Peace Maker Journalism, Beyond Reporting - Introduction Session

"Peacemaker is a global movement built up by young people of many groups from different countries, cultures and regions who fight for global justice and peace. Peacemakers fight global injustices and policies that are unfavorable and unjust."

Peacemaker journalism is one of the important elements within the peacemaker programme. Introduction session to this novel topic was organized by the Born to Win Relationships together with YMCA of Pamunugama on 17 September, 2021 via zoom from 7 - 8 pm. There were 18 interested individuals including journalists and activists attended the event 

Mr. Fredrik Glad-Gjerns the director of Y Global of Norway participated the event as the resource person to introduce the concept. Mr. Fredrik has been giving leadership to the Peace Maker movements from its birth. During his sharing Mr. Fredrik mentioned that "information plays a vital role in peace making and fighting for justice. Peace maker journalism goes beyond just reporting an incident. It is about reporting on injustice and exploitations from the perspective of victims. It is supposed to pave the way and create the opportunities for action for peace and justice." 

Mr. Evan also joined from Tanzania to share his ground experiences on peacemaker journalism specially around the exploitations by multinational mining companies in Tanzania. Mr, Evan also mentioned the important ground rules that journalists should follow when engaging in peacemaker journalism such as authenticity of the information.

Both resource persons shared the importance of understanding of the ground situation and local contexts to secure the safety of peacemaker journalists since the peace maker journalism can be visible as offending towards the perpetrators and people who are corrupter with power. 

It was an interactive session with comments and questions from participants. Mr. Dileepa of BTWR facilitated the meeting. YMCA of Pamunugama together with Born to Win Relationships are looking forward to explore more on the concept and to build-up a network for peacemaker activities and peacemaker journalism.

Note: Those who are interested to read more about the session a detailed report will be available soon and send us a mail to pamunugama_icy@yahoo.com or arunathushari@gmail.com. We will forward it to you.