The Annual Meeting of the Southeast Europe Coalition on Whistleblower Protection (Coalition), co-hosted by the Centre for the Development of Youth Activism CROA, a member of the Coalition from Bosnia and Herzegovina, was held in Sarajevo on Friday, February 3, 2023 with the support of RAI Secretariat.

The Annual Meeting was opened with remarks delivered by Minister of Justice and Administration and Acting Prime Minister of Sarajevo Canton Darja Softic Kadenic, Head of RAI Secretariat Desislava Gotskova and Legal Advisor and Project Cooridinator at the co-host CROA Alma Fejzic.

The Annual Meeting serves as a platform for discussion of common challenges, strategies and solutions for improving the protection of whistleblowers, as well as on how to best utilize the Coalition resources.

This was also an opportunity to celebrate success through among other things the granting of the Free Speech Awards and sharing lessons learned. Winners that were granted the Free Speech Award for this year are: Amila Tatarević (Baby Steps), Rubina Čengić (journalist) Maida Bilal (Fondacija Krug života, Kruščica), The Center for Investigative Reporting (CIN), Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN). The awards are given for activist efforts, engagement in the public interest and contribution to transparency within their community in 2022.

The Coalition Annual Meeting was organized under the auspices of the regional project ‘Breaking the Silence: Enhancing the whistleblowing policies and culture in Western Balkans and Moldova’, which is funded by the European Union and implemented by the RAI Secretariat. The Annual Meeting gathered representatives of civil society organizations from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Kosovo*, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia.

This article first appeared in rai-see.org

February 3, 2023