online listeners than on radio, but we believe our influence is greater on radio, because access to the Internet is still limited, it doesn’t exceed 20 per cent of the population.

JT: Robert, I interrupted you before, just at the point where you were telling us how you got started. Your interest for the defence of human rights developed in a very pragmatic way. Could you go into that for us?

RR: The cartoonist I met had been stabbed, beaten and his house ransacked, and I had to chase him down. He thought I was a CIA agent or a spy. He was working for the last communist newspaper in Sri Lanka at the time. I finally corralled him and we talked, and I said, “Look, how can I help you, what do you want?” I thought he was going to say something like, “Well, get the U.S. Ambassador, write to the United Nations; let’s start a letter-writing campaign. And he just said, “If they kill me, please make sure my wife is taken care of. And if they put me in the hospital again, please make sure my children have sandals for their feet when they go to school.” His only concern was his family. His only concern was just keeping his own world intact, somebody out there appreciating what he did and providing for his family. At that moment, he and I started Cartoonists’ Rights Network. I had no idea about journalism. I don’t come from a journalism background. Maybe that’s why I can do this; I didn’t know what I was getting into.

JT: Tell us how that organisation works. What do you do, and who do you do it with?

RR: We’re kind of modelled after the Committee to Protect Journalists, or Reporters Without Frontiers. We find cases of abuse against cartoonists, cartoonists in trouble, and sometimes we are referred

to these cartoonists by these larger organisations, which have much more sophisticated and better-paid stringers out in the world than we can possibly have. But we also find that cartoonists often fall through the net quite a bit in the third world and developing countries. They are generally not treated as journalists; they’re just somebody who comes into the editorial room in the morning and plops down his work and gets his five dollars and that’s the last they see of them. So, they are terribly disenfranchised, not really well-connected to the same kind of protective agencies, the human rights, the free speech organisations. Even at the professional journalism organisations that you find in every developing country, it’s rare that you ever find a cartoonist that’s a member or on the board. Often, these cartoonists were kicked out of third grade for doodling pictures of the teacher all the time. So they’re generally not college educated and they’re not really recognised as journalists. They have some very distinct problems getting their really original, creative messages out into the world.

JT: What pressures do they come under? How bad is it for a cartoonist? Is it jail, or is it threats of death or death itself?

RR: They’re one of the better customers for insult laws. Turkey is a good example of insult laws, where you’re not allowed to insult the president, you’re not allowed to insult the military, you’re not allowed to insult the judiciary, and if you want to draw a cartoon making fun of a court justice or a head of state, you could be charged with very significant crimes that can give you serious jail time. Then there’s a cartoonist in Cameroon, who would always draw the head of state with tiny, little legs. The head of state called him up one day and said, “Popoli, why are you making fun of me like this? I don’t have little legs like that. I am a strong man, I have big legs.” He didn’t give a damn what the politics were, he didn’t like to be shown as a guy with spindly, little legs.

JT: Were there any direct consequences?

RR: He was rounded up by the police. They stopped his car one night, took his shoes off and gave him 20 whacks on the bottom of his feet. We sent letters to the U.S. and British ambassadors, and the next time Popoli left the country on a foreign trip he was treated like a little god at the airport: “Oh, Mr. Popoli, it was a big mistake, we’re so sorry. The big man wants a copy of the cartoon; you can sign it for him, thank you so much.” So it made a difference; those letter writings and diplomatic interventions sometimes work.

JT: I think the two of you have hopes of expanding your work. Is that right, Sawsan?

SZ: Actually, we have always been trying to expand our work, and always in the same direction and with the same goal, which, in terms of human rights, is to provide access or a forum to all people, the local community, in order that they can express themselves. What we did one year ago was develop a community media network, and now the idea is to create an umbrella for encouraging other community radio stations in other cities in Jordan. We found that there are many people from the region who are very interested in having something similar. Maybe their laws don’t allow them to start on radio, but they can start with Internet-based radio.

JT: Do you find the government moving against Internet operations less frequently than against traditional radio?

SZ: Governments in general are less worried about the Internet. As I said, the penetration of the Internet is still limited in Jordan and the region. And controlling the Internet is not that easy, although the government is trying to control the Internet.

Michael Ehrenreich, Co-Editor, KristeligtDagblad, Denmark:This question is about the so-called Danish cartoon crisis. I believe everybody in this hall is familiar with the original crisis, but since then there has been a follow-up. In February of this year, Danish police revealed a conspiracy in Denmark to assassinate one of the original cartoonists, and of course the Danish media reported on this revelation. To illustrate the point they re-published one of the cartoons. And since then we’ve had another wave of protests in a number of countries, but we also had a new development coming out of a court case under preparation in Amman, Jordan, where we find more than ten Danish editors of newspapers that republished this specific cartoon under indictment for doing so. Of course, I find this completely unacceptable and extremely worrying. I would like members of the panel to say whether they agree with me, and what we should do about it.

RR: The people proposing this are actually an NGO. It then went to the [Jordanian] Ministry of Justice, who I believe have said they will ask Interpol to arrest [the cartoonists] and bring them to the country. This of course is really troubling when you couple this with the fact that the Human Rights Council of the United Nations very recently changed the terms of reference for the Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, changing the language to protect religious feelings from criticism. It used to be that the Special Rapporteur’s job was to search out threats to freedom of expression; now the job is to search out threatening freedom of expression. And I think what you see coming out of Jordan is closely connected with what has been a two- or three-year-process of changing this terminology on the Human Rights Council. It’s a done deal on the Human Rights Council, and the only thing left is that the new Rapporteur has asked for commentary both from official country delegates and NGOs. I know that most of the big human rights and free speech organisations will avail themselves of the opportunity to comment on this, but all our clients over the last six or seven months have been victims of insult to Islam. This we feel is an incredibly important thing happening in freedom of expression. If faith should isolate itself from journalistic investigation, should we tolerate that, can we tolerate that? And now it looks like the United Nations itself, in its own definition of human rights, is backing away from the traditional defence of human expression with regard to faith.

N. Ravi, Editor, The Hindu, India: I would ask whether you would have one base standard of tolerance or could you make some allowance for countries that are going through a nation-building process, societies in which there are conflicts and tensions among various ethnic and religious groups. Would the standards of tolerance vary among countries on this basis? Or would you have one universal standard?

RR: When I look at the work of cartoonists around the world, we see that cartoonists learn very quickly, and they might be a good

bellwether, too, for freedom of expression in general for a country. They learn ways to limit themselves and self-censor themselves. Something cartoonists are always talking about is the red line, or not stepping over the line, and the line is always moving. The line is always different in every country, and even within a country. From one political period to another, the line changes; from one administration to another it changes; from one political party in power to another it changes. Cartoonists are constantly testing the limits of what they can do and not have somebody draw a gun on them, so that they can continue to do their work, but still feel that they are being honest and true to their commitments in terms of truth-telling. It’s a very relative line, it’s different in every country, and it has to be sorted out. For our cartoonists, they need to know what the limits are. What are the rules and can we change the rules?

JT: Can you see any variation on how that might be applied in India?

NR: I had in mind something like the Holocaust laws, which were introduced soon after the Second World War. In India, there is a general blasphemy law and a penal code which applies to all religions across the board. It is not invoked very often, but when it is invoked, it is invoked on a mass scale. One of the leading painters of India, for instance, has been facing a series of court cases on his paintings that are regarded by some as offensive to the Hindu religion. But the Supreme Court has now come up with a judgement quashing all the cases against him. So, on paper there is a law which makes insulting religious sentiments an offence, but in practice the limits are being pushed at every stage. I think the courts are getting more liberal and more tolerant now. And their interpretation of the penal court provisions probably might help in furthering freedom of expression.

JT: Robert, do you have any cases from India of cartoonists in trouble?

RR: There is a cartoonist named Irfaan Khan, who was arrested for insulting a Supreme Court Justice in a cartoon. His case is still

Michael Ehrenreich

IPI Open Forum: The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights IPI Open Forum: The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

N. Ravi Gene Policinski


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Closing Ceremony Presentation of the “Free Media Pioneer 2008”awarded to Talking Points Memo, New York, NY

David Kurtz, Managing Editor, Talking Points Memo, New York

“Free Media Pioneer 2008” Award

David Dadge, Director of IPI

This year, the Free Media Pioneer Award, which is sponsored by The Freedom Forum, goes to Talking Points Media,

a political blog created and run by the U.S. journalist, Joshua Micah Marshall, together with his staff. Talking Points Media (www.talkingpointsmemo.com) is the flagship blog of TPM Media, a network of sites that includes TPMmuckraker, TPMCafe, and TPM Election Central. Headquartered in New York City, Talking Points Memo covers a wide range of topics including U.S. domestic and foreign policy and domestic politics, especially at the federal level. Josh Marshall started Talking Points Memo in November 2000 during the Florida election recount. In 2002, he used Talking Points Memo to publicize U.S. Senator Trent Lott’s controversial comments praising Senator Strom Thurmond’s 1948 presidential run as a segregationist and was instrumental in the reporting that led to Senator Lott’s resignation as Senate Minority Leader.In 2005, TPM launched TPMCafe, which features a collection of blogs about a wide range of domestic and foreign policy issues. TPMmuckracker, launched in 2006, focuses on investigative reporting of political corruption, and exposed the politically-motivated firing of eight U.S. attorneys by the administration of President George W. Bush. TPM’s reporting, which sparked interest by the traditional news media, resulted in the resignation of several high-level government officials and later led to the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

In 2008, Talking Points Memo won a George Polk Award for its coverage of the U.S. Attorney Scandal. So far, it is the only blog to win this prestigious award. I am proud to name Talking Points Memo our Free Media Pioneer for the year 2008 and would like to call on its managing editor, David Kurtz, to come up and

receive this award and say a few words on behalf of Talking Points Memo. David Kurtz, Managing Editor,Talking Points Memo, New York

Thank you very much to IPI and to the Serbian host, the Media Center. It has been a wonderful conference. We are

honoured to have been here and to have had a chance to participate with you. It has been a great learning experience for me personally and quite rewarding to interact with you all and to get the benefit of these tremendous panels that we have had. I would be remiss if I did not note or acknowledge the people at TPM that made this award possible. Josh Marshall, who you were just introduced to in absentia, had this crazy vision that we put together an on-line website that does investigative reporting. He had the audacity to try to make that happen, and we have, so his contribution in that respect cannot be overstated. Justin Rude was essential in the early coverage of the U.S. Attorney scandal and figuring out which attorneys from around the country had been fired by the Bush administration, and kind of laid the groundwork for that reporting. And then Paul Kiel, who I think is not quite yet 30 years old, spearheaded our coverage for

the remainder of that year. And without Paul’s doggedness and precision and fairness and interviews we certainly would not have had the story that we had and I would not be here today. So I certainly want to give attention to those folks for their contributions. It has been interesting to see the discussions that have taken place over the last couple of days about new models for journalism, and we are at the cutting edge of trying to figure out what a new business model for investigative journalism will look like in the United States. It is a tremendous challenge. We are looking forward to the challenge. We do not yet know what it will look like in the end, but every day that we continue at it is another day down that road towards a new way of doing things, incorporating the best traditions of muckraking, as the term is used in the U.S., with the new opportunities that this technology provides us. The recognition from IPI only helps in that regard, as it encourages us to go forward and I think it helps pave the way towards that new model, and hopefully we can report back to you in years to come on how things are going in that regard. So we very much appreciate it, we are honoured by the recognition and we thank you for your hospitality and all that we have learned this week.

in the courts, but it looks like he will win the case because the Supreme Court Justice was retired at the time of the cartoon. In fact, Irfaan had waited until that happened before publishing the cartoon. But the former Justice still had a lot of power, and his cronies were still there and they didn’t want to have a cartoon drawn against them either, so he was arrested and charged with insulting the judiciary, but he’ll probably survive it and come up more the hero.

Gene Policinski, Executive Director, First Amendment Center, USA: These laws tend to be inherently counter-productive. Some of my colleagues in the U.S. would be in disagreement over this, but when the cartoons were published in Denmark, there was one country in which there was a noticeable absence of publication. Some would say, and have said, that was cowardice. In talking to editors I found, ironically, that because of the lack of a government blasphemy law in the U.S., they did not feel compelled to publish the cartoons to prove that they could, or that they should. They made the decision on other journalistic values. So, I think there is an inherit contradiction, because you make these cartoons that might be blasphemous either a challenge that some publications will resist naturally, or you make them, underground, somehow more appealing, more interesting, more alluring, where you could discuss the issue without having to publish them if you were free to make that decision. But you throw in a political aspect into what ought to be a journalistic decision.

RR: But at a certain point those cartoons became news. Whether we could publish them or not might have been the first level of interest, but ultimately they were newsworthy and should they have been seen simply because they were newsworthy?

ME: I don’t think the important point is whether you agreed with the written intent

or not. The important point is you cannot question the right to publish.SZ: I agree with you that you should have the right to publish everything, but one of the arguments I have heard in my country, for example, is about the double standards in Europe and America, where they do not dare say anything about the Holocaust, but they dare to say whatever they want about Islam. To be honest, I believe that they are right, because if you want to protect your freedom of speech, you have a principal and it’s applicable to everything. This is the one thing. The other thing is that I believe the reaction and consequences of the Mohammed cartoons were highly politicized. The cartoons were published and the people didn’t move until the governments and ministers asked the Danish government to apologise. And then the government media were the first to start publishing and talking about it, and even provoking people, and this is when the people went crazy. They were really incited. It was all planned by governments and Islamist movements. It wasn’t spontaneous. I believe the problem is that the whole thing about the measures of freedom of speech is decided by political and religious groups. They are the ones who created, for example, a taboo called the Holocaust; they are the ones who have now created a taboo called Islamophobia. These inventions, I believe, are just there to silence people who want to question the power of these groups.

Geraldine Jackson, Station Manager, SW Radio Africa, UK: My name is Gerry Jackson from Zimbabwe. All my life I lived in a country where everything I have done has been under threat, and I am very concerned at these discussions. I do believe that journalists have to push the parameters, they have to challenge people, they have to make people think. People stay in their comfort zones; they buy the newspapers that fit their opinions. There is a Buddhist saying, “Your enemies are your precious teachers. Your friends will tell you what you want to hear.” It’s your enemies

that you learn from. We must be brave as journalists. We must constantly push people to think about their lives and think about other peoples’ lives; to print and publish whatever they think is wise, and just use common sense. We will get it wrong a lot of the time, it’s what will happen. But we must not bow to what has been described as politicians using these cartoons for their political agenda. It wasn’t the average person who was offended when they first came out; it was used, and it’s still being used.

SZ: I completely agree with the idea that we have to keep pushing our borders; this is the only way to change societies. But the thing is, it’s not only the Western world that really admires freedom of speech; it’s not only the Western world that has to push the limits. We need to do so even more. The harsh reaction came from this part of the world, because we are not used to dealing with freedom of speech, or accepting the viewpoints of others. But the idea is that it is really more a political dilemma. At AmmanNet, for example, we are trying to support and encourage more professional journalism, and I believe part of our problem is how to cover religious issues. It is a major problem in the media in my country. Journalists are like religious scholars in the way that they deal with religion issues. So we really have a problem. But if you want to get any support for training courses, or any support from Western journalists even for our efforts in this case, it’s very hard to find anyone to support you. They are always scared: this is very sensitive issue, they won’t raise it because there is a war on terror and they are really scared to provoke Islamists. It’s like all political calculations. But I believe the solutions are professional; it has to do with how media deal with these issues. There should be a gradual change in the way the media deal with religion in general. Even in the Western world, there are still many problems dealing with these issues. And they are like sacred taboos that are difficult to deal with.

IPI Open Forum: The Limits of Tolerance on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

David Kurtz (left)


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Resolutions adopted by the 57th IPI General Assemblyon Monday, 16 June 2008

Resolution on Unresolved Murders of Journalists and Press Freedom in Serbia

Meeting at their Annual General Assembly on 16 June 2008 in Belgrade, Serbia, IPI members

expressed concern over the fact that the perpetrators of killings of journalists in Serbia are still at large, and called on Serbian authorities to intensify their investigations into these cases.

IPI members welcome assurances given by President Boris Tadic in opening the Assembly that Serbia would uphold press freedom and pursue investigations of murders of journalists.

Dada Vujasinovic, a freelancer and contributor to the Belgrade magazine Duga, was found dead in her Belgrade apartment on 8 April 1994. Fourteen years later, in April 2008, her death, previously called a suicide, was classified as a murder based on new forensic evidence from ballistics experts.

Slavko Curuvija, the owner of the Belgrade daily Dnevni Telegraf and the magazine Evropljanin, was gunned down by masked men near his home in the centre of Belgrade on 11 April 1999. Curuvija, a fierce critic of the former President Slobodan Milosevic, had often been harassed for his writings and publishing activities.

Milan Pantic, a local reporter for the Belgrade-based daily Vecernje Novosti, was murdered on 11 June 2001, in the central Serbian town of Jagodina. Pantic, whose reporting focused on crime and corruption, received threatening phone calls on his articles before his death.

In the early morning of 14 April 2007, a bomb exploded in front of the Belgrade

home of Dejan Anastasijevic, journalist for the weekly Vreme, who reports about criminal activity in Serbia and on war crimes in the former Yugoslavia. The explosion destroyed the windows and bedroom of his ground-floor apartment, in the city centre, and damaged nearby buildings and cars. Investigation has yielded no results.

Failure to bring to justice the perpetrators of such attacks sends dangerous signals, with journalists increasingly seen as easy targets. IPI members urge Serbian authorities to take active steps to investigate vigorously these committed murders and attacks.

IPI members also hold that the Serbian authorities should improve the climate which militates against journalistic investigations of corruption. Companies and public agencies should refrain from using their placing of advertising to influence the editorial views of media outlets.

Resolution on Erosion of Protection of Sources


criticized measures diluting journalists’ right to protect the confidentiality of their sources everywhere, and particularly in Europe.

This most fundamental journalistic right has recently been subjected to attacks, both blatant and relatively subtle, in many of Europe’s established democracies. In France, authorities attempted to coerce at least five journalists into revealing their informants over the last twelve months alone, with reporter Guillaume Dasquié, accused of publishing state secrets and threatened with pre-trial detention should he refuse to reveal the source of a government leak, detained for two days by a French intelligence agency.

Long-awaited draft legislation intended to offer journalists better protection, submitted to Parliament in mid-May, provided little comfort. Its vague wording, obliging journalists to reveal information when a “pressing need requires it,” is unlikely to offer strong support for journalists with information of interest to law enforcement.

More subtle threats are posed by the implementation of a European Union (EU) directive in 2006, requiring telecommunications companies to retain, from between six months and two years, certain information regarding all telephone calls, e-mails and short messages, for potential use in criminal investigations.

In Germany, under legislation enforcing this EU directive, information on journalists’ communications with confidential sources could be made available to authorities upon request.

In the United Kingdom, where telecommunications traffic data is already retained under a voluntary agreement between telecommunications companies and the government, proposed legislation would require companies to transmit that data to the government for storage.

These developments require a very high level of faith in law enforcement’s capacity for self-restraint, despite a pattern of aggressive, wide-reaching searches of media offices and journalist homes throughout the Continent, often under the guise of fighting terrorism.

Recent developments in Germany, where a major telecommunications company admitted tracking the timing of, and participants in, certain communications, suggest that telecommunications companies may also find their easy access to such information difficult to resist.

The Council of Europe and its Court of Human Rights have both often upheld the

public interest in the protection of journalists’ sources, which strengthens the media as society’s watchdog. That role would become exceptionally difficult if news media were forced to rely on sources who were unsure that their identities could be protected by journalists. Therefore, IPI members urge governments to give full consideration to the public interest served by the right of journalists to protect sources when drafting legislation or in conducting legal investigations and prosecutions.

Resolution on Journalists’ Freedom to Report on Natural Catastrophes


called on governments to respect journalists’ right to report freely on natural catastrophes and their aftermaths, permitting them to collect and disseminate information about such events.

When earthquakes, hurricanes, floods and other disasters strike, media coverage serves many essential purposes. In their immediate aftermath, it can save lives by supporting the proper coordination of rescue and relief efforts. In the longer run, unrestricted reporting submits to public scrutiny the efficacy of government responses to disasters, as well as any malfeasance that may exacerbate damage.

Burmese authorities recently demonstrated callous disregard for this right when, in early May, Cyclone Nargis devastated the country, claiming more than 100,000 lives. As the cyclone approached, Burmese authorities failed to issue early warnings, although they were informed of its imminence. Even after disaster struck and the resulting need for food, water, shelter and medical assistance put more than one million persons at risk, the Burmese junta chose censorship over information. While local journalists were initially allowed to travel freely, Burmese publications reported under strict orders to depict reconstruction efforts only, not the destruction. Foreign reporters, who don’t operate under the same fear of reprisals, were barred entirely. Those who risked reporting without a visa were quickly expelled.

By contrast, when an earthquake hit China’s Sichuan province on 12 May, killing more than 80,000 people and rendering homeless five million, the freedom to report enjoyed by both local and international journalists

covering the event was unprecedented. Disappointingly, that openness gave way to increased censorship as reports triggered unsettling questions about possible connections between the high number of casualties, shoddy school construction, and corruption. Signs that movement in the area is subject to restrictions and gatherings prohibited have grown. Reports of journalists, particularly foreign ones, being denied access to, or expelled from, cities experiencing protests are also rising.

IPI members urge Chinese authorities not to abandon their initial, encouragingly open approach to coverage of the disaster and remind all governments of the importance and fragility of the right to report freely on both natural catastrophes and the uncomfortable realities that they sometimes reveal.

Resolution on Countries’ Failure to Respect Article 19


on the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights expressed deep concern at the number of countries who have signed the declaration but fail to apply in their countries the freedom of expression and press freedom principles contained in the Declaration’s Article 19.

As a result their countries’ media have frequently been assailed by punitive and other measures which obstruct the free flow of information and prevent journalists from carrying out their duty to keep the public informed.

Article 19 states:

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

The application of these principles is essential to enable the media to fulfil its watchdog role over the conduct of affairs by the government and other institutions. Countries which do not enable media to carry out this important function not only abrogate a cornerstone principle of membership of the United Nations but also lose claims to being regarded as democracies.

IPI members call on countries to examine their standards of conduct in relation

to Article 19 and their media and also request the United Nations to investigate the adoption of measures to ensure that countries live up to those important principles. IPI will explore means by way of which countries which have failed to respect Article 19 are exposed to the public at large.

Resolution on Mexico’s Missing Journalists


expressed alarm over the growing number of missing journalists in Mexico, and the continuing failure of the authorities to bring to justice those who perpetrate attacks against members of the country’s news media.

In the latest case, Mauricio Estrada Zamora, a crime reporter for La Opinión de Apatzingán, was last seen on 12 February 2008 as he left his newspaper’s offices in Apatzingan, Michoacán state. The journalist’s car was found the next day with the doors open and engine running. His camera and laptop were missing. Estrada’s disappearance brings to eight the number of journalists missing in Mexico since 2003.

The other missing journalists are Gamaliel López and Gerardo Paredes of TV Azteca Noreste in Monterrey, Nuevo Léon, missing since 10 May 2007; Rodolfo Rincón Taracena of Tabasco Hoy in Villahermosa, Tabasco (20 January 2007); José Antonio García Apac of Ecos de la Cuenca in Tepalcatepec, Michoacán (20 November 2006); Rafael Ortiz Martínez of El Zócalo, Monclava, Coahuila (8 July 2006); José Alfredo Jiménez Mota of El Imparcial in Hermosillo, Sonora (2 April 2005); and Jesús Mejía Lechuga of Radio MS-Noticias in Martínez de la Torre, Veracruz (10 July 2003).

Mexico has become the most dangerous country in the Americas for journalists, who increasingly find themselves the target of corrupt officials, drug traffickers and other criminals. The Special Prosecutor’s Office for Crimes against Journalists (FEADP), set up by the Mexican government in February 2006, has proven ineffective in stemming the surge of attacks against journalists and has yet to prosecute a single case successfully.

The apparent inability or lack of political will to bring to justice those responsible for crimes against journalists has created a climate of fear and increased self-censorship in Mexico, thereby limiting the public’s access to information.

IPI members call on the federal and state authorities of Mexico to investigate fully and


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thoroughly all cases of missing journalists and to report in a transparent and timely manner the status of their investigations.

IPI members further call on the Mexican government to strengthen the Special Prosecutor’s Office by developing the necessary legal framework and granting it the independence needed to investigate and bring to justice those who threaten, attack or murder journalists, and to end the continuing impunity that accompanies these crimes.

Resolution on Bomb Attack on El Correo Newspaper


strongly condemned the recent bombing of the offices of the Bilbao edition of the Spanish daily newspaper El Correo.

On the morning of Sunday, 8 June, five kilos of explosives detonated at the publication’s printing presses, as the following day’s edition of the newspaper was being printed. El Correo is the daily newspaper with the largest circulation in the Basque country. Approximately 50 employees were present at the time of the bombing, some of whom only narrowly escaped injury. El Correo’s employees returned to their posts as quickly as authorities would permit, and the Sunday edition arrived on the market on schedule.

El Correo received hundreds of messages of support in the days following the attack. IPI members add their voice to this support, and strongly condemn such violent attacks on freedom of expression. IPI members call on the authorities to vigorously investigate this crime to ensure that its perpetrators are apprehended and brought to justice.

Resolution on Freedom of Expression in Zimbabwe


condemned the surge of attacks on the media in Zimbabwe, sparked by disputed election results in March, which have further deteriorated conditions for journalists, and threaten the legitimacy of run-off elections slated for 27 June.

The country’s bureaucratic requirements, long burdensome, have become increasingly inscrutable. Cosmetic amendments to the notorious Access to

Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA) have triggered confusion, with journalists required to seek accreditation from an agency that has yet to be formed, and electoral coverage requiring two levels of permission, one from a legally defunct entity. As the recent banning of multiple media outlets and prosecutions of journalists, both local and foreign, demonstrated, these inconsistencies have not prevented authorities from using legislation to stifle critical coverage.

Physical attacks are on the rise. In the last few months, several freelancers have been brutally beaten. In May, staffers transporting 60,000 copies of a newspaper into the country from South Africa were assaulted, and their truck torched. Reports of “war veterans” joining together to intimidate villagers into removing satellite receivers permitting access to international programs have emerged.

Judicial harassment has also increased, with an editor prosecuted for “publishing false statements prejudicial to the state and contempt of court” after running a column by an opposition politician, and a media lawyer charged with “undermining the authority or insulting the president” for an alleged remark suggesting that Mugabe should step down.

The state-controlled Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) has been particularly hard hit by the recent clampdown. On 14 May, Henry Muradzikwa, the head of ZBC, was reportedly fired after refusing to comply with orders to deny positive coverage to the opposition. In a blatant attempt to intimidate, in early June, eight other ZBC employees, including senior managers and reporters, were placed on two-month long paid vacation, ordered to surrender their ZBC identity cards, and instructed to stay away from both other employees and ZBC premises.

An uninformed and intimidated citizenry cannot benefit from free and fair elections. IPI members call on President Mugabe to take effective measures to stop the violence and judicial attacks against the media, and to permit fair elections, which include unfettered access to information, and the unhindered presence of the international media.

IPI members also call on the African Union and the Southern African Development Community to take a public stand against the Zimbabwean authorities’ actions against freedom of expression in their country.

Resolution on Arrests of Journalists in South Africa


expressed alarm at the growing number of arrests of journalists and photographers reporting on or photographing the actions of the police at scenes of crime or other incidents in South Africa.

On several occasions in the last year journalists have been summarily bundled into police vans and imprisoned sometimes for a night. In all instances the alleged crimes they had committed – never clearly spelled out at the time of their arrest – have been thrown out of court mainly on grounds that there was no evidence on which to base a prosecution.

Media organizations in South Africa have perceived this conduct by the authorities as an attempt to prevent the public from being informed about official conduct and to intimidate journalists.

At the same time IPI members have noted increasing complaints from journalists and others about the refusal of government officials and local authorities to supply information in answer to questions, certain authorities refusing to deal with newspapers which have criticized official conduct to the extent of refusing to place advertisements in those papers, clearly designed to harm the financial viability of the papers and to coerce editors into being less critical.

IPI members condemn these actions as attempts to impose censorship by indirect means and call on the government to order its staffs and others in authority to abide by the freedom of expression and freedom of the media principles in the country’s constitution. IPI members are deeply distressed that South Africa, which was lauded when it introduced its new enlightened constitution in 1996 after years of censorship by the previous apartheid regime, should allow flagrant deviation from those fine principles so soon after it began playing a leadership role in the continent.

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Stability and security.

SECURITY THREADHold the banknote against the light and a dark line will appear.

COLOR-CHANGING NUMBERTilt the banknote and the value numeral will change color from purple to olive green or brown.

The International Press Institute and the Belgrade Host Committee would like to thank the following institutions, organisations and companies for their generous support in the realisation of the IPI World Congress and 57th General Assembly:

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International Press Institute Belgrade 2008 · 2 Congress Report 2008 Congress Report 2008 Be in...

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Transcript of International Press Institute Belgrade 2008 · 2 Congress Report 2008 Congress Report 2008 Be in...