Fifth Central Asian Media Conference
When
17 September 2003 (All day)
Where
Bishkek
(OSCE)A Kyrgyz woman sells newspapers and magazines on a street in Bishkek. (OSCE) Photo details
The Fifth Central Asian Media Conference, organized by the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Freimut Duve, the OSCE Centre in Bishkek and CIMERA, an organization that trains journalists, was held on 17-18 September in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
The 120 participants included journalists from across Central Asia, government officials, members of parliament and civil society. Unfortunately, no participants from Turkmenistan were able to attend.
Participants stressed that the issues and problems highlighted in the previous declarations from the conferences in Bishkek (1999), Dushanbe (2000), Almaty (2001) and Tashkent (2002) still remained valid and of utmost concern to media professionals. Above all, the global fight against terrorism should not be used as a pretext to restricted civil liberties.
The resulting Bishkek Declaration made a number of recommendations, including:
- The media should be free to exercise its corrective function towards the economic interests and activities of politicians and their families.
- Governments should ensure that citizens, as members of different linguistic and cultural groups, have the right and opportunity to express their views and preserve their language and culture through the media.
- The media should be free to play its constructive role in combating discrimination, and should not be used to advocate and provoke violence.
- Governments should ensure broad access for journalists to sources of information of public relevance