Conference on the future of Belarusian journalism opens in Vilnius

On Sep­tem­ber 16, the Lithuan­ian cap­i­tal host­ed the open­ing of the con­fer­ence “Belaru­sian Jour­nal­ism: Where Tomor­row Begins.”  This year, the gath­er­ing car­ries spe­cial mean­ing: BAJ is cel­e­brat­ing the 30th anniver­sary of its found­ing.

BAJ chair­man Andrei Bas­tunets opens the con­fer­ence “Belaru­sian Jour­nal­ism: Where Tomor­row Begins.” Vil­nius, Sep­tem­ber 16, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“One rea­son for today’s meet­ing is the 30th anniver­sary of the Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists. BAJ was offi­cial­ly reg­is­tered on this very day — Sep­tem­ber 16, 1995,” said BAJ chair­man Andrei Bas­tunets in his open­ing remarks. “But we are here to speak not only, and not so much, about the past. As the title of the con­fer­ence sug­gests, our focus is on what is urgent and on what lies ahead for Belaru­sian jour­nal­ism.”

He remind­ed par­tic­i­pants that 27 media pro­fes­sion­als remain behind bars in Belarus. At the same time, he wel­comed col­leagues who had just regained their free­dom on Sep­tem­ber 11. Among them was Rehi­janal­na­ja Haze­ta edi­tor-in-chief Ali­ak­san­dr Mant­se­vich, who joined the con­fer­ence in per­son.

The pro­gram also pre­sent­ed the project “Jour­nal­ists: The Silent Mode.” BAJ empha­sized that doc­u­ment­ing per­se­cu­tion and repres­sion of jour­nal­ists is essen­tial so that these sto­ries do not van­ish into the infor­ma­tion void or dis­solve into back­ground noise. Artists Kasia Budzko and Kat­siary­na Miats brought this project to life visu­al­ly. Budzko’s work places images of jour­nal­ists back into the cityscapes where they once lived, loved, worked, and dreamed. Miats, inspired by the metaphor of a mosa­ic, explores how iso­la­tion and impris­on­ment frag­ment a human being — while col­or and mem­o­ry pre­serve dig­ni­ty and car­ry the hope of light return­ing to each polit­i­cal prisoner’s life.

Andrei Bas­tunets speaks at the open­ing in front of the exhi­bi­tion “Jour­nal­ists: The Silent Mode.” Vil­nius, Sep­tem­ber 16, 2025. Pho­to: BAJ

“What can be done for Belaru­sian jour­nal­ism in exile? We once called our depar­ture relo­ca­tion, but what seemed tem­po­rary is becom­ing more and more per­ma­nent,” Bas­tunets reflect­ed — set­ting the tone for dis­cus­sions at the start of the con­fer­ence.

On the eve of the event, the BAJ Bourd approved a new strat­e­gy to guide the organization’s work in the com­ing years.

The con­fer­ence will con­clude with the announce­ment of win­ners of the cre­ative com­pe­ti­tion Vol­na­je Slo­va (Free Word).