Highlight

Innocents

Whistleblowers choose to disclose information in the public interest, uncovering evidence of crime on their workplace – yet in doing so they risk facing prosecution and retaliation. Our special dossier looks at the initiatives which are being taken to protect whistleblowers at the European level.

They bear no fault, but children in Armenia are still exposed to physical and psychological violence as a form of punishment. A new campaign is now raising awareness on the issue, in order to induce a change in parents' behavior.

More in the news: how many streets in the Western Balkans are still named after Tito? An analysis combining data, memory, and identity. Also Lidija Pisker focuses on data, looking at the people leaving the Balkan region. They head more and more to Central-Eastern Europe.

Save the Date! The European Data Journalism Network (EDJNet) is a joint effort of 13 media outlets operating across Europe to produce, disseminate and facilitate the reuse of data-driven news content on European affairs across Europe and beyond. The network will be presented on Monday the 6th in Brussels

Crafts

Nearly a decade after the economic crisis hit Greece, people are experimenting alternative ways to make it through, by retrieving the handmade way of life they used to live in in the past decades. Elvira Krithari met the new Greek craftswomen.

It's an unusual craft, but watermen in Armenian Armavir Province have a fundamental role: water quality is so low in this region that villages rely on private delivery lorries, bringing clean water to the villages each morning. OC Media met Tigran Davtyan, who has been a waterman for 22 years.

In Romania, the profession of kiosk owners is in danger, with serious repercussion on press freedom: due to the collapse of press distribution networks, entire cities no longer receive printed press, not to mention rural areas.

Back and forth

Despite the breakup with president Poroshenko, former president of Georgia Mikhail Saakashvili is now back to Ukraine. While many wonder how his return will impact on domestic politics, his coming back certainly says something about the current situation in the country.

Will the Parthenon marbles, currently exhibited at the British Museum, ever return to Athens? Brexit negotiations may open a window of opportunity, as Greece could trade the restitution of the sculptures for the Greek parliament's "yes" to Brexit.

More in this newsletter: last week in Serbia, media and citizens joined forces in a campaign against increasing pressures on media; the situation regarding media is a bleak one in Montenegro, too: a background of past and present issues curtailing media freedom is available in our Dossier on Media Freedom in Montenegro.

Counting the words that count

How did Juncker's speech on the State of Union stand out compared to previous ones? A quantitative analysis weights 2017 SOTEU, highlighting emerging trends. More on this topic: what were the references to South East Europe in Juncker's address to the European Parliament.

Words that count are also spelled out by Drago Hedl in his interview for Novosti on the journalist's craft, between threats and humiliations. Finally, the poisoning impact of smear campaigns against journalists and activists in Serbia has been dismissed by Belgrade prosecutor with a pronouncement marked with contradictions: a commentary by Dragan Janijić.

More in this newsletters: Cumhuriyet trial, the defendants remain in prison; the weight of garbage generated by tourism: an overview of the situation in South East Europe.

Re-branding

This week, OCCRP investigation The Azerbaijani Laundromat reached international visibility, revealing the attempt at cleaning up the image of a government crashing any internal opposition: Arzu Geybullaeva retraces for OBCT the ongoing spiral of repression that lead 158 political prisoners and 11 journalists in jail in the country.

There's little re-branding effort in the new government of Albania, made in the image of its undisputed leader. In fact, democratic Albania has never had such a monolithic, one-man-show government.

Zagreb city assembly decided to rename the square named after Josip Broz Tito. Giorgio Comai parsed OpenStreetMap data in order to find all streets and squares dedicated to Tito in the former Yugoslavia.

Journalism under trial in Turkey

On July 24 the trial has started against the journalists and administrators of the Turkish daily Cumhuriyet, accused of terrorism. The voices from the courtroom point to the concerning state of the relationship between journalism and power in the country. We report about the trial, counting also on drawings made in court by Murat Başol and Tarık Tolunay.

Day after day, a live blog run by ECPMF makes it possible to follow the unfolding of the trial.

Diversity

Vladimir Jokić, young exponent of the recently established opposition party Democratic Montenegro, has been the mayor of Kotor since last fall. He belongs to a political force different from Đukanović’s party, which has been leading the country for years. We discussed with him the opportunities for genuine democratic alternation in the country.

An artistic project articulates a different approach to the historical memory of the conflicts of the 1990s and to the concept of testimony: an overview of its development so far. Also on memory: an interview with professor Vjeran Pavlaković on commemorative practices, European memory and processes of victimization in the post-Yugoslav space.

Also, in this newsletter: RECOM looks at the Summit on the Western Balkans , that will take place in Trieste next July 12th, as an occasion for revival. The coalition has gathered thousands of signatures from citizens of the region. Finally, socialists and democrats in Albania have found an agreement that will allow regular elections to take place on June 25th. But at what price? A commentary by Tsai Mali .

This week, Greece lost a brave journalists and citizen. We had the honour to cooperate with Costas Efimeros as part of the transnational campaign on media freedom OBCT has been running within the ECPMF project. He incited all of us to pursue with tenacity the task we had given ourselves, a commitment we will do our best to honour.

Change

Journalism for social change: a thematic series that OBC Transeuropa dedicated - in the context of the ECPMF project - to journalistic initiatives that foster high-quality reporting, promoting and strengthening democratic values and fundamental rights in European societies.

In an editorial published on World Press freedom Day, Mogens Blicher Bjerregård, President of the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) discusses the battle between the media and politics in Europe and how it is reshaping the challenges facing journalists in their daily work.

More in this newsletter: a selection of the dossier on media ownership produced by our media partners, covering Albania, Bosnia Herzegovina, Romania, Montenegro and Serbia; an analysis by Katarina Tadić looks at the impact of the spoil system on the functioning of the public administration in Kosovo; an interview with MEP Konstantina Kuneva, attacked for her activism, now fighting for women workers' rights in Europe .

From our partners: ECPMF provides temporary shelter for European journalists under threat. Applications are open until May 12th

Access to Information in South East Europe

The countries of South East Europe enjoy very high standards when it comes to the legislation regulating access to public information and transparency. But the reality on the ground is different and journalists across the region denounce serious difficulties in obtaining – both from private organizations and public institutions - the access to information they are entitled by the law. A recently published dossier gathers the articles published by the network of our media partners in the ECPMF project, assessing the specific situation in the countries involved in the project

Seminar “EQUAL RIGHTS FOR ALL”, December 16, 2016 Rovereto Italy

As part of the project “The parliament of Rights”, OBCT organises the seminar “EQUAL RIGHTS FOR ALL” on December 16, 2016. The meeting is the first one in a series of four events aiming to amplify the impact of the anti-discrimination Educational Kit developed by CEJI .

The seminar will take place in Rovereto, with the participation of a CEJI’s experienced diversity education trainer, and it is open to youth volunteers, CSOs, officers of local authorities and school teachers with a direct interest in anti-discrimination policies, so as to help local realities understand how policy-making works at EU level and how they can take part in it.