Promoting accountable and professional reporting on issues of organised crime, war crimes, discrimination and domestic violence

After two years of monitoring and reporting on the activities of state institutions and media in the fields of organised crime, war crimes, discrimination and domestic violence (more…), the BCHR has concluded that the process of advocacy should be expanded to include not only stakeholders but also the general public. Since the best way to influence public opinion is through media, we believe that building the professional capacity of journalists as “watchdogs of democracy” should be the focus of the future activities of the BCHR in the above-mentioned four fields.With this project BCHR hopes to achieve the following goals:

• To increase the professional capacity of young journalists in monitoring and reporting on issues that are important for the promotion of human rights and the development of the rule of law;
• To promote and strengthen the role of the media in raising public awareness on these four issues;
• To increase the visibility of these issues in society and to build public awareness on the importance of adequate reactions by state authorities in terms of victim protection, prosecution and efficient and fair trials in these four areas.

The primary target group for this project consists of 20 young journalists and students at the Faculty of Political Science and other faculties of similar orientation. The project will have four phases each of them devoted to one of the programme’s priority issues: organised crime, war crimes, discrimination and domestic violence. Each phase will begin with lectures and workshops. After the training students divided into four teams, and each team will be given one month to produce media reports on each of the four issues, here you can see selected reports published/broadcast in cooperation with our media partners.

Besides developing professional skills, students will be provided excellent networking and knowledge-sharing opportunities. The students will benefit from instruction by recognised experts in various fields (members of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, judges, lawyers, NGO activists and journalists).

The results of the four phases will be summarized and the media reports will be distributed to the media (for radio and TV broadcasts, and as articles to be published in daily newspapers). The articles will also be published in relevant internet portals in the BCHR webpage and will be distributed via the BCHR’s mailing list. DVDs of the students’ complete work will be distributed to university faculties, journalists, decision-makers, NGOs, etc. Ultimately, the informed and educated public will be in a better position to influence the actions of the state bodies and actively contribute to the process of democratisation in Serbia.

Photos from the training can be viewed in the Gallery section