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Author: WeBalkans

Regional conference on countering disinformation

Written by WeBalkans on . Posted in News.

On 1 June, the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) organised a third conference on disinformation in cooperation with the Osservatorio Balcani e Caucaso Transeuropa, the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats, and the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. The conference brought together over 100 participants, including key experts, academics, journalists, researchers, representatives of youth organisations from the Western Balkans, students, and practitioners from the region and beyond.  
“The Western Balkans has unfortunately always been susceptible to divisive narratives that bring hatred and violence and it is our constant responsibility to cultivate understanding and awareness of this phenomenon in our region. The good news is that Western Balkan citizens have understood the detrimental potential of disinformation – as 74% of them agree disinformation poses a security threat to their economies,” said Amer Kapetanović, Head of the Political Department of the Regional Cooperation Council, at the opening of the conference.  
After two years of organising these conferences with the aim of raising awareness about the phenomenon of disinformation, this year’s conference focused on a more practical level and capacity building, primarily aimed at youth and students from the Western Balkans. 

Belgrade’s Tiršova 2 children’s hospital is becoming a reality

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During his visit to Serbia, European Commissioner for Enlargement, Olivér Várhelyi visited the construction site of the Tiršova 2 children’s hospital together with the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić. The construction of the hospital began in October and is being supported by the European Union with over €35 million.

 

The European Union has never supported such a large health infrastructure investment, Commissioner Várhelyi pointed out. He added that such a project is a consequence of the Covid pandemic, which taught us to appreciate health even more. “Health, especially the health of our children, is the most important thing,” said the Commissioner, adding that Tiršova 2 will open in about three years’ time. “I am sure that patients will appreciate this great contribution to the city and the state,” he concluded.

 

The event was also attended by the EU Ambassador to Serbia, Emanuele Giaufret; Minister of Health, Zlatibor Lončar; Minister of European Integration, Jadranka Joksimović; Mayor of Belgrade and former director of Tiršova, Dr Zoran Radojičić; Director of the Public Investment Office, Marko Blagojević; and Siniša Dučić, director of Tiršova 2.

EIB opens a representation office in North Macedonia

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On 30 May, the European Investment Bank (EIB) officially inaugurated its new representation office in Skopje, located in the premises of the Delegation of the European Union to the Republic of North Macedonia. By taking this step, the bank of European Union confirms its support for the country’s sustainable growth and green transition. The new dedicated local presence will enhance technical and financial support for private and public investment.  
Opening a representation office in Skopje is in line with the EIB’s policy of establishing a presence in more countries outside the European Union. This effort will help the EU bank to understand regional financing needs, identify more new projects and establish closer ties with national authorities and other stakeholders. To date, the EIB has established offices in 23 EU Member States and 30 countries outside the EU, promoting business and policy dialogue.  
At the opening ceremony, Prime Minister of North Macedonia, Dimitar Kovačevski and EIB Vice-President Lilyana Pavlova were joined by the Minister of Finance Fatmir Besimi, the Head of the EU Delegation in North Macedonia David Geer, and other international financial partners and high-level representatives of the business and banking community.

The New European Bauhaus Festival

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Starting on 9 June, the first edition of The New European Bauhaus Festival will bring together exhibitions, artistic performances, conferences, seminars and other gatherings combining a live onsite event in Brussels with online activities and side events across the EU and beyond, including the Western Balkans. Featuring debates, great speakers, artistic performances, exhibitions and networking opportunities, the festival is a chance for experts, organisations and families to debate and design future ways of living together.

 

The festival’s main themes are beauty, sustainability and inclusiveness and it aims to build connections, linking the worlds of research, science and technology to those of education and civil engagement, and art, culture and architecture.

 

The New European Bauhaus is a creative and interdisciplinary initiative that connects the European Green Deal to our living spaces and experiences. It calls on all of us to imagine and build together a sustainable and inclusive future that is beautiful for our eyes, minds, and souls.

Launched by President von der Leyen in her 2020 State of the Union address, the New European Bauhaus was co-designed together with thousands of people and organisations across Europe and beyond. In September 2021, the initiative moved from co-design to delivery with a Commission Communication  setting out policy actions and funding to make the initiative a reality.

Telling the story straight

Written by WeBalkans on . Posted in Stories.

The Balkan Transitional Justice programme has brought reliable information to Western Balkan audiences for over ten years.

Kula in Croatia and Hrtkovci in Serbia are two Western Balkan villages which share a common tragedy. In 1992, after armed conflict broke out in what was then Yugoslavia, Serbs and Croats from Kula in Croatia and Hrtkovci in Serbia swapped houses and moved to each other’s villages. This was described as “humane relocation”, but it was actually a forced population exchange in the midst of a war. The story of these two villages was captured in the documentary film, “Your house was my home” produced by the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN).

The documentary was produced as part of the Balkan Transitional Justice programme, a regional platform co-funded by the EU. The platform publishes online news reports covering local issues related to war crimes, thus improving the general public’s understanding of transitional justice issues in the former Yugoslavia.

“We are the only media outlet in the region that covers war crime trials in detail and fully based on facts. I think that this is one of the most important things that Balkan transitional justice has accomplished in the past ten years.”

Over ten years of war crime reporting

Nejra Mualomerović, a programme associate, explains that the main focus of the programme is to ensure a regular and up-to-date flow of information about transitional justice issues, mainly war crime trials, in the region. This is achieved through a dedicated network of correspondents across the former Yugoslavia, and contributors from other media outlets, civil society organisations, government institutions, and academia. “We are the only media outlet in the region that covers war crime trials in detail and fully based on facts. I think that this is one of the most important things that Balkan transitional justice has accomplished in the past ten years,” says Nejra.

However, as the number of war crime trials has declined, the programme has started to develop other activities with the same aim, using their experience and the information they already have. One of their projects is a database of mass graves. The programme team have been compiling this since 2020, dealing with the challenges of a large number of mass graves and scattered information. Nejra explains that because the information was not in one place, and most was available only in hard copy, the programme staff had to visit numerous institutions and organisations. They also went with a photographer to mass grave locations in order to record them and store them in the database. The information was then made public.

During these visits it became clear that most of the mass grave sites were not marked or memorialised and offered no access. ” Some of them were on private property, some were turned into dumpsites, and some sites had churches built on them,” says Nejra.

Nevertheless, the team has already managed to locate, film, photograph and store in the database several dozen locations, and the work continues.

 “I think that all the people who have worked with BIRN during these ten years have seen their work also in terms of the impact that it will have on future generations and how they will see history.”

About the project

The Balkan Transitional Justice programme is a regional platform that aims to improve the general public’s understanding of transitional justice issues in former Yugoslav countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia). The programme is supported by the European Union, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) and the Embassy of the Kingdom of The Netherlands.

Another of the programme’s recent initiatives is the Reporting House Museum that will be opened in Sarajevo this autumn. It will be the first independent non-profit regional museum in the Balkans, displaying the comprehensive story, told from a journalistic perspective, of the break-up and wars of Yugoslavia, and their aftermath. The museum will be located in the city centre in a three-storey building with 600 square metres of space. The first two floors will be a permanent exhibition, telling the stories of the war crimes that were committed in the former Yugoslavia, including stories of refugees, ethnic cleansing, genocide and war camps, and also the life of journalists during the war. The third floor will function as a community space for journalists, others from civil society and the wider public, and will be used for discussions relating to conflict journalism and the media’s role today.

Nejra acknowledges that transitional justice topics are not easy to cover. “But I think that all the people who have worked with BIRN during these ten years have seen their work also in terms of the impact that it will have on the future generations and how they will see history,” she says.

Fighting pollution across the border

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Cross-border municipalities in North Macedonia and Serbia join forces to fight pollution.

The border areas of Lipkovo in North Macedonia and Preshevo/ Preševo in Serbia are both municipalities with small populations: Lipkovo has 13,000 and Preshevo/ Preševo 27,000 inhabitants. With most of their inhabitants living in rural areas, they share a common culture, traditions, an economic system, and strong family and friendship ties. However, they also share an important problem: a high level of pollution from illegal garbage dump sites. There are 11 illegal dump-sites in the municipality of Preshevo/ Preševo and seven in Lipkovo.

Both municipalities have a waste collection system organised through public utility companies. However, these companies do not fully cover their respective municipalities. The Pisha company in Lipkovo maintains ten villages out of the 22 that are inhabited in the agreed area for waste collection, and the Moravica company on the Serbian side of the border covers 11 villages out of the 34 that are inhabited in the municipality. The increasing problem of the villages that are not serviced could not be addressed at municipal level due to lack of funds and coordination, so the two municipalities decided to seek external support for managing the problem.

“The number of people with infectious diseases was very high considering the relatively small size of the municipalities, and it was obvious to us that one of the main reasons was the illegal dump sites and polluted environment.”

Joining forces for a better environment

Aleksandar Gumberovski is a project manager with the municipality of Lipkovo. He explains that according to the official data received from the Regional Hospital in Vranje, the number of persons with infectious disease in Preshevo/ Preševo municipality was 20 in 2017, 30 in 2018 and 35 in just the first half of 2019. On his side of the border, in Lipkovo, the number of those with infectious disease was 23 in 2017, 38 in 2018 and 42 in just the first half of 2019, thus showing a continuous rise in infection there too. “The number of people with infectious diseases was very high considering the relatively small size of the municipalities, and it was obvious to us that one of the main reasons was the illegal dump sites and polluted environment,” says Aleksandar.

Due to their mainly rural economy and their size, neither municipality has sufficient funds to cover all services to their residents properly, and this is the reason why they were not able to provide waste collection services to all their citizens. However, as the municipality of Lipkovo had a good experience of support from donors, they joined forces with the neighbouring municipality of Preshevo/ Preševo on the Serbian side of the border, and decided to apply for EU funding to help them with this problem.

They jointly devised a project called “Less Garbage, Less Risk, More Health” and got support from the EU-funded North Macedonia – Serbia Cross-Border Cooperation programme. Through the project they purchased two waste collection trucks, 20 bigger waste collection containers and over 1700 small bins to be distributed to the households in the region.

“These municipalities are underdeveloped, and there is a lack of funds for almost every sector. The EU support is therefore really important for resolving our problems – sometimes even the most basic ones.”

About the project

The EU-funded cross-border cooperation project “Less Garbage, Less Risk, More Health” started at the beginning of 2021 and will run until the end of 2022. The overall value of the project is over €250,000 with around 85% of this sum funded by the EU. The specific objectives of the project include:

increasing capacities for managing man-made risks and hazards related to solid waste disposal and protection of the environment; increasing capacity and improving institutions’ approach to services for organised waste collection; awareness-raising among local residents on the consequences of pollution; and mitigation of infectious diseases.

In addition to its support with equipment, the project will also launch an awareness campaign of leaflets and videos, in order to change citizens’ habits relating to the environment, encouraging them to use the newly-purchased bins for their waste.

This is not the first EU-funded project that Lipkovo municipality has benefited from. Aleksandar explains that because the municipality is on the border also with Bulgaria and Kosovo, they have been part of other cross-border cooperation programmes. “These municipalities are underdeveloped, and there is a lack of funds for almost every sector. The EU support is therefore really important for resolving our problems – sometimes even the most basic ones,” he says.

YEAs participate in debate caravan in Serbia

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Young European Ambassadors (YEAs) from Serbia, Adrijana Nikitović and Dimitrije Prokopović, took part in the EU School of Debate Caravan which was organised from 23 to 26 May.  This Caravan was organised by the EU Info Centres in Serbia and supported by the EU Delegation to Serbia, as well as by EU for Tourism and Cultural Heritage.

 

In the four-day Caravan, together with participants from the EU School of Debate, YEAs visited Felix Romuliana, Golubac, Kladovo, Negotin, Smederevo, Srebrno jezero and Zaječar. In Kladovo, Negotin and Smederevo, Adrijana and Dimitrije presented the YEA Network and promoted the third YEA call for applicants. Dimitrije also talked about the call on local media. On the second day, the EU Ambassador to Serbia, Emanuele Giaufret, visited the Caravan and had a discussion with participants on the future of the EU and Serbia.

 

The Young European Ambassadors platform is a creative network of young activists from across the Western Balkans (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia). YEAs come from different backgrounds, yet they all share a common vision: the Western Balkans united in diversity. They learn about each other and the EU together, pursue creative projects, acquire new skills, connect via social media, and organise inspiring events – always driven by the idea that activism in youth is the most powerful force of social change.

 

The aims of the network are: to share EU values; to raise awareness about the EU’s cooperation with its Western Balkan partners; to showcase the tangible results of this cooperation; to contribute to policy dialogue on various topics, and; to help increase civic activism.

YEAs conduct media literacy workshops for schools

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Media Literacy Workshops organised by the Young European Ambassadors (YEAs) for elementary school students in the Western Balkans have kicked off. The first workshop took place in Zenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where Young European Ambassadors, Dragana Vucković and Džulisa Otuzbir, held a workshop for seventh-grade students in the Miroslav Krleža elementary school.

 

YEAs had previously attended training for youth trainers on the basics of media literacy. Now they are ready to share this knowledge with young students who are consumers of media content, especially social media. Led by the idea that it is vital to engage youth in the creation and dissemination of media literacy knowledge, the main aim of peer-to-peer workshops is to introduce young students to the importance of proper consumption of media content.

 

The YEA platform is a creative network of young activists from across the Western Balkans (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia). YEAs come from different backgrounds, yet they all share a common vision: the Western Balkans united in diversity. They learn about each other and the EU together, pursue creative projects, acquire new skills, connect via social media, and organise inspiring events – always driven by the idea that activism in youth is the most powerful force of social change.

 

The aims of the network are: to share EU values; to raise awareness about the EU’s cooperation with its Western Balkan partners; to showcase the tangible results of this cooperation; to contribute to policy dialogue on various topics, and; to help increase civic activism.

Civil Society Forum 2022

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The EU-financed TACSO 3 project announced the forthcoming EU-Western Balkans and Turkey Civil Society Forum 2022 and invites civil society organisation (CSO) leaders and experienced civil society activists as well as representatives of grassroots CSOs to apply as contributors to the Forum sessions and as participants of the event.

 

The Civil Society Forum 2022 (Forum ’22) will be held on 8 and 9 June as a hybrid live and virtual event. A limited number of up to 120 participants will be selected for live participation in Skopje. Online participation will allow further active video involvement in all Forum ’22 sessions.

 

Forum ‘22 will gather civil society representatives (including non-profit media organisations), public authorities, EU representatives, donors, and other stakeholders in the area of civil society development in the Western Balkans and Turkey. It will discuss the current state of affairs for CSOs in the region, as well as joint actions on the part of the EU, public authorities and civil society that will address the identified challenges.

 

The main objective of Forum ’22 is to launch, present and discuss the follow-up to the revised EU Guidelines for Support to Civil Society in the Enlargement region (2021-2027), for which there has been extensive consultation with civil society in the past two years and which have been revised based on the feedback received and new developments.

Ambassador of the EU to Serbia visits agriculture fair in Novi Sad

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Emanuele Giaufret, Ambassador of the European Union to Serbia, Branislav Nedimović, Minister of Agriculture, and Jadranka Joksimović, Minister of European Integration, visited the Agricultural Fair in Novi Sad on 25 May.  
Last year, in the context of overall food exports to the EU in excess of €2.3 billion, Serbia achieved a positive trade balance of almost €700 million. This amounts to over half (55%) of all Serbian food exports being destined for the EU.  
Referencing the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance for Rural Development III (IPARD III), Ambassador Emanuele Giaufret said: “Excellent work was done during the preparation of the IPARD III programme, which was adopted by the Commission in March this year. That brings an additional €377 million to the Serbian agricultural sector, of which €288 million is financed by the EU. On the other hand, I stressed that Serbia should make every effort to successfully complete the implementation of IPARD II and avoid any additional loss of funding under this programme. Serbia lost €3.7 million in 2021 due to constant problems with the payment of annual funds.”  
During the second cycle of the IPARD programme, which is coming to an end, nine public calls have been announced, and more than 550 grants have been approved, about half of which have already been paid to Serbian farmers and food producers.  
The ambassador also spoke about other successful projects financed by the EU in Serbia. For example, no case of rabies has been recorded in Serbia for years, and the EU is also participating in the suppression of swine fever. The EU has supported the control and eradication of these two dangerous diseases with over €20 million. The EU is also funding projects to support the purchase of solar panels, as well as equipping the National Reference Laboratory.  
Emphasising the desire for further cooperation Ambassador Giaufret said: “We are better together.”