Jeta Xharra

Jeta Xharra is Director of Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Kosovo, as well as a leading anchor and editor of “Life in Kosovo”, broadcasted in prime-time in Kosovar public TV, the only Kosovo program profiled in New York Times. The program has pushed the boundaries of debate, opening taboo subjects that Kosovars have never before discussed and has gone to being from the most criticised to the most watched current affairs program in Kosovo. She got into journalism working as a fixer/local producer for BBC News in 1998 and later became the manager of the BBC Kosovo Bureau. She completed an MA in War Studies at King’s College London (2000), and gained a distinction for an MA in Screenwriting from the London College of Printing (2002). Xharra has published a front-page article in the Independent and written for the Economist, Sunday Telegraph and Jane’s Intelligence Review. While in the UK, Xharra worked for the Foreign News Planning Desk at the BBC World Service, Institute for War and Peace Reporting and in 2005 she became one of the founders of Balkan Investigative Reporting Network. BIRN Kosovo has about 50 staff all over Kosovo that do a combination of monitoring courts, public funds, municipal governance and the agreements between Prishtina and Belgrade as well as reporting for BIRN English publications such as Balkan Insight and Prishtina Insight, producing “Justice in Kosovo” broadcast on public TV, “Life in Kosovo newspaper” and partner in Kallxo.com, the most trusted civil society platform for reporting corruption. In 2012 the South East Europe Media Organisation, SEEMO, named Jeta Xharra as winner of the 2012 Dr Erhard Busek – SEEMO Award for Better Understanding in South East Europe.