The media must fight misinformation and disinformation and adapt to any technological developments, such as AI, investment in digital content and social media. This is what the president of the Greek News Agency ANA-MPA, Aimilios Perdikaris, said, who says that before reporting on any event, the media must check if the sources they receive are safe.

Perdikaris, in an interview for KosovaPress, considers that the media in Kosovo are developing quite quickly and are no different from other countries, but he says that the state should help, because as he says, the media that work in the right way, can offer more democracy and more voices to be heard and that is good for the country itself.

He says that cooperation is important for news agencies.

"We must overcome all obstacles and face old challenges. We must fight misinformation and disinformation, we must adapt to any technological developments, like AI, like investing in digital content and social media. I think that if we're talking especially for news agencies a very important thing is to cooperate and I'm very happy that in the Greek news agency Athens-Macedonian News Agency we have bilateral cooperation with a lot of other agencies in the region and in Europe as well. And of course we are active members of all European and Worldwide unions and other forums, which can help us to to develop our strategy and develop our journalistic product, so as to to provide more accurate and more quickly news to our clients", says Perdiakris.

The same says that the media should be more careful in the reliability of the sources, for which he says that in this regard the news agencies are a reliable source.

"We know that now we have the journalism of social media, but we have to be very careful about the credibility of our sources and that's why news agencies I think that they are truthful and credible source, this is why their cross-checking, the information, they are performing fact checks and other checks which can provide that their content, their news content is more accurate and credible than the others, than the other media, because this is our role, our role is to be a source for other media, this is our role to report to be on the field, to report everything's happening. And that's why we are using other sources, like social media, and we're performing these checks I referred to earlier, and not only our work to be based on these sources before checking with our staff, with our network, what's happening in reality", adds Perdikaris.

Speaking about the importance of the media, he points out that the most important investment in them is an educated staff who are knowledgeable about developments.

"About success is a very difficult question because you're wanting to go further, you're wanting to go better and better. You must establish development, you must establish that you are constantly developing your content, your organization in general. So, I think it's a difficult question and I cannot concentrate on a particular thing. It's a matter of many things, but if I can refer to only one thing, I should tell that the staff, a well educated and familiar staff, with the developments, with digital media and social media is the most important investment for every news agency here." says Perdikaris.

In this regard, he says that Kosovo is developing quickly, but he considers that the state should invest more in the media.

"Exactly as a country, I think that they are developing quickly, and they do not have any difference with other media, with media in other countries. And I'm also happy that I'm here with our friends from KosovoPress and we have a very close cooperation and I believe that it will continue in the future. In fact, as news agencies, most of the news agencies are financed by the state, yes because of apart from this, we are living in difficult times., we had the pandemic, we had many crisis, consecutive crisis, and yes, as other businesses who were helped by the state, I think that the state should help media as well. Because, media which work in the proper way they can provide more democracy and more voices to be heard, and this is good for the country itself", concludes Perdikaris.

Perdikaris participated in the international conference "Freedom of Speech Borders", hosted by KosovaPress News Agency.

During the conference, he emphasized that as an agency they are working very hard for the safety of journalists./E.Krasniqi/