Representatives from nine countries will attend an international conference from September 27 to 30, to mark the 20th anniversary of the Colombo Declaration on Media Freedom and Social Responsibility, organised by the Sri Lanka Press Institute (SLPI), and its constituent partners UNESCO and the Royal Norwegian Embassy.
The conference will also coincide with the UN-designated International Day for the Universal Access to Information (IDUAI).
The conference will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe on September 27. On September 28, the keynote address on IDUAI will be made by Speaker Karu Jayasuriya, followed by an address by RTI Commission Chairman Mahinda Gammanpila.
The working sessions will be held at the Cinnamon Grand and the Mount Lavinia Hotel and will be attended by local editors, publishers, journalists, academics and information technologists. Representatives from Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, Germany, India, Norway, Pakistan and the United Kingdom will be participating.
The 12 sessions that will cover the conference will include topics such as ‘Revisiting the Colombo Declaration of 1998’; ‘Regulating the media’; ‘Public service versus private broadcasting’, ‘The RTI and the way ahead’; ‘Truth and trust’: Fake news and media credibility’; ‘Contempt of court’; ‘Training and preparing for the future’; and the ‘Power of journalism’.
The last day will look at the achievements of the Colombo Declaration, take stock of what has been achieved, and map out the way ahead.
The international conference is supported by the media industry comprising The Editors’ Guild of Sri Lanka (TEGOSL), Free Media Movement (FMM), Sri Lanka Working Journalists Association (SLWJA), Newspaper Society of Sri Lanka (NSSL), Press Complaints Commission of Sri Lanka (PCCSL), Sri Lanka College of Journalists (SLCJ), WAN/IFRA, Commonwealth Media Trust, Committee for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ) and the International Press Institute (IPI).
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