Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe
OSCE Centre in Almaty

Speech of the Head of the OSCE Centre in Almaty, Ambassador Ivar Vikki
at the presentation of results of the project 
«Master class on environmental journalism» 
7 April 2004, "Ceasar" movie theatre

Dear students,
Dear co-organizers,
Dear guests,

I am glad to welcome you all today at the closure of the Master class on environmental journalism that was conducted together by the OSCE Centre in Almaty, Ecological Press-Centre and Friedrich Ebert Foundation.

Let me introduce myself: my name is Ivar Vikki, I am Head of the OSCE Centre in Almaty. I arrived in Kazakhstan only three days ago, and it is a pleasure to me to be present at such an interesting event.  

I would like to briefly tell you about the goals and structure of the organization I work for. The main goal of the Organization for security and co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is support of stability in its 55 participating states, one of them being Kazakhstan. The work is done in three main dimensions: political-military, economic-ecological, and human. An important aspect of stability maintaining is informing of people on processes going on in the society, and journalists, of course, play a very important role in that. That is why the OSCE Centre in Almaty pays a lot of attention to projects assisting in development of journalism.

 Environmental journalism requires particular attention. Realization of importance of environmental issues increases in the world, and Kazakhstan is not an exception. As experience shows, it is absolutely necessary that not only state structures, but also ordinary citizens, people living in environmentally problematic areas took part in decision-making on environmental issues. However, for that they should be properly, timely and fully informed. 

Last year the OSCE Centre supported the Third Central-Asian environmental journalism festival-2003 organized by the Ecological Press-Centre. The idea to organize a master-class on environmental journalism appeared as a result of this Festival. My colleagues will tell you in a greater detail on these two projects. 

Today you will see the results of the Master-class – video feature stories prepared by participants of the Master-class. You will also be presented with Inter-active catalogues with summary of the Third Central-Asian Festival of environmental journalism-2003. The Inter-active CD-catalogues contain all works that received awards at the Festival in nominations of PRESS, RADIO and VIDEO

In conclusion you are cordially invited to a reception. 

Thank you for your attention!