Opinions & Interviews

BelTA director highlights responsible role of journalists

Irina Akulovich

MINSK, 15 December (BelTA) - Journalists have a great responsibility, Director General of BelTA news agency Irina Akulovich told the media ahead of the 30th meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State News Agencies which is set to take place in Minsk on 15 December, BelTA has learned.

The BelTA head stressed that the President Hotel hosted the Meeting of the Heads of Security Bodies and Intelligence Services of the CIS member states the day before. “It is very symbolic that yesterday’s meeting here highlighted the issues of protection of state security of the CIS countries. The meeting participants discussed the ways to preserve the CIS. Before that, the meeting participants met with the head of state. The president was very clear in outlining the tasks that today face absolutely all services in our countries, including the importance of information security,” Irina Akulovich said.

According to her, journalists are literally on the front line. “Huge forces and huge funds are used to destroy the CIS, to destroy the ties that have developed between us over many years. Human, economic, political ties. Journalists have a very big responsibility to preserve these ties. Today we need to preserve the CIS. We need this Council for that,”  the director general said. She added that the meeting would highlight the problems, the general agenda and the future steps.

“We need to be more attentive to each other's agenda, to all integration processes. We should cover, search for and create information occasions, do absolutely everything possible to preserve the CIS in the information space,” Irina Akulovich said.

Heads of the CIS state news agencies are set to discuss the areas of cooperation in 2024, the results of the main CIS events in 2023 and the key events of the CIS in 2024, the progress of projects of the CIS Council of Heads of State News Agencies. Among the issues on the agenda are the international cooperation of the AZERTAC agency within the framework of the Alliance of Turkic News Agencies (ATNA), the experience of cooperation with the national Delphic Councils and the International Delphic Committee in covering the Delphic Games, coverage of the events related to giving Samarkand the CIS Capital of Culture status in 2024, and Tashkent - the CIS Capital of the Youth.

According to Irina Akulovich, the council was initiated by the BelTA news agency. “We wanted our colleagues to come to Minsk in December, because BelTA turns 105 on 23 December. This is a very beautiful, bright history of the agency, which has been working in the interests of its country, writing the chronicle of its country in photos, letters, videos,” she said. “We want to come together. On the one hand, to talk about BelTA, on the other hand, to discuss our plans. But first of all, to do absolutely everything to preserve the CIS. Today it is extremely necessary. The world is changing, the world is becoming different, it is fragile. The president rightly says that we should all work for one task.”

Director General of the Russian TASS news agency Andrei Kondrashov and BelTA Director General Irina Akulovich

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