The role of a journalist is to preserve history and pass on the reality to future generations, AGERPRES Director General Claudia Nicolae said at a cross-border conference as part of BTA's Europe on Balkans: Cohesion Skills project.
She said Bulgaria and Romania gradually began to understand that cultural and regional peculiarities will lead to other collaborations and common interests, as was the case with BTA and AGERPRES, both of which work for common interests and promote objective information.
Beyond the areas of interest that we are talking about today - research, education, cohesion, which actually tell us about our belonging to the EU and joining European policies - I think journalism is the main link that can, on the one hand, promote and encourage all these developments, and on the other hand, defend reliable information, added Nicolae.
If we can create a bridge between journalism, research and science, we can see the common goals very clearly and we will see very clearly in the future the footprint on each field, she concluded.
BTA Director General Kiril Valchev noted that April has a symbolic meaning for both countries, as the treaty for their EU accession was approved almost exactly 20 years ago by the European Parliament on April 13, 2005 and then signed on April 25, 2005 in Luxembourg. In April 2024, the air and water border controls between the two countries and the EU were abolished, before both countries were fully accepted in Schengen in 2025.
In his remarks, Valchev pointed out that the two agencies have been together in the European Alliance of News Agencies for years, and with the support of Agerpres, in September 2022 BTA became the headquarters of the Association of Balkan News Agencies - Southeast Europe (ABNA - SEE), in which 12 agencies participate.
Also attending the conference, Bulgarian Ambassador to Romania Radko Vlaykov said that the meaning of such projects, such as that of BTA, as well as the meaning of cooperation with agencies such as AGERPRES, is to resist the enormous power of the hybrid wars that are being waged against us, which aim to provoke Euroscepticism. "Fake news and manipulations can be answered with only one thing, the truth," the ambassador is quoted as saying, adding that this is where the huge role of the media and cooperation in the field of education and science between the two countries lies. Vlaykov also noted the traditionally good contacts between universities in Bulgaria and Romania, which have become much more intensive in recent years and are on very specific issues of the countries' contemporary development.
He emphasised that Romania is Bulgaria's second biggest trading partner and Bulgaria is in fourth to fifth place among Romania's trading partners. He also noted the importance of the admission of both countries to Schengen, adding that business is already feeling the free passage, which eliminates waiting times at the borders and reduces the cost of transportation.
The ambassador added that currently the best developing area of relations between the two countries is cooperation in the field of security and defence. He stated the importance of their cooperation in the Black Sea and recalled the initiative of Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey in the Black Sea Mine Countermeasures Task Group, as well as the importance of the role that the countries are about to play in restoring security and navigation in the Black Sea.
BTA's Europe on Balkans: Cohesion Skills project aims to raise public awareness and foster open dialogue about cohesion policy, local achievements, and the implementation of the EU's policy priorities.
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