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Journalists had meetings with the leaders of political parties (Vlad Filat, Vladimir Voronin, Renato Usatii), President of Parliament Igor Corman, and Government officials. The agenda also included meetings with Pirkka Tapiola, head of the EU Delegation to Moldova; Dorin Chirtoaca, Mayor of Chisinau municipality; and representatives of the International Organization for Migration and of the Bureau for Diaspora Relations.
They also visited the Transnistrian region, where they met the minister for external affairs of the self-proclaimed republic, Nina Shtanski, and the region’s journalists and civil society representatives.
According to Mila Corlateanu, freelance journalist from Chisinau, who was responsible for the organization of this study visit, foreign journalists showed particular interest for the internal and external policies of our country, located between the East and the West. “During discussions, our guests wanted to learn about the reforms implemented in our country, about the vector of our external policy, about the problems with the export of Moldovan goods in the context of the European integration and introduction of the embargo by the Russian Federation, as well as about the position of the pseudo-authorities of the Transnistrian region in relation to the frozen conflict and the chances of its settlement in the future format of negotiations,” Mila Corlateanu told Media-Azi.
Oliver Bilger, German correspondent writing about Russia and the former Soviet countries, representing n-ost, believes that a single week is too little to know the real situation in a country like Moldova. “We found out a lot, but we must have missed lots of other things. I appreciate all the meetings we had with politicians, because they helped us find answers to numerous questions,” the journalist said.
For Dörthe Ziemer, freelance journalist from Germany, it was the first visit to Moldova. “It was a very productive week. I am grateful to organizers for the program we had. I hope that in the future I can benefit from more training opportunities, visits, etc. that n-ost offers to the journalists who are members of the Association.”
Her colleague Maya Kristin Schonfelder, also freelancer from Germany, expressed her regret with the fact that Moldova is a country that is little known in the West. “It was a pleasant surprise to discover that Moldova is no longer a part of the old Soviet system, but that it is a European country, with people who think freely. I would personally like to live for a while in a family, to know better how the representatives of different nations live, work and get along together.”
Study visits, conferences, training programs for journalists, scholarships and awards are just some of the projects of the n-ost organization, which is a network of correspondents for East Europe that aims at promoting the image of Central and East European countries in the German environment.
Participants in the study visit to Moldova, interested in the parliamentary elections of 30 November, will produce radio and TV materials, write articles for news agencies, electronic portals and print media, informing the public from the three countries (Germany, Switzerland and Austria) about what they saw, felt and experienced in our country during this visit.
