MOSTAR, Feb 21 (Hina) - Reporters from about 40 editorial boards in the area of the former Yugoslavia gathered in the southern city of Mostar, Bosnia-Herzegovina, on Saturday to hold a round table discussion on how much local media
contributed to horrors of the wars in the former Yugoslavia in 1990s and how they could now contribute to normalisation of relations in the region.
MOSTAR, Feb 21 (Hina) - Reporters from about 40 editorial boards in the
area of the former Yugoslavia gathered in the southern city of Mostar,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, on Saturday to hold a round table discussion on
how much local media contributed to horrors of the wars in the former
Yugoslavia in 1990s and how they could now contribute to normalisation
of relations in the region.#L#
The round table discussion, called 'Media-Factors Of Reconciliation in
the Region; Reports on War Crimes', was organised by the Studio 88
radio station, under the auspices of the US Embassy in Bosnia.
A journalist, Boris Dezulovic, from the Zagreb-based Globus daily
criticised the Belgrade media as well as the Croatian Television for
their reports on events in the war, and he also suggested that
reporters, who were accountable for war events, should be processed by
courts.
"It is absolutely true that the war was impossible without the media
which bear great responsibility for it. I am confident that there are
reporters and editors from 1990s who should be tried by the
Hague-based tribunal," Dezulovic said adding that most of such kind of
the media were not prepared to open war chapters of their past.
Petar Lukovic, Belgrade correspondent of the Split-based Feral Tribune
weekly, pointed the finger at the current syndrome of the Serbian
media, accusing them of spreading defeatism since the assassination of
Premier Zoran Djindjic in March 2003.
(Hina) ms sb