Category: Trainers and panelists

Anuška Delić

Anuška Delić, is an investigative and data journalist with Slovenia’s main daily newspaper Delo.

She has investigated a variety of issues from asbestos on state-owned train infrastructure and abuses of election campaign law, to Slovenia’s own anabolic steroid king Mihael Karner.

At the end of 2011 she uncovered that leaders of the Slovenian branch of worldwide neo-Nazi organization Blood&Honor were actively involved in the ranks of leading right-wing party. As a direct consequence of her articles, Delić was charged with publishing classified information, charges that were dramatically dropped by state prosecutors minutes before judgement. Subsequently, the Slovenian government changed the article of Criminal Code relating to publication of state secrets.

In 2015 she started The MEPs Project. She gathered journalists representing all 28 EU Member States who filed requests for access to documents of the European Parliament that show how Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) spend the professional allowances they receive on top of their paychecks. Journalists were refused access, and thus filed complaints against the European Parliament with the European Court of Justice. Cases are pending. The group launched its first investigation in May 2017, which revealed how some MEPs abused their allowance, and includes a search facility for readers to check the filings of their local MEP.

In 2015 and 2016 Delić – also a partner of OCCRP – worked on ICIJ’s Panama Papers investigation which brought her and more than ten colleagues at Delo the highest journalistic award in Slovenia: the Slovene Association of Journalists’ Watchdog Award for Extraordinary Achievements.

Twitter: @007_delic

Ruth Rosenberg

Ruth Rosenberg is an independent consultant and advisor on a wide range of human trafficking issues, providing management for implementation of projects, advising government policy, undertaking research, evaluations and assessments and designing and giving training courses.  

Ruth has conducted training for a wide range of audiences including law enforcement, social workers, policy makers and others. Ruth is the author of a number of reports including Promising Approaches – Addressing Child Trafficking in Europe and Eurasia, Trafficking of Adult Men in the Europe and Eurasia Region, Best Practices for Programming to Protect and Assist Victims of Trafficking in Europe and Eurasia, Best Practices for Programming to Prevent Trafficking in Human Beings in Europe and Eurasia, Shelter Assessment for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Lawrence Marzouk

Lawrence Marzouk is a journalist and editor with Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Kosovo. He has worked as a journalist for a decade, writing and editing for major regional newspapers in Britain, and contributing news, investigations and features to national British newspapers.  

He helped his first paper to national awards with his editing of the coverage of July 2005 London bombings.

Lawrence has been shortlisted twice for regional reporter of the year awards for his work uncovering scandals in the British public sector, including serious conflicts of interests and lavish spending by state institutions, exposed by documents obtained under the Freedom of Information act.

Since 2009, he has worked for Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Kosovo, editing its English-language newspaper Prishtina Insight and launching a new investigative journalism portal, Gazeta Jeta ne Kosove.

His investigations into high-level corruption have led to international and local criminal probes, including against serving ministers.

In 2010 and 2011, he won best anti-corruption investigation of the year at awards organised by the UN Development Programme.

Lawrence is the author of the manual Follow the Paper Trail, a guide to document-based investigative journalism in Kosovo.

He is currently involved in various projects making data more accessible in Kosovo, including scraping public databases, and encouraging the use of Freedom of Information laws through workshops.

Tamara Causidis

Tamara Causidis – is a freelance journalist and an activist for press freedom.  She is the president of the Trade Union of Macedonian Journalists and Media Workers (SSNM).

Causidis began her journalist career in 1988 as a reporter for Macedonian National Radio. She later became a news anchor and editor and in May 2001, joined the South Slavic department of Radio Free Europe. She worked as a correspondent during the ethnic conflict in Macedonia and became a permanent member of the Macedonian department of Radio Free Europe in September 2001. Causidis was also an editor in the Macedonian BIRN office and a producer and editor at ALSAT-M TV, the only bilingual media in Macedonia.

During her career, she became involved in promoting professional standards, human rights and press freedom issues in Macedonia. She was elected President of the Council of Honor at the Macedonian Journalists Association from 2006-2009. She is also a co-author of the Journalism Ethics Manual.

As the president of SSNM, she is involved in promoting professional standards as a precondition for press freedom.

Vuk Djuricic

Before he became a spokesman for the Bureau for Combating Corruption and Organized Crime (USKOK) in 2008, he worked as a professional journalist at the newspaper Slobodna Dalmacija in Split, Croatia. 

In addition to being a journalist, he was a columnist, deputy editor in chief and chief editor for the correspondence office in Zagreb. He completed his Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb.

 

 

German Filkov

German Filkov is an analyst and researcher in anticorruption and institutional transparency and has trained more than 250 journalists in investigative journalism and corruption reporting. 

He spent 12 years as a TV business journalist and news editor where he reported daily on important socio-economic changes in Macedonia for the highest rated TV station in the country.  He now uses his wealth of experience in media for civil society work.  Filkov has conducted extensive research that addresses measures to be taken by central and local governments to reduce corruption. He also regularly participates in designing anti-corruption initiatives and strategies.  Due to his expertise, Filkov has been invited to a number of regional and international workshops and conferences, to train leaders and organizations in good governance, anti-corruption methodology, and journalism.  In 2002-2003, he held the Hubert Humphrey Fellowship as a visiting scholar at the Missouri School of Journalism.  In 2005, he co-founded the Center for Civil Communications, one of the leading anticorruption NGOs in the country.

Vladan Joler

Vladan Joler is Associate Professor and Chair of New Media Department at the University of Novi Sad, Serbia.

Joler is also the director of the SHARE Foundation. Share Foundation, nonprofit organization that is dedicated to protecting the rights of Internet citizens and promoting positive values of openness, decentralization, free access and exchange of knowledge, information and technology. The activities of Share Foundation are supported by cooperation and friendship with a wide network of various institutions, individuals and organizations.

Jeta Xharra

Country Director, Kosovo
Editor-in-Chief

Jeta Xharra is a renowned journalist in Kosovo and the Balkans.

Since 2005, she has been the Country Director of the BIRN office in Kosovo and the editor-in-chief of Kosovo’s most-watched current affairs TV programme, Life in Kosovo.

Xharra first got into journalism by working as a fixer/local producer for BBC News and Channel 4 in 1998 and later became Manager of the BBC Kosovo Bureau. In 1999, she worked for BBC News in Albania and Macedonia.

She graduated with an MA in War Studies from King’s College London (2000) and an MA with Distinction in Screenwriting from the London College of Printing (2002).

She has published a front-page article in The Independent and other articles in The Economist, Sunday Telegraph and Jane’s Intelligence Review. While in the UK, Xharra worked for the Foreign News Planning Desk at the BBC World Service.

In 2003, Xharra became Project Director for the IWPR Kosovo office, where she made an impact with her vigilant and challenging moderation of popular current affairs programmes broadcast on the main Kosovo TV channels, RTK and KTV.

Under Xharra’s supervision, Kosovo was the first office in the IWPR Balkan project to develop a three-month journalism training programme, which attracted over 200 people for 20 places.

Warless, a play that Xharra wrote in English, was chosen as one of the 10 best plays among 550 that competed in the Young Writers Festival at the Royal Court Theatre in London, where it had a public reading on December 10 2004.

Summer School of Investigative Reporting 2025 Session

From Exposure to Impact: Why Some Investigations Spark Change and Others Don’t

This session will explore the key factors that determine whether investigative stories lead to real-world change, examining case studies, strategies for maximizing impact, and the role of timing, storytelling, and stakeholder engagement.

Don Ray

Don Ray is a multi-media producer, writer, author, journalist and lecturer. He began his television journalism career as a researcher with the investigative news team Unit 4 at KNBC-TV, now NBC4, in Burbank, California in 1978.

In 1980 he worked as a news writer, insert producer and assignment editor there before moving to the Phoenix-area public broadcast station, KAET-TV, in Tempe, Arizona, as a producer/director/reporter for the programs “Arizona Weekly” and “Horizon”.

In 1981, he wrote and produced “Close-up Buscaglia,” and conducted an in-depth, one-on-one interview with the popular educator and author, Leo Buscaglia. Ray returned to Los Angeles in 1982 where he was a news writer for KNXT-TV, now KCBS-TV, in Hollywood.

The following year, Ray produced investigative segments for KCAL-TV in Hollywood. In 1987, Ray returned to KCBS-TV as an investigative producer for the investigative news team Channel 2 Investigations, where he won top writing and investigative reporting awards.

In 1989 Ray opened an independent production company, ENG Productions, where he provided investigative research, writing, videography and production assistance for all of the major networks.

Ray broke the story with KNBC-TV of the child molestation investigation by police of rock star Michael Jackson in 1993. In 1995, Ray produced television segments for “The Crusaders” and “Inside Edition.” Ray was a segment producer with Dateline NBC’s two-hour special on Michael Jackson in 2004. Also that year, he conducted many of the on-camera interviews for the documentary “One Six Right” (2004).

Currently, Ray is producing independent documentaries.

www.donray.com

Drew Sullivan

Drew Sullivan is a journalist and media development specialist who has worked for almost a decade in Eastern Europe and Eurasia

He founded the Center for Investigative Reporting in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 2004 and served as its editor and first director before the center became an independent, locally run organisation.

He is the advising editor for the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Program, an organisation he founded together with a consortium of centers, media outlets and reporters from a dozen countries.

He founded the Journalism Development Network, an innovative media development organization with programmess in Eastern Europe and Eurasia.

He was a reporter or editor on work that won the Online Journalism Award for investigative reporting, the first ever Global Shining Light Award, The Tom Renner Award for crime reporting, the Overseas Press Club award and many other prizes.

He worked as an investigative reporter for the Tennessean newspaper in Nashville and for the Special Assignment Team of the Associated Press in New York. He has served on the board of directors for Investigative Reporters and Editors and the National Institute for Computer Assisted Reporting.

He has a degree in Aerospace Engineering and worked for six years on the Space Shuttle project for Rockwell Space Systems. He spent one year as a professional stand-up comedian.

http://cima.ned.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/CIMA-Libel_Tourism-Report.pdf