Within the project, two rounds of public debates on observing ethical principles, the rights of privacy and presumption of innocence were held in Chisinau. Journalists, publishers, lawyers, press service officers, media experts, and other participants of the debars discussed specific cases of violation of the rules by journalists willing to upgrade the ranking of their newspaper or broadcast station, as well as the cases when law-enforcing authorities published erroneous information in their press releases. As a result of the debates, the Press Council of Moldova decided to hold joint thematic workshops for journalists and staff members of spokesman’s services.

A major component of the project was the International Conference “Observing the Presumption of Innocence and the Rights of Privacy” held in Chisinau on November 23-24, 2011. Representatives of journalistic self-regulatory structures from six countries – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine and Russia – took part in the Conference. The experts shared opinions regarding the problems faced by journalist self-regulation bodies in examination of complaints surging from information product consumers and the experience of interaction with mass media professionals in solving conflict situations related to the violation of the standards of journalist ethics. During the first day of the Conference the delegates were introduced to the practice of the Press Council of Moldova and afterwards exchanged comments on the solutions developed by the Council.

In late 2011, the Press Council published the book “Journalist Self-Regulation Practices in New Democracies” in English to distribute to the countries involved in the Conference. The Romanian language version of the book is available at the website of the Association of Independent Press of Moldova. Now the Russian version of the book is available for uploading (you can upload the English original and the Romanian version as well).