Citizens in Kosovo, above all Kosovo Serbs, found themselves between a rock and a hard place: the pro-regime media in Belgrade and Pristina, which have a similar reporting style despite supporting two different centers of power – to raise tensions with grandiloquent and dramatic allegations.
Belgrade-based portal Alo.rs, reporting on the recent fire in the Osojane valley, knowingly or unknowingly, erroneously placed this Metohija region in the area of the north of Kosovo. The same portal has been writing about a series of crises for years now: „Dramatic situation in the north of Kosovo“.
„It is no longer the case that words and thoughts are being stuffed down the throats of Kosovo Serbs, but the geography is being relocated. As per a news item from Belgrade, the Osojane Valley has now been moved to the north of Kosovo,“ the editor of Radio Goraždevac, Darko Dimitrijević, underlined.
In the latest episode of KoSSev’s podcast, Dimitrijević addressed this recent misinformation.
According to him, such news pieces are the product of a desire to report in a sensationalist manner.
„The fire in the Osojane Valley, which is situated at least 30 km south of the Ibar river, was presented as a dramatic situation in the north, perhaps because then it would lure more people to click on such news,“ he says.
Sadly, the media in Serbia, even with an audience of millions, do not have a proper view of the events in Kosovo.
„It is just another indicator of how many of those people who cover Kosovo topics are not actually physically present in Kosovo. Most of those portals and newsrooms from Belgrade mostly monitor from a distance and have no idea even about geographical areas,“ says Dimitrijević, adding:
„It’s just that we’re tougher nut to crack.“
Darko Dimitrijević is the editor-in-chief of Radio Goraždevac. He began his journalistic career in the tragic August 2003 marked when several children were killed in Bistrica in this very village.
He says that was the moment he realized how important it is to publish accurate information.
By coincidence, in the same year, the murder of a girl also took place in Peć, with attempts to inaccurately portray this tragedy also a consequence of ethnic violence in the conflicts with the Serbs in Goraždevac.
„If it wasn’t for Radio Goraždevac, maybe the Kosma network, this news probably would have concealed the first one. I realized that journalism would be my lifelong occupation and profession. Since then, I have dedicated my entire life to the journalistic calling,“ said our interlocutor.
Preuzimanje i objavljivanje tekstova sa portala KoSSev nije dozvoljeno bez navođenja izvora. Hvala na poštovanju etike novinarske profesije.
