1. The rapid development of telecommunications and media technologies has changed the very nature of the media. In both space and time they are becoming an integral part of events taking place. Live coverage itself has been transformed into a new event. Examples of this are the landing of US marines in Somalia and Haiti and the assault on the Beli dom and the Ostankino television station in Moscow.

2. Politicians have a powerful and crucial influence on the media in non-democratic regimes and unconsolidated democracies. In democratic societies politicians endeavour to influence the media as much as possible by spin-doctoring. On the other hand the media themselves are able to exert an increasingly decisive influence on the behaviour and decisions of politicians. My argument is that the media have no power of their own, but that their influence stems from modern methods of implementing specific policies: above all through the media, to a lesser extent in the parliament and in other arenas for political activities.

3. Commercialisation suppresses the diversity of programming, as well as programs related to minorities, alternative culture, and subcultures. TTh pursuit of higher audience ratings is reflected in news and current affairs reporting. News presentation, that selection of excerpts from reality presented by media to their audience is now characterised by the trivial, the bizarre and the scandalous. As a consequence of this hard news now occupies less space in the media. There is less willingness to cover the expenses of public service broadcasters which are now being forced into commercialisation. In the process, the public has the most to lose – it loses its sources of information.

Every single word has a life of its own in Yugoslavia:

• responsibility is non-existent: there is an absolute monopoly of a single family;
• inequality of the media: state-run media and pro-government media have much greater technical and financial capacity; independent media are subject to a repressive law and unequal treatment in the exercise of their basic rights;
• national conflicts have been a regular occurrence for most of the past decade, the authorities simply resolving one national conflict by generating another;
• guarantees of any sort are virtually impossible as there is no legality and everything is reduced to autocracy and the wilfulness of the narrow circle of people in power;
• the independent media have no choice but to cling to survival without the possibility of developing and establishing serious and strong alternatives to the state-controlled media'
• democracy and democratisation: these terms have been completely discredited by constant media manipulation and the false promotion of anti-democratic values as democratic.
• the regime uses the media as an army whose task is to thoroughly prepare the ground and then instigate and brutalise national conflicts;
• the isolation brought about by sanctions doubles their effect on the independent media: the flow of information decreases.

Because of the limitations imposed by commercialisation (Infotainment), worldwide information networks report superficially by creating stereotypes without seeking insights into conflict.

I believe that the public has no autonomy; public opinion on conflicts in remote countries is shaped largely according to the suggestions of political and other elites. Such opinion in turn influences politicians and governments to behave similarly, thus exacerbating the conflict or contributing to the emergence of new conflicts for which the most powerful partner is responsible, regardless of whether he is a tyrant or a criminal or takes a pro-democracy stance.

Commercialisation is a function of the regime's self-promotion and anti-cultural trends towards light entertainment and kitsch. Through a monopoly these impose themselves as the dominant cultural and social form.

Foreign commercial programs are most easily available to state-run media, as the state has substantial financial resources at its disposal. Consequently these programs are available to those who use the context of these shows to promote vilification, violence and intolerance.

Telecommunications are also firmly controlled by the repressive authorities. International telecommunications corporations cooperate with the regime through joint ventures. This represents direct assistance to the undemocratic regime (as seen in the purchase of 49 per cent of the state telecommunications company by Greek and Italian corporations immediately before the election, when the regime most needed money). This leads to restrictions in licensing resources to independent media, NGOs and so on.

The distribution of frequency licences is basically politically manipulated, which is tolerated despite international standards and regulations dealing with this issue.

Access to satellite distribution is also limited.

The Internet is frequently censored and the infrastructure which would allow a more serious commercial approach to the offering of Internet services is inaccessible.

The core program content of state-run and pro-government media is the promotion and endorsement of the interests of the oligarchy. This, of course, has nothing to do with the communal role of public media.

In contrast to the public state-run media, the independent professional media design their program content by taking the public interest into account.

B92 will celebrate its tenth anniversary this year - as will the authoritarian regime of Slobodan Milosevic. The basic concept of B92 was formulated through an analysis of past experience and in consideration of the needs of a society which is yet to enter the process of democratisation. Thus B92's programming is based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: simultaneously various freedoms and rights were exercised and there has been a constant struggle to ensure that these principles are observed and honoured. Because of this a number of similar projects have been initiated both in the media sphere and in the non-governmental sector. Avoiding the creation of its own monopolistic position, B92 has encouraged the development of local media and established a radio and television network presently consisting of 33 radio and 17 television stations. The use of modern technologies, primarily the Internet, has enabled us to bypass government censorship and bans (as in the case of B92 in 1996). Under the circumstances B92 was unable to function properly by operating only as a broadcaster. Thus various departments have been developed, radio programming, video production, music production and a cultural centre. B92 also established the first ISP (Internet Service Provider) in Yugoslavia, preventing a state monopoly and providing Internet access for the independent media and NGOs. Thus it is necessary to produce authentic programming and then to establish the infrastructure through the media highway (see the tables attached).

In order to ensure the success of this concept, it is necessary to implement the following projects.

1 The establishment of the media network within the country through professional and technical cooperation, solidarity and self-defence activity (the struggle for general principles).

2 The creation of a coalition of donors to systematically draw up independent media development projects and plans for the long term, and to monitor and support their development.

3 The creation of coalitions of international NGOs engaged in protecting the freedom of expression. (B92 has established an international committee - Free 2000 - which is active in international defence campaigns, exerting pressure on governments and international organisations.)

4 The establishment of a coalition of international organisations (the conference held in December 1998 under the auspices of the Secretary General of the Council of Europe and was decided to remain in continuous session).

The media do not generate political, national or other conflicts: they are able to intensify them or to attempt to contribute to their resolution, but journalists themselves have no decisive impact on either the deterioration or amelioration of such situations.

Radio B92, in addition to its professional practice, is also engaged in working on the theoretical foundations of this issue. In collaboration with the European Institute for the Media, B92 has published a study, Writing Death - The Media in Times of Conflict (Pisanje smrti - mediji u vremenima sukoba) by Dusan Reljic.

The experiences of B92 which have been confirmed by corresponding theoretical works include:

"The first lesson in an international media intervention in the conflict-plagued regions says: support must be provided from the beginning and in continuance. Dangerous tendencies like the "hate speech" and the authorities' interference in the activities of the independent print media must be taken as ominous signs of impending conflict". There are no simple formulae which could be applied to determine the potential of the media to actively engage in conflict resolution and the democratisation process. This must consist of a combination of activities:

• the above support should be provided from the very beginning, and continuously (not intermittently and too late - the European Union needed almost two years to act, which sometimes render the assistance itself counter-productive);
• support for the independent media cannot properly be implemented without broader assistance to civil sector development and to democratic institutions. (So that, for instance, the European Union cannot conduct a program of supporting independent media while at the same time excluding Yugoslavia from the PHARE program for the development of democracy);
• freedom of information must be a constituent part of every foreign affairs activity and cannot be relegated to the position of a minor issue;
• continuous and intensive training and development courses for editors, managers, journalists and technicians are of vital importance: professional training, conflict resolution programs, reporting on minorities, effective advertising activities...
• multiple education programs must be coordinated so that time and energy are no wasted through the redundant repetition of activities (ANEM has established strong coordination among various media initiatives in the field and preparations are under way to establish the European Media School with the assistance of the BBC, Deutsche Welle and Radio Hilversum);
• the development of local media guarantees the affirmation of distinctive regional features;
• support for new technologies - the Internet and satellite systems – is extremely important in the establishment of networks of local and regional activities; the Internet and satellite have removed boundaries and rendered censorship obsolete and ineffective, which is why they should be at the disposal of the independent media, enabling them to compete with state-controlled media and overcome government censorship;
• external media intervention through programs produced by VOA, BBC, RFE/RL, RFI and Deutsche Welle in various languages cannot be sufficiently effective as listeners always seek to detect the political interest of the country in which the broadcaster is based, however by collaborating in the development of the local media which would rebroadcast these programs it becomes possible to increase the flow of information and to develop a local infrastructure;
• the technical capacities of these international broadcasters must be at the disposal of local media to assist them in resisting government censorship (as in the cooperation of B92 and VOA in 1996) or a network should be established (as in the collaboration of B92 and BBC which assisted in the establishment of a network of 33 radio stations in Yugoslavia)
• other technical capacities must be identified for use in the process of conflict resolution (ANEM is currently negotiating with EbS for the use of their satellite channels to broadcast programming intended for Kosovo where at present there are no independent electronic media) - thus a system of "humanitarian frequencies" for assistance in conflict resolution and the development of independent media could be managed by organisations such as the OSCE;
• apart from financial aid, the economic effectiveness of independent media structures must also be enhanced in undemocratic countries which are plagued by national conflicts - this may be achieved by granting loans (which is already being done by the Media Development Loan Fund in New York); thus the economic independence of media organisations could be gradually achieved, integrating these in a natural way into the international economic system and rules of conduct;
• it is necessary to constantly monitor the operations of the media as a thorough analysis of reporting may provide serious warnings of impending conflict, at the same time professional guidance should be provided for the successful development of local independent media;
• it is also necessary to implement projects for raising awareness among all political bodies of the importance of journalism in the political process of democratisation (often the opposition does not understand the concept of independent media, seeing them instead as opposition media);
• encouragement for interlinking and networking media initiatives with progressive initiatives by civil movements, the non-governmental sector, educational institutions, minority organisations and so on, thus advancing and affirming universal principles.

The combination of all these activities, adjusted to a situation burdened with conflicts, may also correspond to the suggestion of Jamie Metzl in Foreign Affairs for the creation of "information and intervention units" which would engage in monitoring the information available in war-plagued regions, broadcasting pacifist programs and, "in extreme cases", jamming other broadcasts in order to suppress the hate propaganda and conflict provocation. Some of these initiatives have already been examined and implemented during the first ten years of Radio B92 and the Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM) - which is now being held up as a possible model for other conflict-plagued regions.

Only those initiatives which have taken root and become an integral part of the social fabric of area in conflict stand a chance of yielding satisfactory results: initiatives from outside would surely fail as they can never do more than mimic local cultural patterns, this mimicry is obvious to the local community and the information it carries is disregarded. The only thing the international community should do is to closely cooperate with those individuals and organisations which are implementing local political, cultural and media initiatives in order to help the civil structures in the society to win power.