Arif Aliyev joined School of Peacemaking and Media Technology as a trainer in 2011. He is professional journalist, has got rich experience in the media industry.Having become a member of the expert team of the School, he has developed a number of original training methods to destroy stereotypes of journalists and media editors in southern Kyrgyzstan. He specializes in peacemaking and ethnic journalism, is the chairman of the "Yeni Nesil” union of journalists Azerbaijan. Arif is also the initiator of the Baku Press Club project and the Press Council of Azerbaijan. Arif is a founder of the prestigious in the country journalism award "Key media." He is an author of more than 830 nonfiction works in newspapers and magazines, television and radio - broadcasts, documentaries, author and compiler of 14 books.
Publications:
http://www.osce.org/ru/fom/19476
Eran Fraenkel is a specialist in the field of media and social change. International trainer on peacemaking journalism joined School in 2012, when he has successfully trained multinational group of reporters from southern Kyrgyzstan on production of reportage at post conflict area. New concept of journalism for Kyrgyzstan previously has been successfully applied during such a project in Macedonia in the Balkans, in the post-conflict period. In the framework of his activities Eran trained Kenyan youth and community groups to the development of programs of the media to conflict transformation.
He led the team that conducted the evaluation of the media in Afghanistan, and worked as the lead author of the "Afghanistan: assessment of media opportunities to build peace" report published by the U.S. Institute of Peace in 2010. Fraenkel has developed a program for the training of young radio journalists in Aceh, Indonesia, and a new program to assess the media in conflict regions.
Publications:
http://www.usip.org/publications/iona
http://conflict-prevention.net/page.php?id=40&formid=73&action=show&surveyid=4
Ashot Melikyan joined the trainers’ team of the School of peacemaking and Media Technology in 2011. With rich experience in the reporting on ethni conflicts, peacemaking and establishing peace between the warring parties, he is one of the developers of training materials for the training of journalists in southern Kyrgyzstan. This technique is based on the experience gained by reporters and media organizations of Armenia and Azerbaijan in the implementation of joint projects. Beginning in 2011, the technique was successfully implemented in the training course of the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology. Ashot was a professor of journalism at the University of Yerevan, was the director of the Media Association and coordinator of the Yerevan Press Club. Currently, Ashot Melikyan is a chairman of the Committee on Freedom of Speech in Armenia.
Tevan Pogosyan is the first expert and trainer on effective communication, negotiation and conflict management skills. He opened series of
peacemaking trainings conducted by School for participants from Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan in 2010.
His training skills are certified in the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University of the USA, Conflict Management Group in Cambridge in the USA, and his techniques on the destruction of stereotypes and the elements of the effective negotiations are being used by activists and journalists in Kyrgyzstan so far. His methods of teaching at the mediation were successfully tested in the post-conflict period in Armenian and Azerbaijani communities. Tevan is also executive director of the International Center for Human Development in Armenia, included in the list of the top 25 brain trust centers of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. At the end of the nineties, Pogosyan was the representative of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic in the USA, and in 2012 he became a member of the National Parliament of Armenia.
Vyacheslav Likhachev is an expert in the area of the ethno-political conflict solving, xenophobia on the post-Soviet spacepolitical extremism, the theory of nation and nationalism. He joined the team of experts of the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology in 2012. Vyacheslav deals with developing of training methodologies on media monitoring tools to identify the hate speech and conflict-prone attitudes for School, and conducts webinars on the ways of avoiding hate speech in public discourse.
Likhachev also runs a program for monitoring and analysis of xenophobia Congress of National Communities of Ukraine, is the author of several books, 300 articles and more than 60 scientific publications.
The analytical review "Hate Speech and Ethnical Stereotypes in Print Media in Southern Kyrgyzstan", which is a summary report of the Media Monitoring Group for School of Peacemaking and Media Technologies on the results of several studies of media in 2010, 2011 and 2012, is prepared. During this period the group, which included professional journalists and media experts, conducted a study on the subject of identifying ethnical stereotypes, hate speech, and content analysis of publications on contentious.
Analytical review is based on a study of the content of articles in Kyrgyz-language, Uzbek-language and Russian-language press and random express surveys with a population and the media community of Osh, Jalalabad and Batken regions of southern Kyrgyzstan. The examples given in the report are accompanied by the originals scanned from newspaper articles.
The work is not aimed at the production of some recommendations, since the main objective of this study was the creation of an analytical framework for the development of training materials on peace journalism for training workshops conducted by Schools of Peacemaking for reporters in southern Kyrgyzstan and the Fergana Valley.
This report can be useful to researchers, human rights activists and journalists.(See here the full report >>)
School of Peacemaking and Media Technology is a nonprofit media
development organization focusing on peace research, advocacy, and training on
media issues. Organization vision statement aims at supporting freedom of
expression, access to information and citizens making informed opinions and
decisions as a means of promoting an informed, democratic and tolerant
society. We as well promote free and
fair journalism in areas of crises and conflicts in Kyrgyzstan and the Central
Asian Region.
Our organization was established in June 2010 after ethnic violence in the southern Kyrgyzstan for mediation and peacemaking training and capacity building of the local community in the post-conflict period. School of Peacemaking was registered as a Network of Social Mediators Public Foundation.
On October 24-25-26-27, 2013 a training on peacemaking journalism, conflict reporting and the destruction of stereotypes for print and online media in Osh, Jalalabad and Batken oblasts of Kyrgyzstan was organized by the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology of Network of Social Mediators public foundation.
The aim of the event was to teach reporters to media tools for reducing the charge to a confrontational society, techniques destabilizing confrontation, the organization of post-conflict rehabilitation of journalists, and ways to find common mechanisms to improve the efficiency of media peacemaking efforts.
The training was held in the form of an interactive discussion. Reporters learned the theory of reporting on conflicts and consolidated their knowledge by participating in an interactive game, prepared by experienced trainers Arif Aliyev (Azerbaijan) and Ashot Melikyan (Armenia).
Training participants also used their knowledge for practical exercises to overcome xenophobic stereotypes, working with publications of local journalists containing hate speech.
With the help of the trainers journalists have developed a glossary of stereotypes, which must become a handbook for journalists working in conflict zones.
"I acquired a lot of useful knowledge in the training. Now I know how to cover conflicts correctly," a training member Apihazan Amitova, correspondent of the Osh Shamy newspaper said.
There are a lot of problems mecessary to report on in our region, however, it is dangerous to cover these problems in media. The training has taught us to conflict reporting technologies and post-conflict rehabilitation of the journalist, Alina Sydykova, correspondent of Oshmedia site said.
Today, the School of Peacemaking and Media Technologies has been trained about 80 journalists from media outlets in southern Kyrgyzstan. The training was conducted by specially developed techniques, which are based on practical experience of building media dialogue in conflict-prone areas of the world: the Balkans and the Caucasus. Within the School webinars on destroying stereotypes, clichés, and overcoming the image of the enemy in mass media are conducted.
The training is organized to promote peacemaking journalism, the ability of journalists to discuss openly issues of conflict, training of finding the common ground between the opposite sides of the conflict, and techniques of finding active groups from different communities who are ready for dialogue, analysis of existing patterns of conflicts and methods of their destruction.
The four-day training seminar for journalists in southern Kyrgyzstan is led by an experienced team of media experts with extensive practical experience in building a media dialogue in conflict areas of the world: in the Balkans and the southern Caucasus.
The event will be held in the form of interactive discussion, the combination of theory and practice.
The training will be held in Bishkek, date on October 24, 25, 26, 27 (arrival on October 23, exit on October 28) 2013. All expenses are paid by the organizers.
To participate in the seminar, it is necessary to fill out an electronic form on the site www.ca-mediators.net or to send your resume and motivational letter by October 10, 2013. In motivational letter you should indicate why you would like to participate in this training, and how it will affect the future of your career. Also, e-mail to thepeacemakingschool@gmail.com a scanned copy of your passport.
The bids are considered only if there is a complete set.
Leading trainer in multimedia report production at the Camp for Media Innovations Oksana Silantieva recommends the following: first of all, it is important to start mastering skills of photo and video shooting using simple equipment, creating infographics on available free websites and combine everything together. Multimedia journalist is a balance between the meaning and the form, she says.
Multimedia journalism is a craft. As any other craft, this profession is based on basic principles and skills. Multimedia journalist can write decently, shoot decently, make photos and create infographics decently.
If you wrote only in newspapers earlier, then you will have to learn how to make photos, study what composition and color are at a basic level, rather than at the professional photographer’s level. This is needed to make photos with correct composition, and that are meaningful. Such basic things are offered by distance courses. Now a lot of manuals can be found on the internet – go for it! Further on you will have to practice only.
As soon as you master photography, you can start video shooting. What is the difference between the photo and the video, what is editing, what views can be or cannot be edited? Just find the Principles of video editing on the internet, read them, and start shooting video. There’s no need to have classical big cameras.
Don’t try to master some extra professional equipment under any circumstance! Leave it to broadcasters. A smartphone is enough to take a nice shot that can be posted on the web. A multimedia journalist is known not for techniques (though, he can have them), but for the skill of combining them.
A multimedia journalist is a reporter obsessed with the stories. When he sees the issue, he sees what event it can be. He looks at the event and starts gathering information just like any traditional journalist does. But he structures the story in the multimedia format in his head, “So many people have gathered here! I can make a 360 degree panoramic shot to demonstrate the event vividly.”
Or, for example, the event is full of movement. People are running, bicyclers are cycling, something is falling down, someone is shouting. This movement is better demonstrated by a video. A multimedia journalist reacts promptly to that: he takes out his smartphone and records a video, collects people’s quotes, runs to the office (or uses his notebook on the spot), assembles the story out of small parts, adds some text, some photos, some infographics. Present technology helps people not master highly professional applications, but mastering figures and meaning is a must.
When you take a course in a multimedia journalism, you should not forget about traditional journalism, which implies the search and check of information, search for heroes, their development by asking correct questions, comparison of figures and data check. No technology can replace this.
To become a multimedia journalist, one should practice a lot. No university or lecture can replace daily hours-long practice. Only practice can lead to the craft of multimedia journalism. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, to make it better and to get satisfaction from it!
Military men near the aftermarket during mass clashes, Osh, June 201
Training’s participants on mediation and conflict management are building the Tower of Peace, Bishkek, April 2011
Training in destroying stereotypes for journalists, Bishkek, April 2012
Workshop on production of team reporting in multinational journalist groups, Bishkek, August 2012
The School of Peacemaking and Media Technology in Central Asia announces an annual competition among students from Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan,…
25 journalists and media workers from various regions of Kyrgyzstan have been trained to counter the propaganda of violent extremism and hate in…
Within the current context, media and journalists in Central Asia face the following dilemmas: How to cover issues happening in Afghanistan now? How to communicate information to the audience while describing the Taliban, whose image has been presented mainly in reports on terrorist attacks for almost 20 years? Can journalists offer audiences updated and redesigned narratives about a seemingly ex-terrorist group, while complying with standards and ethics?
Conflict-sensitive approaches, peace and solutions journalism tools, and new media formats can help create strategies to offer audiences a sufficiently clear and objective story.
Not Terrorists Anymore?
Kazakhstan was the first Central Asian country to officially remove the Taliban from the list of banned terrorist organisations. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said Astana took this step based on "the importance of developing trade and economic cooperation with present-day Afghanistan and understanding that this regime is a long-term factor”.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kyrgyzstan soon reported the same decision, emphasising that it was "aimed at strengthening regional stability and maintaining a dialogue”.
In mid-September 2024, the media reported on the "unofficial visit” of the head of Tajikistan’s State Committee for National Security Saimumin Yatimov to Kabul and his meeting with the Taliban security chiefs. It was noted that the visit was made to "strengthen bilateral relations between Tajikistan and the Taliban”.
Official Dushanbe has not yet made any statements on this, however, at the time of writing this article, the Taliban were not on the list of terrorist and extremist organisations. Economic interests play their role. Tajikistan exports electricity to Afghanistan and has reopened five markets in border towns where goods are traded on both sides. Foreign trade turnover between the two countries totalled about $46 million in the first six months of 2024.
In Uzbekistan, the Taliban were not included in the 2016 list of 22 terrorist organisations banned by the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan. After the Taliban came to power, official Tashkent opened the Uzbek-Afghan border for the delivery of essential goods and humanitarian aid.
This August, Uzbek Prime Minister Abdulla Aripov visited Kabul. According to media reports, Aripov met with Taliban leaders and discussed bilateral relations and strengthening trade and business between the two countries. As a result, five trade and investment agreements were signed in the energy, agricultural, and industrial sectors.
Turkmenistan had been in contact with the Taliban representatives even before they came to power amid growing tensions over the paramilitary attacks across Afghanistan. On September 11, 2024, in the border town of Serhetabad, Turkmenistan and the Taliban representatives relaunched the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) Natural Gas Pipeline Project. This large-scale project was first initiated almost 10 years ago.
The pipeline is expected to transport up to 33 billion cubic metres of natural Turkmen gas to South Asia annually.
On the one hand, the Central Asian region is becoming an important partner for Afghanistan offering infrastructure and trade projects and increasing cooperation with the regime in Kabul. This cooperation is taking place despite violations of the rights of women, girls, and minorities, restrictions on media freedom, arbitrary executions, and active calls by the UN and other international human rights bodies to put an end to such violations. The regime’s representatives in Kabul are still on the UN Security Council Consolidated Sanctions List.
On the other hand, Central Asian countries are concerned about security issues.
For example, in early September, a suicide bomber, a member of ISIS (an organisation banned in Central Asia), detonated an explosive device near the Kabul prosecutor’s office killing 6 people and injuring 13.
This fact and the length of the common Central Asian border with Afghanistan, which is more than two thousand kilometres long, pose a danger of infiltration into the region by members of ‘sleeper terrorist cells’.
Where Do We Start?
Define the unified terminology you will use in reporting on Afghanistan-related topics.
How should we describe the formerly banned and terrorist Taliban movement now?
Refer to international documents. Look up the UN-used terminology in the Case Law Database. In the latest speech of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, the regime in Kabul is referred to as the ‘de facto authorities’. This is quite a correct phrasing as it does not legitimise the authorities but only shows the reality.
In statements and reports of the European Union, the authorities in Kabul are called ‘the Taliban’. Many foreign media – BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, and others – also use this term. For the Central Asian media, it is less acceptable because for several years, the phrase ‘the Taliban’ was necessarily labelled in brackets as ‘the terrorist and banned movement’.
The following is a list of terms that may be acceptable to use.
To use definitions correctly, it is necessary to update editorial guidelines and compile a list of terms for reporting on Afghan issues.
More precise terminology is necessary to create a balanced and impartial narrative when describing events related to Afghanistan.
What Events Should I Select for Reporting?
The most suitable topics may include:
Human Rights and Other Sensitive Topics
Many media avoid reporting on this sensitive issue amid Central Asian countries’ selective cooperation with Afghanistan. However, reporting on human rights violations is a journalist’s ethical obligation.
The exclusion of women and girls from education and employment opportunities, as well as from public spaces, continues in Afghanistan. Extreme forms of violence occur. In addition to forced early marriages and sexual violence, the Taliban has adopted a decree on public flogging and stoning women to death.
The UN Women estimates that since the Taliban came to power, they have adopted 70 documents restricting women’s rights and freedoms. Such policy is carried out with no regard for the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, which Afghanistan ratified in 2003.
At the end of August 2024, the law on ‘Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice’ was announced by the de facto authorities, which prohibits women from saying anything out loud in public and demonstrating their faces outside the house. This law cements policies that completely erase women’s presence in public – depriving them of their autonomy, attempting to render them into faceless, voiceless shadows.
Pay attention to the following topics:
Use Teamwork to Prepare the Material
Teamwork and cross-border reporting are great methods to gather information from different sides. Create a team of journalists and experts from several countries, including Afghanistan. Identify the topic and the person responsible for finalising the gathered information.
Citations, Statistics, and Online Resources
To keep up to date, create a similar list of Afghan media and keep track of the information. Pay attention to Afghan media amu.tv, which is based abroad. It has a separate constantly updated section on cooperation with Central Asia.
When reporting on violations of women’s rights and violence against women, in addition to using international reports, monitor incidents of gender discrimination on Rukhshana.media. This is an Afghan women’s media organisation created in memory of Rukhshana, a young woman stoned to death in Ghor province for running away after a forced marriage.
Be careful with citations. If you are going to use official press releases, it will be necessary to give some explanation in brackets after phrases such as ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’ (note: This is the title of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan used by the de facto authorities since 2021), etc. The same should be considered when republishing materials from Afghan official media. If you use Russian-language versions of Afghan websites, it is worth double-checking the information several times, as problems with translation accuracy are common.
If references to Afghan statistics are needed, you can use data from the National Statistics and Information Authority (NSIA). However, there is no comprehensive information available. There is a lack of data on the ethnic composition of the population. This problem dates to 1979, the last time a population census was conducted. After a failed attempt in 2008, another census began in 2013 and was expected to be completed in six years. According to the Minority Rights Group, it was decided that the census would not include questions on language or ethnic background for fear that the results would be too politicised and lead to another failed census. However, the census was never completed.
What Background Information Should Be Used?
Reports on issues in Afghanistan should always contain background information to better explain to the audience what is happening. Since the Central Asian aspect is more focused on the events after August 2021, it is necessary to mention the process of peace negotiations in Afghanistan, why all the conditions of the Peace Deal were not fulfilled, and how the society lived before that.
For example: "De facto authorities came to power in Kabul after the previous Afghan government led by President Ashraf Ghani collapsed amid the US troops withdrawal from the country in August 2021. Earlier, in February 2020, a Peace Deal was signed between the US and the Taliban in Doha (Qatar) after more than eighteen years. The Deal addressed a reduction in violence, withdrawal of foreign troops, the start of intra-Afghan negotiations, and guarantees that Afghanistan won’t again become a refuge for terrorists. However, the Taliban failed to fulfil several conditions of the Peace Deal. The Taliban was formed in Pakistan in the 1990s after the Soviet Union’s troops withdrew from Afghanistan. Many of its early militants were trained in Pakistani madrassas. After NATO troops’ deployment, Pakistan gave the Taliban refuge”.
Such background can be shorter or longer according to the topic you are reporting on.
If the material is to cover the state structure of Afghanistan, the focus should be on comparing the Constitution of the country legally in force since 2004 with the draft Constitution that de facto authorities proposed and then abandoned.
It is also important to note that Afghanistan is a party to several international conventions, such as the Convention Against Torture and Other Forms of Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment (1984), the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979), the International Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (1965), the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989), and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006). In addition, the country ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966), the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture (2002), the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict (2000), the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution, and child pornography (2000). Explore the report describing the impact of the situation on human rights.
It is necessary to use the links to these documents in the context of human rights reporting.
Visual Design of the Materials
When using visuals, such as illustrative photos or collages, it is important to consider the nuances of traditional dress that identify different groups. If you want to show a group of Afghan men wearing dastmols (Persian: دستمال) – traditional headscarves, you need to know that these are most often soft-textured, black, grey, white, brown, mixed tones of these colours, or brown and turquoise scarves in a checked pattern.
The group of people from the de facto government can be identified by the white or black turbans on their heads. If it is not possible to find original photos, search for such illustrations.
A man wearing a red and white chequered scarf of hard texture represents Arabic or Middle Eastern style and the use of such an illustration would be wrong.
When designing visuals for the material on women’s issues, it is correct to refer to a woman’s head and face garment in the Afghan dialect as chodari (Persian: چادری) rather than burqa. It is most often a blue-coloured garment, but other colours are also found.
