The second Bali Democracy Forum The Bali Democracy Forum (BDF) started as an initiative launched by Indonesia in 2008, aiming at the promotion of regional international cooperation in the field of democracy and political development amongst countries in Asia.
The forum is expected to contribute to the pursuit of the democratic ideals through dialogue and practical cooperation. It is an institution dedicated to promote regional and international cooperation in the field of democracy, and as such to strengthen democratic institutions at the national level and bridge the gaps in political development in Asia. Through the Institute for Peace and Democracy it plans to have a number of activities going on the whole year.
The second forum took place on 9 and 10 December with participants from all over the region. Norway participated as observer member with Ambassador Homme and senior adviser Salvesen from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Oslo. Norway pledged already before the first BDF USD 2.5m to the Bali Democracy Forum, mainly toward its endowment fund, but also for program activities. A joint Letter of Intent was signed in Norway during the visit of the Foreign Minister of Indonesia to Oslo in April this year. At that time, Dr. Hassan Wirajuda, still a strong promoter and advocate of the BDF.
We are looking forward to the Institute for Peace and Democracy holding of regional a workshop in February next year on Indonesian and Asian Experiences of Comparative Transitions, where also International IDEA will contribute to the outcome. We believe lessons learned from this workshop will turn out also to be valuable for other regions. Norway was also contributing to a two-day gathering in parallel to the BDF on the accountability of the media and how the media can govern itself. This was done in cooperation with the Government of Indonesia and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ).
One of the conclusions of the media workshop was that governments should “give top priority to creating conditions that ensure free media and in dependent journalism, without any form of legal or political pressure”. The conclusions from the media workshop were presented to the governments participating in the second Bali Democracy Forum. In 2006, after the cartoon controversy, Indonesia initiated the Global intermedia dialogue and invited Norway along. We had three successful dialogue meetings. Cooperation projects between media experts worldwide still continues. Some of its key actors took part in the workshop on Media and Accountability.
For more information on these events: http://balidemocracyforum.org/ and http://ifj.org/