INDEPENDENT MEDIA CENTRE KURDISTAN

,,We need a credible media'', said the Kurdish prime minister Nerchirvan Barzani at the opening of the new Kurdish newsagency AK. ,,Independent media have to strenghten democracy.'' It was for the first time the Kurdish PM showed his strong support for independent media in the north of Iraq. He criticized the role of media that let themselves be manipulated to deform information. Kurdistan needs an independent newsagency to inform the people, and to show the world what is happening there, was his message. In the past Kurds have suffered from media that distorted the facts. ,,That's why it took so long in the 80's for news on the genocide in Kurdistan to reach the world.'' AK is an independent Kurdish newsagency, that operates in Kurdish, Arabic and English from Irbil, the capital of the Kurdish region of Iraq. The IMCK has helped AK by offering training to the staff since June 2008.

Thirteen Kurdish journalists started November 15 in Irbil on a three day training on text editing. The training was organised by IMCK together Kurdistan Journalist Syndicate in Irbil and the Kurdish Organisation for Civil Development. The training will teach experience journalists how to edit the texts of their colleagues, before they are printed. This should help to make Kurdish newspapers more attractive and stories and newsitems more reliable. The participants are from different print media in Irbil, both partymedia and (semi-) independent. The trainers are Judit Neurink (director IMCK and senior trainer) and Khidr Domle (freelance journalist and trainer for IMCK).

Pictures from Najaf were shown on November 11 in Irbil. The exhibition will be in Sulaymaniya from November 15. IMCK made this first personal exhibition of Alaa al-Marjani 's possible. After attending the photo journalism course of Eddy van Wessel, his exhibition was opened of pictures from daily life in Najaf, of displaced Iraqi's and of mass graves in the South of Iraq. Al-Marjani publishes for AP.