Death of a young journalist casts a shadow over the first training session within the Syrian Media Incubator

Next week, Mohammed was supposed to participate in the first training session organised in the Syrian Media Incubator, which CFI has just opened in Gaziantep. The whole CFI team was saddened to hear this tragic news.

Since the beginning of the conflict in March 2011, Syria has had a shortage of independent journalists to cover the life of the Syrian people. The members of the international and Syrian media attempting to report the news in Syria are currently operating under extreme and dangerous conditions. CFI has decided to support several initiatives created by Syrian journalists who are trying to provide the remaining population in Syria with free, high-quality information.

During one week, from 16 to 22 September, 13 Syrian journalists, 7 of whom are female, will be trained in the production of multimedia content adapted for the Internet. They will also benefit from training dedicated to producing a report, drawing on the different forms of media and their complementarity. It is a question of citizens getting involved, journalists working on the Internet, the television, the radio or in print media. This initiative is being carried out together with the Syrian Female Journalists Network.

A media incubator to reinforce the role of the independent Syrian media

This training will take place in Gaziantep in Turkey, near the Syrian border, within the Syrian Media Incubator, which has just been opened by CFI thanks to European Union funding.

This new centre provides Syrian media professionals with technical equipment (studio, editing room, etc.) and will hold over 15 two-week training courses over the next 18 months, in Arabic, for almost 200 journalists. The objective is to reinforce the role of the Syrian media in the production and dissemination of reliable and balanced information, and to train a new generation of journalists to operate at a professional level.

"How can we not spare a thought for the courage of Mohammed Alqasim and the other Syrian citizens that are involved, many of whom have already come to receive training on rudimentary journalism techniques with CFI for a few days and have gone back home in order to tell the world about this civil war. The death of this young journalist once again shows how dangerous and difficult it is to do this job in Syria. With the Media Incubator, CFI has made a long-term commitment to these young citizen journalists who embody the Syria that we love."
Étienne Fiatte, Managing Director of CFI.