Supported projects

RIYADH - The attacks of 11 September 2001 sent shockwaves around the world. Ten years later, journalist Lisa De Bode reveals that a quiet gender revolution is underway in the Arab world that could pave the way for greater democracy.

KABUL / ISLAMABAD - Afghanistan has been in a state of perpetual war for the past thirty years. Much of the misery that continues to shape our world today has arisen from this cauldron of turmoil and the surrounding area. Internal insurgencies are ongoing in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir. Regional conflicts extend as far as China, Iran and Russia. Not to mention Western geopolitics, which is directly linked to the growth and impact of international jihadism. But what do we really know about the causes and consequences of a war in which Belgian and Dutch soldiers are now also fighting?

BRUSSELS - A fascinating view behind the scenes of the Council of Ministers. Here, the idea of European unity is not at all obvious. Also, when ministers are occupied with national matters, diplomats seem to have a substantial influence in shaping European decisions.

BRUSSELS - targetBRUSSELS gathers information on the activities of Eastern European secret services in Brussels during the Cold War. The research is based on the intelligence archives of the former German Democratic Republic, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and Romania.

CARACAS - In The Oil King, Edwin Koopman paints a sobering portrait of a divided country. What began as an investigation into the origins of a Latin American revolution evolved into a deeply personal narrative of power, ideals, hatred, passion, and disappointment.

BRUSSELS - Women who give up their child for adoption come up against a double taboo. Society frowns on it - what mother does such a thing? Meanwhile, they themselves struggle with their maternal feelings. Sometimes. But sometimes not. Shadow Mother brings their story: sometimes harrowing and painful, sometimes resigned and reconciling with it all.

ISLAMABAD - The American president Obama described a part of Pakistan as ‘the most dangerous place on earth’. The country is dangerous in two ways: dangerous to itself, as few places yield as many bomb attacks and victims, but also dangerous to the rest of the world, as the bombings are exported and Pakistan is a nuclear power, with ‘Islamic’ bombs that are perhaps not sufficiently secured.

BRUSSELS - A film by Arielle Sleutel & Dorothee van den Berghe. A documentary about ‘giving up your child‘.

BRUSSELS - In Silent Stories Hanne Phlypo and Catherine Vuysteke follow two men and two women from Algeria, Senegal, Iraq and Guinea whose sexual orientation forced them to leave their country - wether they were bisexual, homosexual, lesbian or transsexual.

KINSHASA - White Elephant is a documentary about the Central Post-Office and its employees in Kinshasa, DR Congo.

SALVADOR - NGOs, city administrations and publishers worldwide switch to FSC-certified paper. Ordinary consumers can buy copy and printing paper as well as paper towels and even wallpaper bearing the tree logo. But is the paper's green image justified?

BRASILIA - Several tens of thousands of illegal Brazilians work on Belgian construction sites. They are also known as the 'new Poles'. Journalists Nico Schoofs and Filip Michiels from the magazine Vacature expose the shady business behind the exploitation of these cheap workers.

URUMQI - Xinjiang is a province of China, with the statute of ‘Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region’ under control of the central Chinese government. It is very Chinese and at the same time it seems not Chinese at all.

YAMOUSSOUKRO - Anthropologist Karel Arnaut and photographer Raymond Dakoua have been following the patriotic militants since 2003. They describe and show the ex-militia members in their everyday environment and introduce the public to the world of the young ex-combatants, their activities and limitations, their memories and their expectations for the future. A report on their most recent stay in Ivory Coast. 

SALAR DE UYUNI - Uyuni is a backward region in the South of Bolivia. Bult the salt lake of Uyuni is rich with lithium, the commodity for the production of batteries, soon also for batteries for electrical vehicles. For this raw material a game of chess is being played between some multinational companies, the people of Uyuni and Bolivia's government.

TRIPOLI - Sub Saharan refugees and migrants get stranded in Libya, one of the most important transit countries, on their way to Europe. The European Union tries to keep migrants from reaching Europe by making expensive deals with the Libyan Government. 

SREBRENICA - 15 years after the war in Bosnia over 7000 refugees still live in ‘temporary’ refugee camps in the heart of Europe. The Bosnians themselves want to forget about them, the NGO’s have left the country, moved on to new conflict zones. But the people are still there.

BRUSSELS – For the first time, Lusobelgae sheds light on the Portuguese community in Brussels, from the first wave of migration in the 1960s (political and economic refugees fleeing the Salazar regime) to the present day. The community is divided between traditional labour migration and EU officials, and there is a young generation who want to break free from the closed community and engage with wider society.

BRUSSELS - Everywhere people are on the move. In search of a better life. Europe is bursting at the seams with new citizens. The old continent is struggling with the immigration phenomenon; and handling it with amazing ineptitude. The question is not: who is welcome and who is not? The question has to be: how are we to accommodate all these newcomers?

BRUSSEL - ‘Facing Brussels’ is a photographic exploration of the city's incredible diversity. The project captures the many different people who make up Brussels, ranging from tourists and commuters to Eurocrats, homeless people, migrants and the local population.

KINSHASA - More then a hundred years after the publication of Joseph Conrads’ book ’The Heart of Darkness”. Marc Hoogsteyns checks if the situation in Congo has changed. Despite all the trouble the author remarks that there is still hope for this country.

KINSHASA - In July 2009, the American magazine Foreign Policy published its annual list of failed nation-states. The Democratic Republic of Congo occupied fifth place, after notoriously dysfunctional states like Somalia, Zimbabwe, Sudan, and Chad, and ahead of war-torn countries like Iraq and Afghanistan. This performance was particularly depressing, given the high hopes that surrounded the presidential election of 2006, the first democratic ballot since the country gained independence in 1960. In fact, a few years into the new administration, the country seems to be doing even worse, despite its immense natural resources.

BRUSSELS - Due to the banking crisis the Belgian government had to bail out 4 major financial institutions in 2008 and 2009 to prevent them from bankruptcy. Fortis, KBC, Dexia and Ethias initially received more than 20 billion of tax payers' money which they will have to reimburse eventually. But which role does the government play in the meantime now that it acquired seats as an important stakeholder in the governing boards of these banks?

ROTTERDAM - A taboo-breaking story about the hidden problem of incest in immigrant families in the Netherlands.

GABORONE - Ask any average Belgian, or any European for that matter, to name three words he associates with sub-Saharan Africa. The odds are big he will come up with for instance ‘war’, ‘hunger’ and ‘rape’.

NOVOSIBIRSK - Debby Huysmans shows a photographic research on forgotten and isolated communities in Siberia. The two longest rivers of Siberia, the Yenisey and Lena, guided the photographer through the desolated area in search of individuals who experience this area as their biotope and the marks they leave in the landscape that surrounds them. Remainders of dreams of the past and signs of hope for the future appear through the daily environment.

MECHELEN / AMSTERDAM - Venturing off the beaten track and discovering things that no one has ever described before. This seems to be the dream of every investigative journalist. In this book, Luuk Sengers explores every stage of the investigative journalism process, from the initial idea to the finished story.

MUMBAI - With financial support from the Fonds Pascal Decroos, Nick Meynen followed carbon credit money flowing from Belgium to India, where he discovered a desert full of mirages. Part from the fraud and abuse, he also noticed the difference in approach between Flanders and Belgium, the buyers of carbon credits.

TARINKOT - How does a man with only a motorbike, a satellite phone and a small group of confidants become President of Afghanistan? In Expedition Uruzgan, Bette Dam reveals how Hamid Karzai liberated the province of Uruzgan from the Taliban after 11 September 2001. This was a crucial moment in Afghan history.

BUDAPEST - One year ago, the Belgian government purchased two million tonnes of CO₂ emission rights from Hungary. This €26 million investment is intended to help the country meet its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol to reduce emissions by 7.5 per cent by 2012 compared to 1990 levels.