Opinions & Interviews

MINSK, 12 July (BelTA) – Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko correctly identified the threats facing the modern mass media, Editor-in-Chief of the Ekho Moskvy radio station Aleksei Venediktov said during the breakout session of the 19th World Congress of Russian Press in Minsk on 12 July, BelTA has learned.

“I would like to get back to the statement made by President Lukashenko who set the tone and the topic of our meeting. I think Alexander Lukashenko correctly identified the threats that we are facing,” Aleksei Venediktov noted. According to him, amid the digital revolution and the development of social media, any person, not related to journalism and media, has a real opportunity to create his own information stream and publish things that he considers news. It is extremely difficult to control this stream, which in some respects can even outperform professional journalism. However, this destructive phenomenon can be dealt with using the most advanced and effective methods, he said. “I think that adding some professionalism to this trend is one of the ways to improve the reliability of such information from inside, Aleksei Venediktov noted.

He said that a couple of weeks ago he took a decision to create an editorial office for social media at the Ekho Moskvy radio station in order to publish quality and reliable information. He also noted that the number of the station’s Twitter subscribers (1.2 million) exceeds the daily number of listeners in Moscow and unique visitors to the site.

“If we do not confront this trend, if we fail to take hold of the situation, then it will overwhelm us,” Aleksei Venediktov said.

The 19th World Congress of Russian Press has brought together mass media representatives from 52 countries in Belarus.

The 19th World Congress of Russian Press is organized by the World Association of Russian Press (WARP), the Belarusian Information Ministry, and the World Russian Press Foundation.