Eleven journalists from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia and from Kosovo in the first workshop of the fifth generation of the Investigative Reporting Program: Stories on Organized Crime Issues, started working on stories which they will investigate over the next five months. The workshop was held on 5-9 February 2007 at Mediacentar Sarajevo.
During the five-day workshop, Saša Leković, Lead Program Trainer, and  Branko Čečen, Assistant Trainer, together with participants made detailed synopses of their investigative stories and by analyzing examples of news investigations, explained the investigative process loop. The trainers gave a lot of attention to ways of finding investigation sources and their use and protection.
Mehmed Halilović, Deputy Ombudsman on Media of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, spoke about legislation and ethics in investigative journalism. Participants showed a lot of interest in internet search techniques demonstrated by Nevena Ršumović, Trainer in Computer Assisted Reporting/CAR.
“My opinion is that this is a very good program offering new practical experiences even to journalists who have worked in investigative reporting for many years. What I myself found most useful was learning a lot more about internet search techniques, which will be very beneficial in my future work,” said Danijela Bugarin, journalist with the B-H daily AS.
The guest lecturer was Aida Hozić, lecturer at the University of Florida, Department of Political Sciences, who spoke about world developments and trends in investigating organized crime, while Ivana Batinić, guest trainer from E-Net centar, taught participants how to use Moodle software which they will need to continue online work.
Participants in the fifth generation of the Investigative Reporting Program were:
1. Rene Bajić, “Dubrovački list”, Dubrovnik, Croatia2. Danijela Bugarin, B-H daily AS, Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina 3. Miroslava Derikonjić, “Politika”, Belgrade, Serbia4. Gabrijela Dimković, BBC Macedonian Network, Kumanovo, Macedonia5. Aneta Gosevska, paper “Večer”, Skopje, Macedonia6. Olivera Ilić, www.kragujevac.co.yu, Kragujevac, Serbia7. Sanja Lipovac, paper “Politikolog”, Belgrade, Serbia8. Arben Rašiti, Radio-Television Kosovo, Pristina, Kosovo9. Gordana Simonović, Deutsche Welle, Zagreb, Croatia10. Slobodanka Stamenić, paper “Danas”, Belgrade, Serbia11. Aleksandra Timkovska, paper “Večer”, Skopje, Macedonia
The Program is five months long and consists of two workshops and online work.
The second workshop in the Program will be held on 8-11 May 2007. It will feature Prof. Dr. Gordana Vilović, Professor of the University of Dubrovnik and International Center for Education of Journalists of Zagreb, who will speak about media ethics, and Paul Christian Radu, multi-awarded Romanian investigative journalist, who will speak about database search.
The Investigative Reporting Program: Stories on Organized Crime Issues is one of the most important and largest projects implemented successfully by NetNovinar - Center for Investigative Reporting and Media Education (founders: Mediacentar Sarajevo and Investigative Journalism Center, Zagreb) for the third subsequent year.
The Program has been attended by more than 60 journalists from the region, some of whom have achieved enviable news investigation results:
• Đorđe Padejski won the NUNS investigative reporting award (in the young journalists/print media category)• Andreja Kasanić’s story “Money laundry to be punished again,” which she made during the Program, was published on the front page of one of Croatia’s highest circulation dailies, Večernji list.• Danijela Vukosavljević and Dušan Telesković’s investigative story made during the Program was published on the front page of the daily Politika.• Marija Mikolić’s story from the series of stories “Dossier – Virovitica Cooperative” was published on the front page of Večernji List in October 2006.• Branislav Grković’s story “Cyber criminal – abusers from anonymity” was published on four pages in the paper Vreme on 8 February, 2007.• Mirjana Jevtović, journalist with the paper Danas during the Program, in the meantime became lead investigative journalist for the multi-awarded investigative show “Insider” on TV B92, Belgrade.