ETHIO-Dutch Journalists International Conference-2006
Foundation for Ethiopia Information and Documentation in the Netherlands
PRESS RELEASE 1
(10&11 June 2006 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands)
May 3, 2006 — We are happy to announce on this pleasant anniversary of the May-3 World Press Day, that a two-day joint conference and workshops of Ethiopian and Netherlands Journalists will be held on the 10 &11, June 2006 in De Balie, Kleine-Gartmanplantsoen 10, in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
The two-day-International Conference is organized by the Foundation for Ethiopian Information and Documentation in the Netherlands, FEIDIN, in cooperation with the Dutch Journalists Union, NVJ, and PRESS NOW, a Dutch organization supporting independent media.
The ever-worsening situations regarding the independent media in Ethiopia calls for an immediate action to fill the frightening information gap which is created when the autocratic regime in power there, closed down all the free press of Ethiopia and imprisoned more than 20 journalists that it could lay hands on.
The conference, in the process of its deliberation, is expected to seek and to propose an Independent Alternative Media, to serve in place of the state-silenced Independent Press in Ethiopia.
The main objective of the conference is to bring representatives of Ethiopian Free Press Journalists in exile in all corners of the globe on to a joint forum in Amsterdam with their Dutch counterparts unionized in the NVJ, and international Media and Human rights Organizations, to review the current media situations in Ethiopia.
Representatives of other professional organizations, friends of Ethiopian Free Press, individuals working on both electronics and print media, and supporters of the aims and objectives of the Ethiopian Free Press Journalists, are also entitled to attend the conference.
The conference is sponsored, among others, by such Dutch funding organizations as the International Cooperation for Sustainable Development, NCDO, Oxfam Novib and Cordaid Foundation.
Journalists and other invited experts shall address the conference and the workshops on relevant topics of press freedom and the rights of journalists in general, and of Ethiopian journalists, in particular.
The June 10 session of the conference is open to the invited journalists, and media organizations only, while the Sunday, the 11th June session, is open to all invited guests and to the general public. The language of the conference and of the workshops is English, but the Sunday public session may also proceed in Amharic. Ethiopian and Dutch chairpersons moderate the main conference jointly.
– P.O.Box 93530, 1090 EA Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Tel. +31 (20) 4650161 Mob. +31 (6) 41 22 11 84 E. [email protected]