The number of initiatives to push news and media literacy, as well as to counter fake news and disinformation, are growing fast. ASEAN countries are putting their own local flavor into a menu of approaches to ‘treat’ this ‘illness’ in today’s digital spaces, explains Uyen Diep of Vietnam’s Thanh Nien News.

ASEAN has been testing its non-intervention habit in ways never done before, playing what is to date its biggest, most active role in relation to Myanmar’s handling of the Rohingya issue. But ASEAN’s role is little known or cared for inside the country, where the mainstream attitude is usually apathy or hostility to this minority community. Aung Zaw Min looks into why this so, in this feature for the Reporting ASEAN series.

Next year, 2020, is the ‘Year of ASEAN Identity’. But 52 years after its creation, ASEAN’s identity markers have been confined to bureaucratic circles instead of seeping into the public, popular sphere. How far can having an ASEAN flag, emblem go? Kavi Chongkittavorn explains in this commentary for the #ReportingASEAN series.

For Lao film producer Vannaphone Sitthirath, a two-hour visit to the Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh leads to reflections about the gift of having options in life, and questions about practices like polygamy. She shares these thoughts in this article for the Reporting ASEAN series.

#VoicesfromCLMV is the hashtag that journalists from Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar and Vietnam created for this story series they are part of in the Reporting ASEAN program, its founder/editor Johanna Son said at the April editorial workshop of the CLMV Integration Series. She also said it was not possible to discuss storytelling related to ASEAN without paying tribute to former ASEAN secretary-general Rodolfo Severino, who passed away earlier in the month.

The CLMV Integration Series of the Reporting ASEAN program is looking for quality story proposals from journalists who are curious about issues beyond their national borders and want to go beyond their regular news routines. If this describes you, this may be your editorial project! Deadline for application: 1 March 2019.

Vietnam is fully plugged into Asean as Southeast Asia’s regional family, Tran Viet Thai of the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam says in the conversation below. Vietnam becomes Asean Chair next year, and 2020 marks the country’s 25th anniversary as a full Asean member. Mr Thai explains how Asean has been a major facilitator in Vietnam’s […]

Keen to bury memories of the diplomatic black eye it got when local protests threw into disarray its ASEAN chairmanship in 2009, Thailand is bent on making sure that this year’s meetings not only go well – but close at yearend with a clear, spicy Thai flavor to ASEAN 2019. Reporting ASEAN’s Johanna Son reports.

Click to download the report on the results of Reporting ASEAN’s survey among editors in Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar and Vietnam, The gems in this in formation-gathering exercise lie in the editors’ evaluations of how familiar their organizations and journalists are with ASEAN issues, what news priority they give to ASEAN- related coverage, their assessments of the strengths, weaknesses and needs of their journalists, as well as what they identify as the toughest reporting challenges in covering ASEAN’s role, relevance and impact.

The number of initiatives to push news and media literacy, as well as to counter fake news and disinformation, are growing fast. ASEAN countries are putting their own local flavor into a menu of approaches to ‘treat’ this ‘illness’ in today’s digital spaces, explains Uyen Diep of Vietnam’s Thanh Nien News.