Let's Pin Down the Headline at the Neighbour's! November 2013 - Turkey

A group of 7 journalists from Armenia visited Turkey from October 31st to November 6th 2013 as part of the Turkey-Armenia Journalists’ Dialogue Programme, organized by the Hrant Dink Foundation with the support of Heinrich Böll Stiftung Turkey Office and the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In this year’s edition, 3 Armenian journalists from France, Lebanon and the USA did also take part in the programme.

In the fifth year of the programme, which aims at strengthening ties between journalists from Turkey and Armenia and helping to establish direct means of exchanging news sources, 7 participants from Armenia were selected out of 55 applicants and were invited to Turkey to take part in a one-week programme in Istanbul and Diyarbakır to gain a better understanding of the country.

Journalists and reporters from Armenian Public Radio, Armnews TV, Aztag Daily, Civil Net, Jnews.am, Media.am, Multimedia Kentron TV, Hetq, Nor Haratch and The Armenian Weekly, paid their first ever visits to Turkey and found out about Turkey as well as the current situation of media and journalists in the country.

The journalists entered the newsrooms of media outlets such as CNN Türk, T24, Zaman, and had the chance to meet their colleagues and discuss bilateral relations and the state of media. They paid visits to Heinrich Böll Stiftung, and got informed about the state of civil society in Turkey following the Gezi protests. Meeting with the members of Taksim Platform was another occasion to understand how the Gezi movement started. As part of the one-week programme the group also visited the Agos newspaper, Aras Publishing, Getronagan High School and Gedikpaşa Armenian Church and received information about the Armenians in Turkey. They were able to learn about the mandate of the Permanent Representation of Republic of Armenia to BSEC - Black Sea Economic Cooperation in Istanbul from the Head of the Mission Michael Vardanian.

To get a deeper insight into political and human rights developments in Turkey participants met in person with Diyarbakır Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Osman Baydemir and the Mayor of Sur District Abdullah Demirbaş in Diyarbakır, and received in-depth information about the dynamics of the region. During their stay in Diyarbakır the group also visited the recently renovated Surp Giragos Church, the largest Armenian church in the Middle East, as well as Mor Yakup Church and learnt about the story of Armenian and Syriac community of Diyarbakır. Meeting with the editor of Özgür Haber in Diyarbakır provided the group insights about the local newspapers in Turkey. The farewell dinner offered by the Mayor of Sur District included leading figures of the city from the bar associations, business associations, architect chambers and recorded a unique conversation on how to come to terms with the past and how to ensure co-existence in the future.

The group also witnessed the opening of the historic conference on Islamized Armenians organised by the Hrant Dink Foundation on 2-4 November, 2013 and met the participants of the AGBU Goriz Seminar 2013 at Boğaziçi University to share their experience and impressions.

Photos: Erhan Arık

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