(ANSA) - TIRANA - Famous entrepreneurs and industrialists who concentrate in their hands many of the media, usually the most widespread and incisive on the formation of public opinion; a plurality of subjects still strongly conditioned by a few public funds; exercise of the profession influenced by pressures put by by publishers and lobbies, when not threatened by crime. This is the current scenario of journalism in the Western Balkans, which was outlined during the two-day 12th edition of the South East Europe Media Forum (SEEMF), an annual event organized by South East Europe Media Organization (SEEMO), Central European Initiative (CEI) and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS), and held in Tirana in 2018.

The press freedom and the media credibility, the transparency in the ownership of newspapers and TV and radio stations, the independence of journalism take a long time and radical reforms to achieve the EU standards. However, there are many courageous independent initiatives that, despite the lack of funding and despite pressures, continue to arise.

Dozens of journalists' speeches (including the European Federation of Journalists, Reporters without Borders, ANSA, CBS Italy, European Post) and experts or connoisseurs of the area (such as Nato StratCom, Intesa Sanpaolo Bank Albania), expressed their concern in some cases, being the press also an indicator of social structure and democracy.

Many speakers cited numerous episodes of death threats made to journalists and journalistic inquiries into corruption or the illegal use of public funds are being conducted in situations of great physical danger. Even for this reason, in the context of the awards presented, all to courageous reporters, a special tribute was paid to the Slovak journalist Jàn Kuciaka, who was killed last February 21st along with his girlfriend, Martina Kusnìrovà. Given that the latter occurrence relates to security, the lack of available public funds is often partially resolved through the use of crowdfunding, which however involves different sorts of problems.

It is no coincidence that Albania's president, Ilir Meta, spoke in his speech opening the Forum, of ''free and independent journalism as one of the pillars of democracy'', criticizing fake news, a phenomenon that can be isolated and averted, only by a high ''professional level of journalism''. This latter activity can make a strong contribution to the growth process which has begun in the Western Balkans, 'nourishing' public opinion with two values, ''collaboration and reconciliation, avoiding the language of hatred''.

Moreover, the issue of free trade and open markets, whose dynamics are more and more complex. TV audience wants to watch events and made-for-TV videos, said Natalia Gumenyuk, head and co-founder of Ukrainian Hromadske TV, but in many cases the production cost is unaffordable. The potential of the social media is still largely unknown, but we need to rely on deontology, in order to distinguish ourselves from with the numerous people who post news in the network without getting them verified. ''Credibility - underlined Adelheid Feilcke, head of Germany's Deutsche Welle in the Western Balkans - is today more important than ever'', hoping for ''solidarity against all forms of threats'' and ''joining forces'' in the event of major investigations.

Finally, a peculiar aspect was underlined by Nico Pitrelli, communication manager of ESOF2020 Trieste: ''The circulation of knowledge, especially in scientific fields, has more to do with democracy; in the discussion about fake news, the independence of journalism and the so-called post-truth. Understanding what is the relationship between power and knowledge and how politics can influence the production of knowledge and decide to finance research is really crucial'' . The 13th SEEMF will take place in Zagreb, announced Oliver Vujovic (Seem), Barbara Fabro (CEI) and Hendrik Sittig (Konrad Adenauer Stiftung). the initiative's organisers.(ANSA).