On September 3-5 in Yerevan a training seminar for non-governmental organizations
representing various minorities and socially vulnerable groups was held. On
the last day of the seminar journalists took part in it, too. The training on
media relations of NGOs was organized by the London-based Media Diversity Institute
(MDI) under “Minority Empowerment and Media Development in South Caucasus” project,
implemented with the financial assistance of the European Union and the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands. The ways and methods to improve the cooperation
between the “third sector” and “the fourth estate” were discussed in the interaction,
moderated by Tim Grout-Smith and Lily Poberezhska (“Media Player International”
consultancy partnership, UK) and Elina Poghosbekian (Yerevan Press Club).
The issues of minority coverage by the media were the main subject for another
MDI event, held on September 3-4 in Istanbul, again under the project above.
The conference of the journalism professors from Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan
aimed at introducing the structure and methodology of curricula of “Reporting
Diversity” course, to be taught this academic year at a number of universities
in the three countries of South Caucasus. Journalism professors from Austria,
Hungary and Russia shared their experience with the participants of the Istanbul
conference.
