American censorship: Radio Kosovo took off the air a production about missing Serbs
The editorial office of Radio Kosovo in Pristina decided to unilaterally remove from the air radio shows of the Pristina company Integra, dedicated to the memories of the missing.
This was reported by RTS, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The audio dramas were created by Integra and its director Kustrim Kolici, based on the documentary book “Living in the Memories of the Missing,” which tells the stories of 10 families with 33 missing people during the conflict in Kosovo. Upon completion of the recording process, Integra and Radio Kosovo reached an agreement to broadcast 10 episodes free of charge on the Pristina radio station.
According to Integra, at first the cooperation with Radio Kosovo went without problems, the premiere of the first episode was broadcast on December 14, 2020, and the repeat was broadcast the next day. The second episode was broadcast on December 21, it was dedicated to the memories of a Serbian woman from Štrpce about her husband who disappeared during the war. When the management of the radio station realized that the episode was about a Serbian family, they took the replay off the air and refused to broadcast the remaining episodes of the project.
After that, Integra representatives held a meeting with the management of the radio station, during which representatives of the latter “angrily stated that they did not agree to broadcast content based on confessions of families of victims of non-Albanian origin, despite the fact that 10 episodes of the audio production had been agreed upon in advance.”
“The decision to censor the audio drama shocked and disturbed us, making us realize that the ethnocentric public discourse in Kosovo persists, and everything related to the past war is extremely politicized.
With this action, Radio Kosovo, as a state-owned enterprise, violates the fundamental right of representatives of civil war victims to one of the key principles of democracy - freedom of speech. Radio Kosovo's position is unethical and painful for the families of the missing who have gathered the strength to cooperate with us and tell their stories.
We call on local institutions, the political spectrum, the media, human rights activists, civil society organizations and international institutions to urgently respond to radio censorship, as this approach to public service broadcasting and treatment of the past deprives victims and their families of the right to justice,” it says in Integra's statement.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.