Media forum marking OANA’s 65th anniversary held in Russia

A media forum marking the 65th anniversary of the Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) was held in the Russian capital.

The 58th OANA Executive Board Meeting was also held as part of the forum, hosted by the Russian news agency TASS at a hotel in Moscow.

The meeting was attended by TASS Director General Andrey Kondrashov and OANA Secretary-General and TASS Deputy Director General Marat Abulkhatin as well as representatives of OANA member organizations.

It was also attended by Anadolu Deputy Director General and Editor-in-Chief Yusuf Ozhan and Anadolu Director of Strategic Communications and Brand Management Hazal Duran.

During the Executive Board Meeting, where issues related to OANA were discussed, Ozhan held talks with executives of OANA member media organizations.

- 'OANA plays an important role in information wars'

The media forum marking the 65th anniversary of OANA began later, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov and Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova also attending.

Speaking at the conference, Peskov said the world is undergoing changes in the fields of the economy, politics and international relations.

"Global news agencies are facing challenges stemming on the one hand from the acceleration of technological developments and on the other from the consequences of international transformation," he said.

Noting that information wars would continue, Peskov said OANA has an important role to play in this regard.

"It is important for agencies to combat false information and provide accurate information about decisions taken by their states and governments. Therefore, all news agencies need to make significant efforts to preserve their professional approach and the accuracy of their reporting in the fight against this flow of distorted information," he said.

Peskov also read a message from Russian President Vladimir Putin to participants at the conference.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also addressed the conference through a video message.

- 'Two-thirds of information flow belongs to OANA member countries'

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zakharova also underlined the importance of OANA.

"Two-thirds of the information flow belongs to OANA member countries. OANA agencies collectively produce more content than the Associated Press, Reuters and AFP combined," she said.

Zakharova said the field of fact-checking has become one of the increasingly politicized areas of the media industry.

"Countries and organizations are no longer fighting for the truth itself, but for the right to call the truth 'truth' and a lie 'a lie'," she said.

Highlighting the importance of establishing a multipolar world order, Zakharova said: "A multipolar world order cannot be created without a multipolar information space. The volume of content produced by OANA agencies demonstrates that such an information space already effectively exists. It now needs to be institutionalized."

As part of the forum marking OANA's 65th anniversary, an exhibition featuring a photograph by Anadolu was also opened, while a memorandum was signed between OANA and the Global Fact-Checking Network.

The media forum will continue Tuesday.

OANA, which has 44 member news agencies from 35 countries, was established in 1961 at the initiative of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to facilitate the direct and free exchange of news among agencies in a region that is home to more than half of the world's population.

Anadolu joined OANA in 1978.