{"id":4653,"date":"2019-09-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-09-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/media4democracy.org\/en\/hilmi-hacaloglu-journalism-in-warzones\/"},"modified":"2019-09-26T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-09-26T00:00:00","slug":"hilmi-hacaloglu-journalism-in-warzones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/media4democracy.org\/en\/hilmi-hacaloglu-journalism-in-warzones\/","title":{"rendered":"Hilmi Hacalo\u011flu \u201cJournalism in Warzones\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

SULTAN YAVUZ- Financed by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the Association of Journalists \u201cMedia for Democracy\/Democracy for Media Programme\u201d (M4D) hosted Hilmi Hacalo\u011flu who did a presentation called \u201cJournalism in Warzones\u201d.<\/p>\n

M4D Project Assistant Coordinator Seva \u00dclman Erten made the opening speech and remarked how exciting yet how dangerous it is being a war correspondent.<\/p>\n

\"\"Erten also gave some information about Hacalo\u011flu \u201cI am sure that most of you dreamed of becoming a war correspondent when first starting out in the profession. It is an extremely exciting profession but it is also extremely dangerous\u2026 Today we are hosting a guest who has been through all of this, Hilmi Hacalo\u011flu. Hacalo\u011flu graduated from St. Joseph Private French Highschool and then studied at Bosphorus University, Faculty of Science and Letters, Department of History. He started working in the profession in 1995 as HBB\u2019s foreign news editor. He later worked for NTV, where he stayed for 13 years. During these years he worked as a war correspondent at Kosovo, Iraq and Georgia. In 2010 he produced programmes about Rwanda, Uganda, Poland and Venezuela for TRT T\u00fcrk. Between June 2012 and October 2013 he produced and presented \u201c\u015eimdi S\u00f6z Sizde\u201d for SkyT\u00fcrk 360. In October of that same year he assumed the position of chief editor for a programme called \u201c32. G\u00fcn\u201d. Hacalo\u011flu is currently the Istanbul representative of \u201cVoice of America\u201d and periodically writes for Atlas, Tarih and National Geographic.<\/p>\n

Following the opening speech, Hacalo\u011flu talked about his experiences as a war correspondent. He started his presentation by showing a video of an attack in Gori where they were injured during the Russo-Georgian War, and commented \u201cJournalists are always lone wolves\u201d. Hacalo\u011flu also mentioned that being a war correspondent also affected his personal life and added \u201cI think we are the issue here. In Iraq I had only 120 dollars in my pocket, there were two radio broadcasters from Korea who were complaining about not having enough money. When I asked them how much money they had, they told me they had 40 thousand dollars with them. Unfortunately, being a journalist in Turkey is being alone; it means to work for very little pay\u201d.<\/p>\n

Hacalo\u011flu talked about how they never received any special training before going to war zones, had no information about chemical weapon attacks, and towards the end of the war in\"\" Kosovo they spent 40 days travelling the region and how they gained their experience in war on-field. Despite not having received any special training, Hacalo\u011flu was able to survive in one piece \u201cI have been attacked at least four times, and nothing happened. I protected myself, my organization and my news through experience\u201d. He also mentioned how they never received any psychological counselling and commented \u201cMaybe we needed it, I don\u2019t know. The only thing I know is that I saw nightmares about war after returning from Georgia\u201d.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m against embedded journalism<\/p>\n

Hacalo\u011flu mentioned that he is not in favour of embedded journalism, during the Syrian war people were able to cross the border by simply running and he was able to do interviews and the main issue to have confidence in yourself.<\/p>\n

Hacalo\u011flu said:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn those moments, something happens and you are able to protect yourself. I\u2019ve always believed in myself and promised myself \u201cI won\u2019t be directed by anyone\u201d. Think about it, I ran across the border and then ran back. Nobody asked me for a passport, I published Salih M\u00fcslim\u2019s comments and nobody said \u201cWho the hell are you?\u201d. I made news standing next to people in the street, without a bullet-proof vest or helmet. In Iraq, an American journalist arrived with 12 soldiers did his news piece and left. I\u2019m against embedded journalism, I think it\u2019s unhealthy. People don\u2019t trust you, you lose objectivity and that\u2019s not something I could accept. The language of the camera is political, I emphasize everywhere that I am a journalist, I do not hide the fact. If someone decides to destroy you, a vest or helmet is not going to protect you. After our incident in Georgia, the people at the TV station got angry \u201cWhy didn\u2019t it say press on your vehicle?\u201d. It wouldn\u2019t have mattered, we were beaten up when people knew we were journalists, too. It\u2019s difficult to maintain your distance; it\u2019s even more difficult in war. But you have to do it. Journalists have nothing to do with weapons; my weapon is my pen.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone has gotten very dirty during this period\u201d<\/p>\n

Hacalo\u011flu also commented on the situation of journalists in Turkey and criticized institutions that decide \u201cwho a journalists is, and who isn\u2019t.\u201d by saying \u201cThis is an unacceptable situation. Institutions or the government cannot decide on who a journalist is. Unfortunately this is killing the tradition of journalists, as well. Today, there are journalists from CHP, HDP, AKP, Fenerbah\u00e7e, Be\u015fikta\u015f etc. journalists from all walks of life. What\u2019s important is the distance between people\u2026 Nowadays journalists can\u2019t say anything, or complain. After the 2001 crisis many people were made redundant and news centres were disbanded. Collective struggle was abolished. The tradition can\u2019t be handed down today, but in the past there was good journalism. We shouldn\u2019t forget this, a newspaper was precious thing. We need to re-establish this trust, everyone has gotten very dirty during this period; this is my main concern but I\u2019m sure we will pull through. We all need to come together, take a look in the mirror and save this profession. We are getting one-sided news from Syria, for example. Nobody is going there. We shouldn\u2019t be pessimistic, we need to carry the torch handed to us from our senior colleagues. The media is the first institution that needs to gather itself, and this responsibility is up to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SULTAN YAVUZ- Financed by the European Union (EU) and implemented by the Association of Journalists “Media for Democracy\/Democracy for Media […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4654,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4653","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-events","9":"post-with-thumbnail","10":"post-with-thumbnail-large"},"yoast_head":"\nHilmi Hacalo\u011flu \u201cJournalism in Warzones\u201d - M4D Project<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/media4democracy.org\/en\/hilmi-hacaloglu-journalism-in-warzones\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"tr_TR\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hilmi Hacalo\u011flu \u201cJournalism in Warzones\u201d - 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