2025-10-22 15:00:37
For decades, Belarus was considered a “blank spot” on the international map of investigative journalism. Its government consistently ranks as the least open in Europe. Despite this, investigative journalism is in its best state ever, with the [GIJN member] Belarusian Investigative Center (BIC) at the forefront. Since its formation, the outlet has systematically exposed high-level corruption and disinformation, leading to dozens of international sanctions and earning global recognition.
The Fix spoke with BIC founder Stanislav Ivashkevich about investigating the Belarusian regime.
BIC founder Stanislav Ivashkevich. Image: Screenshot, Belarusian Investigative Center YouTube channel
The previous state of Belarusian investigative journalism largely consisted of “investigative features” with only national significance. “When I attended the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project’s (OCCRP) summer investigative school in 2016, I learned that on the international map of investigative journalism, Belarus is considered a ‘blank spot.’ And a hopelessly blank one, the only one in all of Europe,” recalls Ivashkevich.
That summer school planted the seed for what would become BIC. The team first began forming in 2017 as part of the TV program Let’s Figure It Out on the Belsat TV channel. In 2018, it spun off into a commercial production company before eventually evolving into the nonprofit media outlet it is today.
To produce more investigations of higher quality, the outlet adopted a unique, process-driven approach. “We managed to achieve this through what I call the ‘Henry Ford-ization’ of investigations. We built pipelines where outstanding journalists could multiply their skills and capabilities by focusing on the specific processes they excel at,” Ivashkevich explains. This structure drew partly on processes learnt from international partners like the OCCRP.
Today, BIC’s team comprises more than 30 people, with a majority based in Warsaw, across departments for analytics, counter-disinformation, and journalistic investigations. The complexity of their work is immense: at any given moment, up to 40 different story hypotheses may be in development within the investigations department. Some will eventually lead nowhere or be shelved for future consideration.
As a result, the team publishes around 20 major investigations per year. Each receives around 500,000 views across both BIC’s channels, together with reprints from other media outlets.
To maintain focus, the outlet prioritizes schemes related to corruption or sanctions evasion worth more than US$20 million. This high-stakes work carries significant risks. “After every investigation, we could face a lawsuit. We receive legal threats or pre-litigation warnings for roughly every third or fourth investigation,” Ivashkevich notes.
Image: Reporters Shield
To protect itself, BIC has a dedicated team of fact-checkers and is insured against strategic lawsuits (SLAPPs) through the Reporters Shield initiative, an OCCRP project. “When the biggest oligarchs send their expensive lawyers after us, our lawyers are definitely not inferior in class, and sometimes it seems they are even superior,” Ivashkevich adds.
The results of the BIC’s work are tangible. Since 2020, their investigations have led to approximately 90 sanction actions against more than 40 individuals and legal entities by the European Union and the United States.
In 2023, journalists discovered that Belarusian oligarch Aleksandr Shakutin had evaded earlier EU sanctions while maintaining a profitable German business. Meanwhile, he ran the loss-making Amkodor holding at Belarusian taxpayers’ expense of about US$100 million. This investigation led to sanctions on Amkodor and Shakutin’s partners who helped him circumvent restrictions.
Another Lukashenka ally, Victor Chevtsov, was sanctioned in August 2024, three months after BIC’s investigation. Journalists exposed his monopoly on security hologram production in Belarus, as well as his Hungarian company, through which Chevtsov earned money in Europe.
By the outlet’s count, the total value of schemes uncovered in collaboration with partners reaches nearly US$2 billion this year alone.
BIC’s founder notes that some investigations aren’t focused on sanctions: “War crimes don’t have a monetary value, so we investigate all those we consider significant.” As an example, this September, the team released an investigation into Belarusians fighting on the Russian side in its war against Ukraine.
Moreover, BIC runs the anti-disinformation project called Weekly Top Fake. It grew from the outlet’s own fact-checking process. “If you dig into the reason why the regime is lying about something, you might find a lead for an investigation,” Ivashkevich explains.
Today, Top Fake is a weekly YouTube program with a dedicated TikTok account with 90,000 subscribers. Each episode receives an average of 470,000 views on these platforms combined. The department is a member of the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) and the European Fact-Checking Standards Network (EFCSN).
A recent edition of BIC’s Weekly Top Fake show on YouTube.
BIC’s success reflects a broader trend. Ivashkevich asserts that “Belarusian investigative journalism is now in its strongest state ever.” He likens its development to a character from Slavic folk tales “who lay on the stove for 30 years, but once he got up… it’s still just picking up speed.”
Several factors fuel this boom. The hacktivist group Cyber Partisans made a major contribution by opening up many previously inaccessible government databases. This, combined with other leaks since 2020 and the absence of official anti-corruption work by state agencies, has created fertile ground for journalists.
Ivashkevich mentions other outlets, like Bureau Media, Belpol, and Mediazona, that have also produced high-level investigations, signaling a broader rise of the field.
BIC operates almost entirely on funding from international donors. Independence is ensured through extensive diversification, with dozens of different donors supporting the outlet at any given time. Several of them are listed on a dedicated page of BIC’s website.
Other revenue streams are nearly impossible. Donating from within Belarus is highly dangerous, as BIC is designated an “extremist organization,” and a person could face years in prison for providing financial assistance. Funds from the Belarusian diaspora are also limited, as they are often directed toward other urgent needs like supporting political prisoners or Ukraine.
This makes international partnerships essential. Ivashkevich highlights OCCRP’s role in providing a global network of investigators with access to the latest tools and crucial structural knowledge. “The era of individual investigative journalists, I would say, belongs to the 20th century… Today, the highest-profile investigations are done by consortiums and ‘corporations’ whose goal is not profit, but maximum impact on real life,” he concludes.
Editor’s Note: This story was originally published by The Fix and is reprinted here with permission.
Hleb Liapeika is a freelance journalist based in Krakow, Poland, covering the Belarusian diaspora and European independent media for The Fix. He is a former journalist at Mediazona.Belarus.
2025-10-21 15:00:20
For reporters working on the frontlines of ethno-religious conflicts — involving groups where religion is an integral part of social or cultural life — the challenge is not only to uncover and document the facts on the ground, but to do so responsibly. However, in navigating online misinformation and deadline pressure from social media news cycles, watchdog journalists can also fall into framing and language traps that can inflame tensions, rather than inform the reader.
Examples from coverage of conflicts in India, Nigeria, Iraq, and the Rohingya crisis in Bangladesh reveal a set of best practices and newsroom policies that journalists and editors can apply to reporting on tension and conflicts anywhere in the world. While some policies are part of longstanding journalism practice or common sense, newsrooms operating in areas where there are long-standing conflicts between ethno-religious groups also have to be even more mindful of the issues and tensions in their beat or region.
When covering ethno-religious groups or conflicts, reporters should consider their choice of words carefully. Sectarian, partisan, loaded, and therefore potentially inflammatory language can start — and be particularly problematic — in the headline. This 2021 story about travelers being attacked and killed by a militia in north-central Nigeria, for example, could escalate tensions by underscoring the ethnic group and religions of those involved.
Johnstone Kpilaakaa, sub-editor and head of standards and ethics at HumAngle Media, recalled feeling uneasy when he was assigned to cover a clash in Nigeria, aware that a single word could either calm or inflame the public. (Editor’s Note: The author has written for and was a former fellow at HumAngle Media.)
The language of journalism can shape public perception more than facts. Labels such as “Fulani herders” (referring to an ethnic group dispersed across the Sahara, Sahel, and West Africa, that are predominantly Muslim) or “Christian indigenes” can harden into stereotypes and cast a community as villains.
“The moment you fix a conflict on ethnicity or religion, you’re creating stereotypes, and stereotypes are dangerous. They fuel distrust, and sometimes, cost lives,” he notes.
In June 2025, Kpilaakaa published an analysis titled Plateau Mob Action: When Identity Becomes a Death Sentence in Nigeria, explaining how HumAngle’s reporting had documented a rise in mob violence in “states with entrenched ethno-religious fault lines” that was being driven by “ethnic and religious profiling,” with “deadly consequences” for travelers in the north central region of Nigeria. HumAngle has an editorial policy of complete avoidance of ethnic and religious labels to make sure their reporting is not inflammatory, but also to ensure that they remain a respected and impartial news source.
Reporters can bring closeness to the subject, a lived experience — and sometimes personal bias into the field. Editors act as intermediaries, ensuring that emotion does not eclipse accuracy and that stories serve the public interest.
Johnstone Kpilaakaa, sub editor and head of ethics and standards at HumAngle Media. Image: Courtesy of Kpilaakaa
That balance depends on open communication. When he was investigating the suspected armed attack in Nigeria’s Plateau State, Kpilaakaa feared the risk of crossing the line between journalism and commentary, objectivity, and identity, as his ethnic group was caught in the center of the violence.
“I knew I couldn’t tell this story without my feelings creeping in, so I told my editor upfront that my perspective might affect the framing,” he recalls. But with the subject expertise editors in his newsroom, where conflict reports pass through multiple editors —an extremism editor, a gender editor, a line editor, and a specialist editor — the reviews ensure deeper scrutiny.
“Bias is inevitable,” Kpilaakaa points out. “But with trust, expertise, and open dialogue, editors and reporters can transform vulnerability into stronger, more responsible journalism.”
There is no accuracy and balance in reports without community voices — they are essential.
“You can’t tell the story of people without talking to them,” says Kpilaakaa. Instead of scheduling interviews, he often visits homes or local leaders of affected communities directly, allowing residents to share raw emotions and experiences. Kpilaakaa recalls traveling to the Bassa Local Government area, in the north of Nigeria’s Plateau State, after a massacre earlier this year, where unscripted conversations revealed deeper truths. “The community knows the challenges — they are the ones living through it.”
Listening to both sides in a conflict setting and unscripted conversations brings more balance and depth to reporting, Kpilaakaa says.
Salam Omer, a media development expert and trainer for conflict-sensitive reporting, is the editor-in-chief of KirkukNow, an independent outlet covering Iraq’s disputed territories — areas in the north of the country, including Iraqi Kurdistan, inhabited by non-Arab groups such as Kurds, Assyrians, Yazidis, Turkmens, and Shabaks that were “Arabized” under Ba’ath Party rule and that are claimed by both the federal government in Baghdad and the Kurdish regional government. There are disputes over territory and control of resources, such as oil and gas. Kirkuk is the capital of the Kirkuk Governorate and the center of the oil industry in the region.
Image: Screenshot, KirkukNow
“My motivation has always been to ensure that journalism serves as a bridge between divided communities, amplifies marginalized voices, and contributes to peace and democratic development in the MENA region,” Omer says.
When KirkukNow dug into a land dispute and escalating tensions in villages around Kirkuk between farmers from the Arab and Kurdish communities, the newsroom reflected on the core principles of fairness, objectivity, and inclusion, demonstrated by presenting both Arab and Kurdish perspectives without inflammatory language, to avoid escalating disputes between the two parties.
In modern journalism, conflict-sensitive reporting is as difficult as it is important, explains Omer. “Journalists should be aware of up to 10 principles, such as verification, objectivity, originality, inclusiveness, transparency, fairness, self-constraint, humanity, accountability, and empowerment.”
In communities gripped by shifting conflict dynamics, newsrooms face the urgent task of safeguarding their work and their audiences. Preparation is key, Omer says. “To mitigate the risk of incitement, it is essential to have clear strategies, such as business plans, gender policies, and safeguarding policies.”
Trust comes from inclusivity, he notes. When diverse teams shape coverage, when editorial lines are transparent, and when stories are published in multiple languages, communities are more likely to believe their reporting is accurate and they are working for them rather than against them. “This consistency can help maintain operational space even in highly volatile situations,” Omer adds.
Omer remembers what that looks like in practice. At KirkukNow, while covering a conflict in Iraq, his newsroom faced an unusual demand. One of the parties involved wanted them to describe their dead as “martyred,” a word heavy with meaning, meant to sanctify loss and tilt the narrative.
Their choice at Kirkuknow was clear. “We refused,” he said. “As journalists, we are not in a position to decide who is right or wrong, nor are we a religious institution. Our role is simply to report facts.”
In an era of breaking news and viral misinformation, restraint has become as vital as accuracy. “Verify all information before publishing, keep stories updated, and issue corrections if mistakes are made,” Omer says. “Over time, this careful approach builds trust and credibility, even if it means being slower.”
That caution is more than theory — it is a practice. At KirkukNow, accuracy routinely takes precedence over speed. In its report on Yazidi survivors, six years after ISIS attacks and kidnappings, the newsroom documented the recovery efforts with precision and avoided including unverified claims.
By working closely with community sources and updating stories as new details emerged, they developed a “Follow-ups” section, which keeps stories updated when reporting is ongoing.
Such diligence is especially critical in the Middle East and North Africa, where religious beliefs can sometimes intersect with misinformation. He stressed that preparation, thorough research, and collaboration with other journalists are essential to avoid distortions.
“Journalists must remain committed to professional standards, no matter the pressures of the environment,” Omer cautions.
Too often, journalists portray victims of conflict in a way that reduces them to their suffering. Redwan Ahmed, a freelance journalist based in Bangladesh who has spent years reporting on the Rohingya crisis, explained that this framing can overshadow their resilience. For Ahmed, humanization begins with listening — without an agenda in the field or the editing room.
“It’s about which quotes we select, whose voice leads the story, and what context we provide,” he adds.
The challenge, he says, is to resist the temptation to define people solely by their wounds. Instead, try to include their aspirations and their fight to live with dignity. “It means being intentional with language: choosing dignity over dramatics, and agency over helplessness.” Ultimately, Ahmed explains, humanizing doesn’t mean sanitizing — it means offering a fuller picture of someone’s life and experiences.
Verification starts not with just a quote or a document, but with active listening and understanding context, explained Ahmed. “As a journalist, it’s crucial to recognize that testimony may come wrapped in fear, miscommunication, or limited understanding of the broader geopolitical stakes.”
Triangulation reporting is key, he emphasizes. That means asking follow-up questions in different ways, cross-checking claims with stakeholders, consulting researchers, and reviewing social media or audio-visual evidence.
“I’ve learned to take nothing at face value, but also not to dismiss a claim because it lacks conventional proof,” says Ahmed. “In a community where truth is routinely suppressed, sometimes the whispers and absences are what you must investigate hardest.”
In reporting, Ahmed avoids publishing identifying details without consent, and often uses encrypted messaging tools and off-record conversations to build trust. These protect sources whose information could, in some cases, cost someone their freedom or life. “In divided societies affected by ethnic or religious violence, protecting sources is not only a technical task — it is an ethical obligation,” he says.
This is alongside the risk of retaliation for many Rohingya, not only from state actors, but also from powerful groups within the large camps where many live in exile. “I’ve delayed stories to wait for people to relocate safely, or shifted the focus entirely to avoid exposing someone inadvertently,” said Ahmed.
For Priyadarshini Sen, safety and precautionary steps don’t begin with the battlefield, but in the newsroom — particularly for women journalists reporting from conflict zones.
Sen — an independent journalist in India and a member of the International Association of Religion Journalists, who reports mostly on the solution angle of religious and ethnic conflict — knows first-hand how female reporters can carry unique perspectives into war and crisis stories, yet also face gender-specific risks that heighten the dangers of these assignments.
“The safety of reporters starts from the newsroom, particularly for women conflict reporters,” she said. In her view, protection is not only about helmets or hostile environment training; it’s also about building networks that act as lifelines. Inside the newsroom, that might mean editors who monitor a reporter’s movements. Beyond that, they should have a set of emergency contacts is ready to step in at short notice.
Sen believes that, for women under the relentless pressure of daily deadlines, these safeguards can make the difference between vulnerability and security.
In volatile environments, the reporter’s greatest tools are not just notebooks or recorders, but relationships. Sen argues that sources are more than providers of information — they are partners in a delicate exchange of trust.
Treating those connections as purely transactional, she explains, erodes credibility and can heighten risks, especially in communities fractured by conflict. While reporting on a priest’s journey to finding peace across borders after years of religious and ethnic conflict, her on-the-ground fixer helped bridge cultural divides, allowing communities to open up and share their stories.
Respecting culture and being mindful of social status are practices that help responsible reporting. Working among marginalized communities is rarely straightforward.
When she met with members of a caste group to report on their marginalization, they hesitated, wary of her dress that symbolized an ethnic group with whom they had fraught relations. It was a reminder of how cultural signifiers can shape trust. With careful mediation from her fixer, who explained her intentions and background, the mistrust lifted. The residents eventually spoke openly, highlighting the importance of cultural sensitivity in conflict reporting.
But collaboration doesn’t stop there. While reporters should be aware of the environment and community they are reporting on, Sen encourages journalists to work in partnership with local reporters and fixers, particularly when the former do not share the religion or ethnicity of the community they’re covering. Such partnerships can lower barriers, reduce suspicion, and create safer spaces for conversations. “It allows people to respond more openly and engage intensively in conversations with reporters,” she said.
Abdulbasid Dantsoho is a Nigerian freelance journalist committed to uncovering truths and driving positive change by covering stories at the intersection of human rights, conflict, climate change, health, and accountability. He has been published by HumAngle Media and Kanempress. He was a media and accountability fellow with HumAngle Media 2023 and also a Journalism fellow with Africa Disease Prevention, Research and Development (ADRaP) 2024. He was a delegate at the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism conference in 2023.
2025-10-20 15:00:18
Editor’s Note: Ahead of the 14th Global Investigative Journalism Conference in Malaysia, GIJN is publishing a series of short interviews with a globally-representative sample of conference speakers. These are among the more than 300 leading journalists and editors who will be sharing practical investigative tools and insights at the event.
Natalia Viana is the co-founder and executive director of Agência Pública, Latin America’s largest nonprofit newsroom. Awarded a 2025 Maria Moors Cabot Prize for outstanding reporting in Latin America by Columbia University, Viana leads long-term investigative projects about corruption, injustice, and human rights abuses in Brazil and elsewhere in Latin America. In their citation for the Cabot prize, the awards committee at the Columbia Journalism School described the importance of her voice in the current global moment well: “Natalia Viana is the kind of journalist our times demand: a reporter, editor, storyteller, and mentor to new generations. Above all, she is an entrepreneur who has built digital-native investigative media outlets to expose power and its inner workings in an era overwhelmed by disinformation.”
Viana has also authored or co-authored five books on political violence and pressing public interest issues in Latin America, including her insider account of the WikiLeaks Cablegate saga, O Vazamento (“The Leak”), and her team has won 80 journalism prizes in total.
Viana will speak on panels titled Managing Investigative Newsrooms as well as Exposing Online Influence and Manipulation Operations at GIJC25 in Kuala Lumpur.
GIJN: Of all the investigations you or your team have worked on, which has been your favorite, and why?
Natalia Viana: There are so many! Our team is constantly working on amazing stories. Just this year, we published an amazing series about the slave past of [Brazil’s] political elite, which won the Excellence in Journalism Award by the Interamerican Press Society. And we are working on a series of investigations about the lobbying of Big Tech, which has been extremely active in Brazil. But for me, some of the investigations that touched me the most were Sao Gabriel and its Demons, about an epidemic of suicides amongst Indigenous peoples in the Amazon state, and the investigation into killings of civilians by the military in Rio’s favelas, which was a finalist at the Global Shining Light Award in 2019, by the way.
GIJN: What are the biggest challenges for investigative reporting in your country?
NV: Brazil is facing big challenges that are true elsewhere, but probably on a higher scale. Because of the wide use of tech platforms, disinformation is rampant and harassment against journalists is normalized — especially against female journalists. We at Agência Pública have to take a series of measures to guarantee the safety and also the mental health of our journalists, but it has been an uphill battle.
GIJN: What reporting tools, databases, or techniques have you found surprisingly useful for your investigations?
NV: I believe AI has a function as a tool, as a support for journalists, but not as a replacement. That’s why we launched early on a policy on how and where we would use AI. For instance, we pledged not to use AI for the production of journalistic content for our readers, but we absolutely should be using AI for internal tool development, summarizing, translating, and helping us see patterns in big data, etc. However, always under human supervision and always with fact checking afterwards.
GIJN: What’s the best advice you’ve received from a peer or journalism conference — and/ or what words of advice would you give an aspiring investigative journalist?
NV: The best advice that I have received was from Monica Gonzales, a top Chilean investigative journalist, from whom I sought advice when Bolsonaro was elected. She told me: go to the most important story; follow the money; follow the links; do not get sidetracked. I think as journalists we have to be brave and humble at the same time, but always truthful to ourselves, to know what is the real story going on. We should not be avoiding the big stories of our time, even if we feel that we are not good enough, or our media is not large enough, or we do not have enough money. It takes a journalist to know the truth.
GIJN: What topic blindspots or undercovered areas do you see in your region? And which of these are ripe for new investigation?
NV: The main issue today is that there has been a massive economic shift in how the internet, and especially these platforms, have operated since 2010. Those who study the subject often refer to it as “platformization” — where the internet has ceased to be an open field of exchange and has instead become a space dominated by a small number of large tech platforms, which are the main products of five companies that dominate digital communications: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft. We could also include ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, and Twitter/X.
We have an obligation to investigate the influence of Big Tech, its alliance with the far right, and especially with the government of Donald Trump, as well as how its investments in lobbying and influence operations have managed to maintain its market power in most countries worldwide. This is one of the most concentrated, profitable, and least regulated markets in the history of capitalism. I believe journalism still has a huge task ahead in investigating these companies, their financial structures, their offshore headquarters, their executives, and their relationships with politicians and the press.
GIJN: Can you share an example of the kind of technique or insight you plan to highlight for GIJC25 attendees — or otherwise what you yourself are looking forward to in Malaysia, whether in terms of networking or learning about an emerging reporting challenge or approach?
NV: I am looking forward to the conference and will focus on investigating tech, as well as several other discussion panels about this topic. I feel that journalists around the globe, but especially in the Global South, must connect and start partnering up to report on the economic abuse of these companies. I always learn a lot when I go to GIJC, and look forward to the event that presents the winner of the Global Shining Light Award. I always feel so inspired and challenged to do more and better journalism afterwards. Finally, I am very, very excited to see the first GIJC to be conducted by a woman, GIJN’s executive director, Emilia Díaz-Struck, an amazing journalist from Venezuela who we in Latin America have had the luck to know for years. I am very glad to see her leading this global powerhouse of journalism!
Rowan Philp is GIJN’s global reporter and impact editor. A former chief reporter for South Africa’s Sunday Times, he has reported on news, politics, corruption, and conflict from more than two dozen countries around the world, and has also served as an assignments editor for newsrooms in the UK, US, and Africa.
2025-10-18 04:25:49
Online scams have become borderless threats that evolve rapidly in scale, sophistication, and impact. From fraudsters using the Internet to steal to phishing networks that engage in social engineering and trick individuals, scams are often backed by organized criminal groups that exploit weak law enforcement, jurisdictional loopholes, and digital anonymity.
For investigative reporters, uncovering the individuals, platforms and financial flows behind these operations is essential to protect the public interest and expose the broader systems that enable online fraud. More money is being lost to online scams and cybercriminals than ever before, according to the FBI.
In this webinar, investigative journalists from around the world will gain practical strategies and tools for tracking, verifying, and reporting on online scams. Whether you’re new to the topic or looking to deepen your expertise, this session will provide advice for impactful reporting on one of the world’s most urgent issues.
Antonio Baquero is a journalist based in Barcelona. He joined OCCRP in 2020 and is an investigative editor covering Europe and beyond. Before that, he made his professional career at El Periódico Catalunya, where he served as a correspondent in North Africa, specializing in migration, as well as a war reporter in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. He participated in OCCRP’s series Scam Empire.
Damien Leloup is an investigative reporter for Le Monde, with a strong focus on tech and the tech industry, and collaborative projects (e.g., Pegasus project, Uber Files). He also covers scams big and small, from the gray economy of affiliate marketing to dropshipping and investment scams.
Hera Rizwan is a reporter with BOOMLive India. She investigates cyber scams, online fraud, digital threats, and the intersection of technology with society.
Nyakerario Omari is a Nairobi‑based fact‑checker and investigative journalist with experience in open source reporting, data research, and digital verification. She is affiliated with Africa Uncensored and has worked with Code4Africa, among others.
The moderator is Craig Silverman, an award-winning investigative journalist, digital investigations/OSINT trainer, and public speaker. Cofounder of The Indicator and GIJN Digital Threats Online Course Lead Trainer.
Watch our Twitter feed @gijn and newsletter for details on future events.
Sign up for the webinar here!
Date: Tuesday October 28
Time: 09:00 AM EDT – Find out what time that is in your city.
2025-10-17 15:00:53
Increasingly threatened by authoritarian regimes, Asia has suffered an accelerating slide in press freedoms, and is now home to five countries ranked as dire environments for independent journalism that are also among the world’s 10 most populous nations.
Facing challenges from environmental exploitation to state repression and human trafficking — and, increasingly, as the center of economic power and new technologies in the world — there is no region in greater need of new pathways to public interest information, and of the full support of the global investigative journalism community. Despite harassment, extreme financial pressures, and sometimes exile, Asia’s investigative journalism community has not only survived, but inspired global peers with pioneering outlets, impactful scoops, and resilience in the face of repression.
But the stakes and threats are higher than ever — and the world’s watchdogs need to support their Asian peers, as well as learn from them.
The first-ever Global Investigative Journalism Conference to be held in Asia — GIJC25 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, from November 20 – 24 — will feature a treasure-trove of Asia-focused panels, data workshops, and networking events, as well as a who’s who of the region’s leading investigative journalists as expert speakers.
As with all previous GIJCs, this will be a truly global gathering of attendees from more than 100 countries, with more than 150 expert sessions relevant to independent journalists in every region, and several new urgent-topic tracks. But the central importance of regional public interest issues, growing press freedom threats locally, and the collaborative power of Asia’s investigative reporting community will be recognized throughout the program tracks and practical sessions. The panels and techniques workshops will feature a record cohort of nearly 100 expert Asian investigative journalists and editors, hailing from all across the continent.
This focus is embodied by Malaysia’s pioneering outlet Malaysiakini, which has held bad actors in the region accountable for a quarter century despite police raids and harassment. It will serve as co-host of GIJC25, along with the Global Investigative Journalism Network (GIJN).
Indeed, the growing appetite and need for robust independent journalism in Asia is well illustrated by the vocal reader support for Malaysiakini’s work — including public vigils outside its newsroom following police raids — and even begrudging praise from politicians held accountable by its reporters.
“Asia has its fair share of authoritarian governments. By holding its first Global Investigative Journalism Conference in this part of the world, GIJN sends an unmistakable message to these governments that they will be held to account for their actions,” says Steven Gan, co-founder of Malaysiakini. “Citizens in these countries are often kept in the dark — they can smell the stench of corruption but they cannot see. Our task as journalists is to turn on the light.”
Some Asia highlights of the GIJC25 program include:
Image: Courtesy of Maria Ressa
The opening keynote address will be delivered by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Ressa, the iconic co-founder of Rappler in the Philippines, and an investigative journalist who has since become a leading global voice for exposing disinformation and autocracy. That must-see speech on the future of the global investigative community will be followed by an all-Asian keynote panel including Nitin Sethi, founding editor of India’s The Reporter’s Collective, Rappler Executive Editor Glenda Gloria, and Wahyu Dhyatmika, CEO of Indonesia’s Tempo Digital, moderated by Malaysiakini’s Steven Gan.
Previously, GIJN hosted regional Asian investigative conferences in Manila (2014), Kathmandu (2016), and Seoul (2018). A fourth ‘Uncovering Asia’ conference had been planned for Kuala Lumpur in 2020 before it was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and that city will now host the largest international gathering of investigative journalists.
Rowan Philp is GIJN’s global reporter and impact editor. A former chief reporter for South Africa’s Sunday Times, he has reported on news, politics, corruption, and conflict from more than two dozen countries around the world, and has also served as an assignments editor for newsrooms in the UK, US, and Africa.
Illustration: Nyuk was born in 2000 in South Korea. He is currently studying at the Department of Applied Art Education at Hanyang University in Seoul, where he also works as an illustrator. Since the exhibition at Hidden Place in 2021, he has participated in various illustration exhibitions. He is mainly interested in hand drawing, which represents the value of his art world.
2025-10-16 15:00:53
South Asia is a major origin, transit, and destination point for internal and transnational human trafficking and smuggling, due to the region’s porous borders, high rates of poverty and unemployment, and weak law enforcement.
Since 2010, the issue has been exacerbated by wars, political violence, and instability in Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, which have transformed trafficking routes. Economic migrants have merged with refugees fleeing conflict and persecution, and the numbers have risen since the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread job losses.
Recent data from the UN’s International Organization for Migration (IOM) shows that 2024 was Asia’s deadliest year for migrants, with at least 2,514 lives lost. Most of the surge in fatalities involved Rohingya Muslims fleeing persecution in Myanmar, and Afghans escaping ongoing regional instability and repression.
Though often conflated in media reports and policy discussions, human trafficking and human smuggling are distinct but interconnected crimes. Human trafficking aims to exploit and involves the recruitment and transportation of persons through force, coercion, or deception, for sexual exploitation or forced labor; women and children make up the majority of victims. People or human smuggling aims to make a profit off those who want to migrate, often by providing or promising passage or false documents. There are many overlapping issues, such as push factors (conflict, persecution, and poverty), survivors’ experiences, and migration routes. People are often victims of both.
In South Asia, common migration routes include internal, such as from rural to wealthier states and cities; cross-border, like from Bangladesh to India; or transnational, for instance, to Europe through Iran and Turkey or from North Africa over the Mediterranean Sea, or from the Bay of Bengal to Southeast Asia. The Gulf States are a significant destination, both for legal work and trafficked persons, and are also a transit stop on the way to Southeast Asia.
Investigative journalists in the region have discovered that smuggling networks often start with local recruiters — who can be friends and neighbors — and expand into organized syndicates that operate across borders, using forged documents and employment contracts, often with the support of border guards, embassy personnel, or other officials.
GIJN spoke with journalists and experts who have covered these issues from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India, who have spent years building contacts; sat down with trafficking survivors, the agents that recruit them, and middlemen; mapped smuggling routes and logistics; and posed undercover as Afghan migrants to report on one of the fastest-growing transnational organized crimes.
Pakistan is both a source and transit country for trafficking and smuggling; for example, it’s an important route for migrants from Afghanistan, who cross through the border between the sparsely populated southwestern province of Balochistan and Iran on a long journey to the Balkans region. Two investigations highlight the dangers of this route and the reasons people attempt it.
Journalist Sahar Baloch’s 2023 story, Quetta: How People Are Smuggled Into Europe, features an interview with an “agent” involved in transporting people through the province.
During lockdown in 2020, Baloch, then a broadcast journalist with BBC Urdu in Islamabad, was working on audio reports on the smuggling of petrol and food items through the Iran-Pakistan border in Balochistan, and kept hearing about how human traffickers were using the same trails to smuggle migrants out of the country, in what is colloquially known as the “dunki” (donkey) route to Europe via the Middle East.
Then, in February 2023, a migrant boat carrying 200 people capsized off the coast of Italy, killing 94 passengers, including Pakistani-Hazara hockey player Shahida Raza, who had left Balochistan in search of medical treatment for her three-year-old son.
While working on a video about Raza, Baloch searched through social media sites, looking for any information she could find on human traffickers. “I was going through TikTok and Facebook and came across so many accounts of ‘agents’ offering ‘VIP packages’ to take people to Iran, Turkey, Greece, etc.,” Baloch explains.
“All this was happening openly, and it was being publicized as an ‘adventure,’” she adds. “Some migrants would upload celebratory videos of themselves upon reaching Europe, thanking their ‘brother’ (the agent), so that got me wondering: Who are these agents?”
She got in touch with one agent who said he was in Belgium (“his number was on his page; it wasn’t like he was trying to hide”), and posed as someone looking to migrate to Europe. He told her to get to Quetta, the provincial capital in Balochistan, because his “services” only began there — and to bring money.
Right before she reached Quetta, however, she called the agent and blurted out the truth: that she was a journalist working on a story on human trafficking. He hung up. “Everyone [around me] laughed and said: ‘Why would anyone speak to you?’ That led to what she calls one of the most interesting, but unsettling interviews of her career.
She had only two days left in Quetta to find a story, so she contacted an old source who connected her with an “agent” in Panjpai: a vast and barren stretch of land about 50-55 kilometers (31-34 miles) outside of Quetta. She had doubts about the interview but arrived with a driver and video journalist Khair Muhammad, both of whom spoke Brahui (one of the languages spoken in Balochistan).
To her surprise, the agent, whose face was concealed in the video, spoke openly and casually about how migrants were packed into “cage-like” vans, and that buses full of people were auctioned off among agents in places like Quetta and Machh. He also spoke about how some ethnic groups, like Hazaras, who were fleeing for security reasons, were charged more compared to Punjabis; how some passengers would agree to being crammed into the trunk of the buses; and how much the agents would need to pay off paramilitary officers at the border guards, anything from 5,000 rupees (US$56), if he happened to be from the same village, to 30,000 rupees (US$338), if he was an outsider.
“Some people would die before they even reached the border, just drop dead [from thirst and exhaustion], because Balochistan is tough; there aren’t many roads or facilities,” Baloch explains. “It’s an intimidating landscape.”
Muhammad Akbar Notezai, from the daily newspaper Dawn, has also investigated this trafficking route, examining other dangers like thieves who steal from passengers at gunpoint, and the risk of being shot at by Iranian border guards. For an exposé, he went undercover posing as an Afghan migrant, traveling from Duk, on the Balochistan-Afghanistan border, to Iran in a pickup truck.
Reporter Muhammad Akbar Notezai went undercover to understand the human smuggling trade between Afghanistan and Iran. Image: Screenshot, Dawn
“I didn’t tell anyone, not even my family,” he tells GIJN. The only person who knew was a source who had helped connect him to a trafficker. “If anything were to happen to me, he was to inform my family and colleagues at Dawn.”
Originally from the Chaghai district, on the Balochistan-Iran border, Akbar had previously reported on human trafficking for Dawn Investigations in 2018, interviewing FIA [security agency] officials, migrants, and their families. He focused mainly on Afghan migrants fleeing war and political instability, and economic migrants from the small towns of Punjab.
“In Punjab, there’s this idea in their mind that Europe is better,” says Akbar, who refers to these migrants as “dream chasers” in his article. “I told them I only have a pen and paper, no camera, so they opened up to me.” That reporting laid the groundwork for his undercover investigation years later.
To prepare, he made trips to all the sites he would eventually have to pass through on the way to the border, traveling to places 500-700 kilometers (310-435 miles) away from Quetta, changing his phone and SIM card so he couldn’t be tracked, and learning Dari to be more convincing in his role. “I saw it as a public service, which kept me motivated despite the risks,” he says.
“Most people didn’t know much about human trafficking in Balochistan before 2018,” Akbar notes, even though the route is said to have been active since the 1970s, when Bengalis and Sri Lankans were fleeing conflict and persecution. “The reporting does make some difference. There are tighter restrictions for a while, but it’s such a vast racket that it’s hard to shut down completely.”
For over a decade, Shariful Islam Hasan covered some of Bangladesh’s most pressing issues, including migration and human trafficking, for Prothom Alo, one of the country’s leading newspapers.
Some of the most unforgettable cases he encountered included Bangladeshi migrants being tortured in Libya, or sold in Dubai, or sexually exploited in Saudi Arabia.
Since 2017, he’s been the associate director of the Migration and Youth Platform at Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), one of the world’s largest NGOs.
“Presently, Bangladeshis form the largest group of migrants using the Central Mediterranean route to Europe via Libya,” he explains. In January, for instance, the bodies of 23 Bangladeshi nationals washed up on the Libyan shore after a migrant boat had set off for Italy a few days earlier.
“There are three or four layers in this trade,” adds Hasan. “The first is someone from within the local community, who deceives victims of a dream life in Europe. They tell people they can go to Europe on a big boat. But then they reach Libya, are kept as hostages, tortured, and their families are asked for ransom. If families aren’t able to pay, they get killed. The international traffickers are never arrested.”
“When I started [covering these issues], there were no laws or rules,” he points out. “It was only after mass graves of Rohingya were discovered between 2012 and 2015 that the government started looking into how to combat illegal routes from the Bay of Bengal to Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, etc.”
Since 2012, Bangladesh has passed two major laws aimed at curbing the practice. This legislation criminalizes all forms of human trafficking, while also providing rehabilitation for victims.
India’s Northeast region shares international borders with Nepal, Bhutan, China, Bangladesh, and Myanmar, where the state of Assam, in particular, is one of the “major hotbeds for human trafficking,” says Pari Saikia, an independent journalist based in Delhi.
Originally from the area, Saikia has spent her entire career reporting on human trafficking in India, which she says is “a global transit, source and destination point” for the trade, besides the frequent domestic trafficking happening within its own borders, particularly of women and girls forced into labor or sexual exploitation.
She first encountered this issue as an aspiring young journalism student. Her father, a local police officer, suggested she meet some trafficking victims who had been rescued from abusive situations in Delhi and Noida, where they were sold by fake recruitment agencies to work as domestic helpers.
“There were 22 girls: some were as young as 12, 13, 14 years old, some had cigarette burn marks on their bodies, and several looked malnourished,” she recalls.
This became her first story, and she says it was a defining moment, though she admits she feels bittersweet looking back now. “When you report on an issue for a very long time, and you see the cycle repeating without much change, you ask yourself: What’s the point of investigating, if it doesn’t lead to anything?,” she says. “However, I refuse to give up.”
In 2024, she published a longform investigation recounting the harrowing 500-day journey of a migrant (‘Singh’) who was “once trafficked, twice smuggled” on his way from Indian Punjab to Portugal, which has become a common entry or destination point for many migrants from South Asia in recent years due to its less difficult residency process.
“With a Temporary Residence Card (TRC), migrants can travel through most of the Schengen region for short periods, creating a market for traffickers to illegally move people across borders into Italy, Germany, or Spain on false job promises,” Saikia explains. “People are told it will be easy. They aren’t warned about the long overland routes, the cold, the risks, or the fact that they’ll likely have to work illegally once they arrive, or pay extortion to stay alive.”
She was working on a series of articles on the lives of Punjabi women in Europe when she soon began receiving phone calls from migrants and their families — including ‘Singh,’ who said he was stranded in Cyprus after his passport had been confiscated by ‘donkers’ (colloquial term for traffickers).
He ended up on the Mediterranean island after transiting through Serbia — where Indians were allowed visa-free entry at the time. Many of the traffickers he encountered on his journey were South Asians operating small guesthouses and networks specifically for smuggling migrants. ‘Singh’ said his family had sold their land to pay his smugglers’ fees, and he refused to return home empty handed.
Indian journalist Pari Saikia tracked the 500-day migration journey of ‘Singh,’ whose smuggling journey traversed Asia and Europe. Image: Screenshot, Rural India online
“For three years, I followed his case,” Saikia recalls. “He told me he was moving from one country to another, and if I didn’t hear from him within 48 hours, I should alert the embassy.”
Traffickers market migration like a business. “They offer two packages: one for Europe and one for the United States,” she explained. “The European route costs less, while the US route can go up to 60 lakh rupees (US$68,000).”
Even as more reports surface about boats sinking in the Mediterranean or migrants dying along overland routes, recruitment and trafficking networks across Asia continue to adapt, using social media, fake recruitment agencies, and word-of-mouth promises.
“The traffickers know exactly what people want to hear,” she notes. “They sell hope. And hope is hard to resist when opportunities at home are so limited.”
Sama Faruqi is a freelance journalist based in Karachi, Pakistan.
Illustration: Nyuk was born in 2000 in South Korea. He is currently studying at the Department of Applied Art Education at Hanyang University in Seoul, where he also works as an illustrator. Since the exhibition at Hidden Place in 2021, he has participated in various illustration exhibitions. He is mainly interested in hand drawing, which represents the value of his art world.
