OSCE, Astana, 27 Feb 2009 – The OSCE Centre in Astana supported training courses held today for journalists and police press officers to improve communication between the media and law-enforcement agencies.
Journalists from major national media outlets and regional law enforcement press officers learned about legal and ethical aspects, as well as effective and professional co-operation. The journalists learned police terminology and police press officers learned how to organize a good press conference and how to write perfect press releases.
“One of the major components of democracy is transparency and openness of the state institutions, including law enforcement,” said Ambassador Alexandre Keltchewsky, Head of the Centre. “The Centre supports initiatives that aim to improve the access to information.”
Alexander Savankov, a Kazakh Vice-Minister of Interior, said: “The Kazakh Ministry of Interior conducts the open information policy and is accessible to media and civil society. In this regard, one of the priority areas is to build a new model of communication with the public, including strengthening co-operation with media and non-governmental organizations.”
After separate seminars, the press officers and the journalists, together with representatives of non-governmental organizations, discussed matters related to lack of interaction between them and agreed on further co-operation.
The event, organized by the North-Kazakhstan Legal Media Centre with support from the OSCE Centre in Astana and Friedrich Ebert Foundation, is a follow up to the Centre’s activities on raising the transparency of police through interaction with media.
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