We are a team of young journalists who worked together for a period of time and experienced first-hand the difficulties faced by free press in Lebanon and the Arab world. We are bound together by a common vision of journalism that is freer and of a society that is more democratic.
We lived through the period where Lebanon moved from sectarian and confessional military conflict into an incomplete peace. We discovered that the idea of peace can only become genuine through democracy, a concept that was violated during peace-time as much as it was during war.
Likewise, the state instituted by the Ta'ef Accord had no real links to the pre-war state, when Lebanon was an advanced model for media freedom, diversity of opinion, and social and political democracy. Consequently, we lived through this open conflict between the democratic traditions of Lebanon and the desire of powers that be to impose an undemocratic model on Lebanon.
We also discovered through our practical experiences that there is a lack in terms of preparing the journalists of tomorrow to follow the global progress of the profession: in terms of investigation, performance, technological advances, and the commitment to the international ethics and concepts of the Universal Declaration for Human Rights.
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