Meeting of Dimitris Galamatis, Secretary General of Communication and Information, with the founding members
In the signing of a Memorandum of Cooperation, with the aim of establishing an International Training Center for the Safety of Journalists and Media Professionals, based in Thessaloniki, the founding members agreed, during their meeting with the General Secretary of Communication and Information, Dimitris Galamatis.
“The establishment of the International Training Center for the Safety of Journalists and Media Professionals, which will be under the scientific responsibility of the Peace Journalism Laboratory, the Department of Journalism and Media of AUTH and will be based in Thessaloniki, we aspire to be a model in international level,” said Mr. Galamatis.
“Its establishment is part of the wider framework of actions, which we implement as the General Secretariat of Communication and Information of the Presidency of the Government, with the creation of a Coordination Working Group (Task Force), to Ensure the Protection, Safety and Strengthening of the Position of Journalists and of other Media Professionals, an initiative that has been recognized by the EU and a number of Member States as ground-breaking”, he emphasized and continued:
“Especially in this case, we are bringing together the institutions and associations of journalists with the academic community and the local government of the first and second degree. We are acting together. We are proceeding with an act of defending and promoting the journalistic work, as well as supporting the media of information, an act that constitutes a basic prerequisite for polyphony, pluralism and the fight against misinformation and fake news.
In addition, the establishment of the International Center makes Thessaloniki and Central Macedonia more widely, a point of international reference, for one of the most important modern challenges in the field of media, but also a pole of attraction for a large number of its professionals, in order to be trained”.
As Mr. Galamatis said, relevant announcements will be made in the immediate future regarding the framework for the operation of the International Center. There will be two areas, the educational and the research.
“It is something that was missing and the Aristotle University will help in the academic part. This Center will contribute to extroversion in the Balkan region and throughout Europe, so in addition to academic diplomacy, we are also talking about journalistic diplomacy,” noted its rector APTH Nikos Papaioannou.
“It is a very important Initiative of the General Secretariat of Communication and Information which we support all the authorities, institutions and agencies of the region, because very simply it will give the opportunity to journalists from the whole region, not only within Greece, to train and to be informed about security issues. This way they will safely perform their duty, their function and at the same time they will be shielded against any threat,” said the regional governor of Central Macedonia, Apostolos Tzitzikostas.
The mayor of Thessaloniki, Konstantinos Zervas, spoke of an “excellent initiative” by the General Secretary of Communication and Information and the General Secretary Dimitris Galamatis.
He pointed out that the Municipality of Thessaloniki will grant the space that will host the headquarters of the International Center and announcements about this will be made in the next period and he stressed: “It is another effort that is being made so that our city has visitors and recognition to be an international center for journalists and it is important that we also contribute to this”.
“Today is very important, because something is being implemented that should have been done a long time ago,” said the president of the Union of Editors of Macedonia and Thrace, Nikos Karras, noting that all five of the country’s Editors’ Unions agreed to the creation of the Center.
“It is a great joy and honor for us because it capitalizes on an effort we started three years ago, with the ESIEMTH and with all the institutions of Thessaloniki. We are grateful and especially thank Mr. Galamatis who essentially supported the creation and operation of the Center as well as all the authorities, the Municipality, the Region, APE-MPE, ERT, ESIEMTH and all the journalistic Associations. Because, essentially, it makes Thessaloniki a center of developments, an innovative center, which capitalizes on experience and Aristotle University’s know-how”, emphasized Nikos Panagiotou, associate professor of the Department of Journalism and Media of AUTH.
The president and general director of APE-MPE, Emilios Perdikaris pointed out the following: “The logic of extroversion that we want to give to the Athenian and Macedonian News Agency, but also the juncture of the presidency of the Balkan Union of News Agencies (currently the Mr. Perdikaris is the president of the Balkan Union) dictated the logic by which we had proposed that Thessaloniki become a training center essentially for the journalists of the Balkans. This initiative is an initiative that will work productively in this direction for this very reason and we support it. Surely the results that can come will be equally productive for the journalistic result, but also mainly for the integrity, education, professionalism of the journalists who will participate and enjoy the profits from this initiative” .
The president of DEPHE Apostolos Veizades said that “this initiative is very important, because it protects journalists, helps to create reliable news and at the same time expands the democratic acquis”.
The meeting took place at the Governor’s Office and was attended by: The Secretary General of Communication and Information Dimitris Galamatis, the regional governor of Central Macedonia Apostolos Tzitzikostas, the mayor of Thessaloniki Konstantinos Zervas, the rector of AUTH Nikos Papaioannou, the president of the Union of Editors of Macedonia and Thrace Nikos Karras, the president and the general manager of the Athenian-Macedonian News Agency Emilios Perdikaris, the general manager of ERT3 Filios Stagos as the representative of the president of ERT Constantinos Zoula, the president of the Municipal Corporation of the Municipality of Thessaloniki (DEPTHE) Apostolos Veizades and the director of the Peace Laboratory Journalism of the Department of Journalism and Media Nikos Panagiotou.
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