Date: 9 June 2015

Country: US

The Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) and the Media Diversity Institute (MDI) organise a panel discussion on Strengthening Freedom of Expression in a Multicultural World. Discussion will be held on 9 June in Washington with Milica Pesic (MDI), Gary Young (Guardian US), dr Verica Rupar (AUT University), Courtney Radsch (Committee to Protect Journalists) and Rob Leavitt (MDI US Trustee). Moderator is Razia Iqbal, BBC News.

Published: 24 May 2015

Region: Eastern Europe

The First Eastern Partnership (EaP) Media Conference took place in Riga on May the 20th, as a side event of the 4th Eastern Partnership summit which gathered  leaders of six Eastern European countries and the EU.  More than 300 representatives of the media community, experts, academia, civil society and policymakers from the EaP and the EU discussed challenges media in the 6 countries experience, in particularly since the beginning of Russian-Ukrainian conflict and ever growing Russian propaganda.

At the Conference, organised by the Latvian Presidency of the Council of the EU, three different studies were presented. Each of them is related to Russian media interpretation of the conflict. As one of the outcomes, the conference provided recommendations regarding consistent and coordinated support from the EU to freedom of expression in the Eap partner countries.

Deadline: Rolling

Region: Central Asia

Registrations are now open for enrolling to Covering Diversity, a new online course on diversity reporting developed by the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology of Central Asia.

Journalists, media experts, educators and students can register for this course.

The course will teach how to cover ethnic, linguistic and cultural diversity, underlining the role of ethical journalism in avoiding misunderstanding and intolerance between communities, and how to reflect the opinions of the whole society, giving voice to those who are usually excluded from mainstream media.

Date: 2 April 2015

Region: Western Balkans

The state of media in the Balkans is far from being healthy. To say it with the words of Dunja Mijatović, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media of Bosnia and Herzegovina, “freedom of the media in the Balkans is worse than after the wars in the ‘90s.”

In the ten year period following the Dayton Peace Accords (1996-2006), the international community invested $290 million in media development. Still, twenty years after the wars, Reporters Without Borders’ 2015 World Press Freedom Index ranks Serbia 67, Montenegro 114 and Macedonia 117 out of 180 countries; IREX’s Media Sustainability Index lists countries like Macedonia and Serbia in the “unsustainable” category.

Published: 10 March 2015

Country: UK

In the week ahead of the International Women’s day, 8^th of March, the Women Of the World Festival (WoW) in London celebrated women and girls and their achievements in art, media, film, education. Since its foundation by the theatre director and producer Jude Kelly in 2011, the success of WOW has counted on a number of event locations around the world, a rapid ticket sale, and big names such as Malala and Annie Lennox. The Media Diversity Institute reporter visited WoW in order to explore how this kind of events can have an impact that goes beyond the 8^th of March and what are the best ways to boost a change towards gender equality.

Published: 16 February 2015

Country: Lithuania

Roma and Muslims living in Lithuania are absent from the country’s media. Alongside a very low representation, the media tend to strengthen stereotypes by offering a one-sided portrayal of Roma as criminals, and Muslims as terrorists. This is often combined with derogatory terms, especially about Romani people who are rarely or never interviewed in the Lithuanian media.

These are the findings of the research conducted by the National Institute of Social Integration (NISI) within the project “Address of Human Rights – Journalism”. The study analysed the news pieces published and broadcast from June 2013 to July 2014 in national and regional media. The research, which focused on three specific ethnic and religious groups reveals that the members of Jewish community generally can be seen and heard in the news.