Workshops held to advocate reconciliation friendly media

Three sensitization workshops were organized in Colombo, Kandy and Kurunegala Districts to advocate reconciliation friendly media to the Journalists by the Ministry of National Integration and Reconciliation, a statement said.

Over 150 Journalists discussed the Role of Media in conflict transformation, reconciliation, and peace building.

The Ministry under the direction of President Maithripala Sirisena has developed a Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) in which reconciliation friendly media has been identified as an important initiative.

Globally it is acknowledged that the media has an important and strategic role to play in building national integration and peace building. At the workshop, the journalists identified that media can contribute to conflict transformation on one hand and also contribute to the escalation of conflict on the other hand. Discussions illustrated that Media can make or break the peace said V. Sivagnanasothy, Secretary, Ministry of National Integration and Reconciliation.

The discussions by the Journalists highlighted that based on the international experiences in Kenya the media spread hate messages which created atrocities and led to genocides in early 1990s. Subsequently the Kenyan government established a team to monitor hate-speeches on social media. Such conflict Barometers with number of high-intensity conflicts helped to track the progress on peace building which helps Journalists to report on the peace status of the country.

Media influences to shape perceptions, condition behaviour and impact the minds, attitudes, emotions of readers and community at large. The Journalists at the discussion pointed out that the cultural, ethnic and religious diversity be respected while fair and nondiscriminatory reporting is a prime responsibility of the Journalists.

Journalists are “truth tellers” but, media has a moral responsibility to promote reconciliation. Discipline in Reporting on conflict related issues were considered as important by many professionals. The workshop discussed that conflict sensitive Journalism focuses on democratic, pluralistic and just society. The peace journalism is where editors and reporters make choices about what to report and how to report - to create opportunities to value non-violent responses to conflict.

The discussions highlighted that Peace Journalism is seen as a special mode of socially responsible journalism which contributes to peaceful settlement of conflicts.

In this context, the participants agreed that Journalists can be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. The role of Journalists as a neutral disseminator be objective, impartial, integrity, ensure fairness, and balance in reporting.