SKOPJE, 10.01.2018 – The Association of Journalists of Macedonia in cooperation with UNDP, organized a three-day workshop for journalists on the topic: “Free and Equal / Inclusive Reporting on Human Rights and Diversities”.
The main conclusion of the workshop was that journalists’ should respect human rights and ethical norms and refrain from discrimination and hate speech, especially towards marginalized communities.
The trainers on the workshop Marina Tuneva and Irena Cvetkovic, said that some media in the country violate basic human rights, especially towards marginalized communities, spreading hate speech and discrimination. Additionally, it was jointly concluded that it is necessary to create systematic engagement of the media regulatory and self-regulatory bodies for establishing decency in the production of topics related to the LGBT community.
According to Marina Tuneva, from the Institute for Communication Studies and Director of the Media Ethics Council, the media has a very important role in changing the perceptions and building public attitudes about important issues of public interest. Through their media articles journalists change some types of informing which are not desirable, or to be more concrete, they should help overcome stereotypes about the LGBT population in the country. This means they should not report using limited sources of information, topics should be broader and they should not provide just servile information from events they have attended,” Tuneva said.
Irena Cvetkovic emphasized that CSO’s can, in cooperation with media, contribute to more inclusive and democratic reporting, especially when reporting on topics related to marginalized groups of the community. “We strongly believe that media serves key partner in our goal, which is changing society and building a democratic society whose principles rest on freedom and equality for all,” Cvetkovic said.
The Executive Director of AJM, Dragan Sekulovski, announced that next mount a manual for ethical reporting on diversity is planned to be published and will be available in three languages: Macedonian, Albanian and English.