Supported projects

SAN SALVADOR - Strikingly absent in the American political debate: the issue of the Central American refugee crisis. Journalist Arthur Debruyne traveled along the migration route between Mexico and the United States.

PORTO-NOVO - Yovo Bonsoir breaks the clichés about Africa. The white volunteer travelling in the West African country of Benin is the guide. With the help of local colleagues, three young Flemish journalists investigate the true nature of "voluntourism", a popular holiday trend that combines tourism and volunteer work.

HARDIN - Sitting Bull personifies the mystery of the Indians. One of the few whites who enjoyed Sitting Bull's confidence was Father Pieter-Jan De Smet, a Jesuit from Dendermonde (Belgium) who came to rescue the Indians. The savage story of these two men is overwhelming. Karl van den Broeck goes in search of the truth behind the myth.

GHENT - Since Bulgaria, the country with the lowest wages in Europe, joined the Union in 2007, around 15,000 Bulgarians have emigrated every year in search of a better future in the West. However, many end up on the margins of our society, camping in remote locations in and around cities.

ATHENS - The cradle of democracy is sinking: today, 2.5 out of 10 million Greeks live below the poverty line, 3.8 million others flirt with it. Bruno Tersago, correspondent in Greece for the Belgian public broadcaster, gives the Greek crisis a face.

COLOMBO - How terror became more important than human rights. And why this only leads to more terror. Three lessons from Chechnya, Kashmir and Sri Lanka.

CAIRO - Three years after the revolution daily life in Egypt is finally, slowly, resuming its pace. How do you continue after the initial euphoria fades away and a stone-cold reality looks you dead in the face? The young Flemish journalist Annabell Van den Berghe takes us along through her Cairo, the city where she studied and where she still often spends weeks or months for her job.

BUTEMBO - This documentary tells the story of exceptionally strong women in eastern Congo. The region has been the scene of a bloody conflict for over 15 years. Positive resistance is growing in the city of Butembo. The population is trying to regain control over its fate and life. When the violence in and around Butembo increases, the inhabitants are not watching from the sidelines. Sometimes they literally run into danger.

CAPE TOWN - The Cape Flats near Cape Town in South Africa are renowned for their large-scale violence. It is very difficult for young people to escape the violence, drugs and criminality.

RABAT - Random arrests, assault, raids, deportation to Algeria. The fate of many Sub-Saharan illegal and legal refugees in Morocco. Maithé Franco and Luca Putteman talked to victims and investigated what role Europe plays in this story.

BRUSSELS - Stories in the media on Scott Manyo or the dutch boy Mauro brought the issue of unaccompanied minors to the attention of the general public. But the boys and girls that end up here all alone, are rarely more than figures in one or the other report.

SANTO TOMÁS DE CASTILLA - This is the story of the first ever Belgian colony, namely the one in Guatemala (1843-1856). Both in Belgium and in Guatemala this little piece of history seems to have been collectively forgotten. However, a few interesting encounters teach us that that migration left a lot of tracks.

STELLENBOSCH - South African winegrowers produce more than seven thousand different wines and are among the wealthy elite in the country. Millions of consumers around the world taste the high quality of South African wine, but the workers who pick and process the grapes barely enjoy the added value produced.

BRUSSELS - In spite of the efforts made by NGOs and the distribution of EU funds, Europe’s main minority is no better off than it was 10 years ago. Anno 2012 the significant proportion of Europe’s 12 million Roma live in deplorable conditions. Ethnic tensions are on the rise. Dutch journalist Hellen Kooijman reconstructed more than ten years of failed European policy. A lack of appropriate supervision in Brussels, the corruption of local leaders and the indifference of national governments are at the root of the problem.

BUSAN - From 29 November to 1 December 2012, the topic of development aid will be high on the international agenda. In Busan, South Korea, more than 2,000 government, multilateral organisation and NGO representatives will work on making development aid more efficient. In an increasingly complex and fast-changing world of emerging powers, financial crises and sweeping austerity measures, the goal in Busan is to establish a new global partnership for development.

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.

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.

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?

BAMAKO - The river Niger, Mali's vein of life, is in danger. Photographer Raymond Dakoua shows the great economic, social, human and ecological importance of Africa's third longest river. 'Le Djoliba' means 'the river' in the Bambara language.

BEIJING / NEW DELHI - ‘Economic globalisation has made many countries, particularly in Asia, richer. However, income inequality has also increased in most countries. Companies are constantly looking for the cheapest and least protected labour. Moreover, the internet has given them access to a virtual global factory floor. They can now break work down into small tasks and outsource them through their global agency network more easily than ever before. Consequently, the proportion of wages in the economy is falling almost everywhere, putting workers under pressure in all sorts of ways. Can things be improved?

BRUSSELS - 'Gypsies. Sinti and Roma under the swastika' is the first Dutch-language overview book on the fate of Sinti and Roma in Europe during the Nazi era, from 1933 to 1945. Like the Jews, the so-called 'Gypsies' were persecuted because, according to Nazi ideology, they were an inferior race.

KUKËS - The Kukes Prefecture, located in north-eastern Albania near the border with Kosovo, is one of the poorest regions in the country. It has a population of almost 120,000, 75% of whom live in rural areas.

SURAT - Once upon a time, Antwerp was the world's centre for diamond trading and cutting. As of 2005, the trade is still present, but Antwerp's renowned diamond industry is in decline. In an increasingly globalised world, diamond processing here has become too labour-intensive and expensive.

TUXTLA GUTIÉRREZ - In January 2004, it will be ten years since the Zapatista Army of Liberation (EZLN) took up arms in the Mexican state of Chiapas. The rebels set themselves an unlikely mission: to declare war on neoliberalism.