(IPI/IFEX) – The following is an IPI press release: Vienna, 15 Otober 1999 Press Release IPI launches new book: The Kosovo News and Propaganda War The International Press Institute today launched a collection of analyses, memoirs and opinions that examines and challenges the media coverage of the conflict in FR Yugoslavia; asks where and how […]
(IPI/IFEX) – The following is an IPI press release:
Vienna, 15 Otober 1999
Press Release
IPI launches new book: The Kosovo News and Propaganda War
The International Press Institute today launched a collection of analyses,
memoirs and opinions that examines and challenges the media coverage of the
conflict in FR Yugoslavia; asks where and how truth got lost or distorted;
and probes for media lessons worth learning from this tragic experience.
The past decade has seen a plunging spiral of violence in the Balkans. The
media has tragically become entwined in this deadly cycle. Flames of hatred
have been fanned by biased journalists, and those reporting objectively have
often faced appalling consequences.
Nato’s decision to attempt to bomb Serbia into respecting human rights and
accepting a peace settlement in Kosovo attracted universal media attention.
With the alliance’s colossal might towering over a war-torn and sanctioned
Yugoslavia, the military outcome was clear from the onset. But the battle
could have been won and lost in the trenches of public opinion. Both parties
buried inconvenient information and deployed deceit and implication to win
the sympathies of a sceptical audience.
The war was punctuated with accusations from the media and against the
media. Claims of censorship, propaganda purveying, distorted and suppressed
information were met by allegations of media treason, sensationalist
reporting, cheerleading and appeasing. This book details the media aspects
of the military conflict in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from various
perspectives. Several opinions have been collated from news professionals on
the issues of the flow of information and the media coverage of the
conflict – in FRY itself, in the bordering countries, in key Nato countries
and in selected neutral countries.
The contributors appraise issues such as the quality of coverage, focus of
attention, levels of impartiality, the parameters of the media debates and
the general presentation. Several journalists who reported from the field
have contributed their media-related observations and personal experiences
during the period of the Nato airstrikes. The Kosovo News and Propaganda War
was pieced together to capture varying views on the coverage of this
conflict and to provide future war reporters, their editors, and indeed
public policy makers, with an overview of the news-related lessons worth
learning from this tragic experience.
The book is produced in conjunction with the Association of Independent
Electronic Media (ANEM), the Alliance of Kosova Journalists, the Albanian
Media Institute and Balkan Media Association. The Kosovo News and Propaganda
War is 584 pages and includes 75 contributions from over 40 countries.
Copies can be ordered from IPI headquarters for $30. For excerpts and more
information please see IPI’s website http: www.freemedia.at
Please copy appeals to the source if possible.
