ATA and ANA sign agreement on promotion of bilateral cooperation
On the sidelines of the ABNA-SE General Assembly meeting, the Albanian Telegraphic Agency and the Greek news agency, ANA, signed a bilateral cooperation agreement, attached here the Diversity Charter, an initiative of the European Commission for the promotion of diversity in business.
General Director of the ATA Valbona Zhupa and her Greek counterpart Aimilios Perdikaris signed the agreement in Thessaloniki.
According to the agreement, the two news agencies will cooperate closely for the media and photographic coverage and follow-up of events from both countries.
The Albanian Telegraphic Agency and ANA have been cooperating for several years, the exchange of news and photos included.
From March 20 to 23, in context of the presidency of ABNA-SE, ANA organized a conference on the topic 'The role of news in the new Balkan reality' with the participation of the Vice-President of the European Commission Margaritis Schinas, academics, and representatives of companies that play an important role in other regions.
ATA and Belga News sign for first time agreement of cooperation
For the first time, the Albanian Telegraphic Agency (ATA) and the largest Belgian news agency, Belga News, signed a cooperation agreement.
This bilateral agreement was signed by the General Director of the Albanian Telegraphic Agency Valbona Zhupa and General Director of the Belga News Patrick Lacroix.
The object of this cooperation agreement between the two agencies is the development of bilateral cooperation in the field of news exchange.
The agreement foresees not only the exchange of news between the two agencies, but also of photos, which will enable the citizens of the two countries to get to know more about the political, economic, touristic, cultural and sports developments in Albania and Belgium.
Zhupa and Lacroix appreciated rather important the signing of this cooperation agreement, the first between the two agencies and with an EU member country like Belgium, especially at a time when public opinion is threatened by the phenomenon of fake news and the world is transformed by artificial intelligence.
This agreement was signed at the headquarters of the Belga News agency, where there are located even offices of the ENR, europeannewsroom.com., the joint editorial
office of 18 European news agencies, European News Room (ENR), where the Albanian Telegraphic Agency is part with full rights.
ATA and Portuguese news agency sign for first time MoU
The Albanian Telegraphic Agency (ATA) has signed a memorandum of understanding, which consists in cooperation and news exchange with the Portuguese National News Agency, LUSA.
This memorandum of understanding was signed by the Albanian Telegraphic Agency Director General, Valbona Zhupa, and the president and chief executive director of the Portuguese National News Agency, Joaquim Carreira, in Lisbon.
This memorandum, which marks a new stage in the expansion of ATA's cooperation with the counterpart official news agencies, also the first to be signed with LUSA, enables the exchange of information.
The MoU envisages the exchange of news items and photos between the two agencies, which will keep the citizens of both countries up to date with the political, economic, tourist, cultural and sporting developments in Albania and Portugal.
The heads of the two news agencies, namely Zhupa and Carreira, during the meeting, underlined the importance of signing this memorandum for the exchange of information, especially in the field of tourism.
While Albania is establishing itself as a point of reference through descriptions in important international media as an up and coming tourist and agri-tourism destination, the MoU between ATA and LUSA will serve to gain a better insight of the respective countries, their traditions, culture , cultural heritage, history and cuisine.
ATA signs MoU with Azeri news agency, AZERTAC
The Albanian Telegraphic Agency (ATA) signed a Memorandum of Understanding for exchange of news with the Azeri news agency, AZERTAC.
This MoU was signed in the Azeri city of Shusha by the general director of the Albanian Telegraphic Agency, Valbona Zhupa, and the general director of AZERTAC, Vugar Aliyev.
This memorandum, which marks a new stage in the expansion of ATA's cooperation with its counterpart official news agencies, consists in exchange of news items and photos between the two agencies.
Zhupa and Aliyev underlined the importance of signing this memorandum for the exchange of information.
ATA and EFE sign Memorandum of Understanding
The Spanish news agency, EFE, and the Albanian Telegraphic Agency, ATA, signed on Friday a memorandum of understanding, which provides for the mutual exchange of a certain amount of their information on a monthly basis for editorial use.
The MoU was signed at the headquarters of the EFE agency, in Madrid, by its president, Gabriela Canas, and the ATA Director General, Valbona Zhupa.
Also, present at the signing ceremony was the ambassador of Albania in Madrid, Gazmend Barbullushi, who underlined the importance of the agreement between the news agencies and their contribution to the relations between the two countries.
The agreement also stipulates an exchange of news items between their respective English departments for use in their information services and publication on the relevant broadcast channels.
The agreement is effective for one year, after which it can be renewed.
Tazpit Press Service and Albanian Telegraphic Agency Sign Collaboration Agreement
Tazpit Press Service and the Albanian Telegraphic Agency signed a memorandum of understanding in Jerusalem.
The ATA is Albania's official news agency and is one of the top ranking news services in the Balkan region. The Jerusalem-based TPS is the only Israeli wire service.
The content-sharing agreement includes free access to all news materials. The agreement was signed by ATA General Director Valbona Zhupa and TPS CEO Amotz Eyal in the presence of Albanian Ambassador to Israel Dr. Bardhyl Canaj.
'This is a new chapter of cooperation,' said Amb. Canaj. 'It will show to everybody a lot of things between our two countries. A lot of people will have new windows to know what happens in Albania and Israel.'
Eyal said, 'We are committed to sharing Israeli technology and opportunities. Israel is trying to improve the world and the way to work with each other. I am happy to look forward to many years of working together.'
Director General Zhupa presents 2024 budget priorities for 2024: ATA, public news domain of future
TIRANA - The Director General of the Albanian Telegraphic Agency (ATA) Valbona Zhupa presented the institution's draft budget for 2024 in front of the members of the Parliamentary Committee on Education and Public Information Means on Wednesday, focusing on ATA's priorities for the next year.
Speaking about ATA's performance, Zhupa pointed out that the news organization is the main source of information collecting and disseminating information and news in Albania and in the international scene and remains the only official news agency in Albania with its wire-service providing information inthree languages - Albanian, English and French - and gathers information about a wide variety of news events happening around the world in English, French and Italian.
'ATA has established contractual relationships and cooperates with around 40 international news agencies and media partners. ATA is a full-fledged member of largest media organizations in Europe and in a wider region, including the European Alliance of News Agencies (EANA), Association of the Balkan News Agencies-Southeast Europe (ABNA-SE|) or the Alliance of Mediterranean news Agencies (AMAN),' Zhupa said.
She underlined that ATA staff make efforts not only to inform correctly about the news events locally and internationally, but also to cope with the challenge of 'fake news', a worrying phenomenon around the world.
'ATA keeps providing and publishing on its official website stories about political, economic, cultural, sport events, feature stories, interviews and documentaries on tourism, as well as translations from leading international media on top tourist destinations in a bid to promote Albanian tourism at a local and international level, being a trustworthy partner in building a brilliant image of Albania as one the most sought-after tourist destinations in the international market,' she added.
'Albania's membership in the European Union has enhanced ATA's importance. The information we disseminate remains unbiased, increasing the demand of European news agencies to sign contractual relations with ATA,' she said.
ATA Director General also informed lawmakers in the Parliamentary Committee on the Media about the cooperation agreements signed in one year only, singling out the deal with the Portuguese news agency LUSA, Greek news agency ANA MPA, Belgian news agency Belga News, as well as with the Spain's international news agency EFE.
Zhupa also drew the lawmakers' attention to ATA's full-fledged membership in the Brussels-based European Newsroom, a unique project reflecting Europe-s spirit, where, together with 18 more news agencies, ATA has continued the fact-based and independent reporting of news and developments in the country.
She also noted that ATA has launched its first app in the media market.
'ATA developed and launched a mobile portal for its local and international readers, who can now easily access to the agency's news text, photos and videos via mobile phones or other social media and online platforms,' ATA Director General explained.
Pointing out the issues facing ATA, Zhupa underlined that the news agency still operates according to a decree issues in 1954 and therefore demanded that new legislation is approved.
'We are working with a group of experts to draft a bill on the functioning of ATA, seeking to draft a complex legislation in order to optimize the approach towards a standard that will guide our institution,' she said.
Zhupa called for the Committee members for a more advanced technological infrastructure for ATA.
