Albania

WHEN THE MEDIA USE TERRORIST TROPES: The Coverage of Dine Hoxha Attack in Albania

On 19 April 2021, a young man entered the “Dine Hoxha” mosque in Tirana, the capital of Albania, and injured five people by stabbing them. According to testimonies by his family members, the man used to attend prayers in the mosque frequently after he had converted to Islam. During the coverage of the incident by …

“HATE SLAVS” – HATE SPEECH IN THE BALKANS

Hate speech is commonplace in public discourse in the Balkans Offensive language, insinuations, labelling, presenting false information about people in public discourse with no holds barred, whether it is the media or the assembly i.e., in public debates, or in messages on social media and other public platforms, has become more the norm than an …

HATE SPEECH IN THE WESTERN BALKANS: Monthly Monitoring Highlights

Throughout April, RDN monitoring team has detected diverse type of hateful narratives. This month we will have a country spotlight including five Western Balkans countries. Roma in North Macedonia: Hate speech from high school teacher on International Roma Day A teacher at the economic high school in Tetovo made offensive comments on her Facebook account …

BALKAN TROLL OF THE MONTH: Tahir Batatini, Kosovo Football Coach

The Balkan Troll of the Month is an individual, a group of individuals or a media outlet that spreads hate on the internet based on gender, ethnicity, religion, or other diversity categories. The Balkan Troll is selected based on hate speech incidents identified across the Western Balkans region. Our April Troll is Kosovo football coach …

HATE SPEECH DURING THE ELECTION CAMPAIGN IN ALBANIA

On 25 April, Albania had its parliamentary elections and the current Prime Minister, Edi Rama is set to win as preliminary results show. However, the focus of this article is not the political environment or the results of the elections but what happened during the electoral campaign. By looking at the rhetoric of all sides …

“YOUNG&DIVERSE” PODCAST WITH SELMA SELMAN – “I have to serve as a role model and that means that I cannot fail”

Selma Selman is an artist from Bosnia and Herzegovina. She incorporates her creativity, but also identity aspects into her artwork. Being part of a Roma family that earns their living from collecting and selling iron, Selma uses iron and reusable materials in her art. In her show Mercedes Matrix breaks a Mercedes car with the …

Monthly Monitoring Highlight: Ethnic hate speech and narratives of divide

Throughout March, Reporting Diversity Network monitoring team has detected several incidents related to xenophobia and hate speech based on ethnicity in the Western Balkan media. Hate speech was spread by politicians, influential figures, and other public figures. While there is a consistency in spreading hateful rhetoric targeting migrants and refugees, media representation of the Roma …

BALKAN TROLL OF THE MONTH: Ivan Ivanovic, a TV Host from Serbia

SEXISM IN THE WESTERN BALKANS: Monthly monitoring highlight

Throughout February, Reporting Diversity Network’s monitoring team discovered more than 20 incidents related to sexist and misogynist narratives across Western Balkan media that targeted female politicians, journalists and other public figures, perpetuated rape victim-blaming and placed women on usual margins of media reporting and society. Although we looked at other diversity categories as well, sexism …