10/15/2025 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 10/16/2025 02:13
To mark the first anniversary of Voices in Exile, a project that supports exiled journalists, Canal France International (CFI), SINGA, La Maison des Journalistes (MDJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) organised a joint event, "Together for the Freedom to Inform." Held at RSF International headquarters, the event brought together the programme's fellows, French media outlets, and representatives of civil society for a look back on the project's first year.
Be they from Gaza, Sudan, Russia, or Iran, hundreds of journalists and media professionals are forced to flee their countries to survive and continue their work. To support them, CFI, SINGA, MDJ and RSF joined forces one year ago to launch the Voices in Exile project, supported by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs. After hosting two rounds of journalist fellowships, they met again on Tuesday, 14 October, in Paris, at RSF headquarters, to discuss the theme, "Together for the Freedom to Inform."
"The 'Voices in Exile' project responds to a fundamental need: enabling journalists in exile to continue their professional activity. The journalists provide powerful antidotes to disinformation, propaganda and manipulated information by exposing the predatory practices of the regimes they were forced to flee and informing audiences in their countries of origin as well as their host countries.Providing exiled journalists with support so they can keep doing their job - informing the public - is a vital matter of democratic and public interest.
The event was also an opportunity to share experiences from the past year, discuss the programme's first outcomes, and explore its future prospects. The ensuing discussions and networking helped to strengthen ties among professionals across the sector.
After a first editionthat brought together journalists from countries where press freedom is deemed "difficult" or "very serious" according to the RSF World Press Freedom Index, the Voices in Exile program welcomed a new cohort of fourteen journalists from Afghanistan, Egypt, Haiti, Libya, Syria, Togo, Turkey and Yemen in May 2025. The program offers personalised and support on multiple fronts, including psychosocial assistance, legal and administrative guidance, as well as editorial, digital, technical and entrepreneurial training through workshops and mentorship sessions.