The Crimean Information and Press Center was created by IREX as part of the ProMedia program in 1997. In October 2002, the Crimean IPC was spun off from IREX and has been operating as a Ukrainian NGO since then. It has received funding from the U.S. Embassy’s Media-Development Fund, from the Eurasia Foundation and the International Renaissance Foundation, as well as from IREX ProMedia. IPC is currently supported by U-Media through a subgrant from IREX.

Because of economic conditions, few newspapers in Southern Ukraine make much of a profit and salaries for journalists are low. Many journalists and newspapers cannot afford regular Internet use or other research materials. Similarly, few media outlets have their own lawyers, - that is why Crimean Information and Press Center is a vital importance to the regional media.

The Crimean IPC:

• offers research facilities, including: a library and a computer class with Internet access to journalists; 
•  provides space for press conferences, roundtables, seminars, and other meetings, including meetings of media NGOs;
• offers legal advice to media outlets and journalists;
• conducts and hosts training sessions for journalists and media business staff.

All of these services are provided free of charge. The center is heavily used, and there is no similar organization providing these services to journalists in Crimea.

Located in Simferopol, Crimea, the center provides services to journalists and media outlets throughout Crimea and in the southern Ukrainian oblasts of Odesa, Mykolaiv, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Journalists outside of Simferopol most often seek information from the Crimean IPC lawyer or librarian by phone, fax or e-mail. During current year IPC  works as “Recourse Center “Elections 2006”. Within this project IPC publishes a bulletin on legal issues “Attorney of the Fourth Power” and IPC lawyer does pre-publication expertise of materials for media outlets.

Crimean Information and Press Center:

Address: vul. Sevastopolska 8, room 99 Simferopol, AR Crimea, 95005; Tel/fax +38 (0652) 251548; +38 (0652) 273190;

Valentyna Samar: Director

Nariman Abdureshitov: Executive Director nariman@ipc.crimea.ua

Vera Soboleva: Librarian vera@ipc.crimea.ua

Ukrainian Association of Independent Regional Publishers (UAIRP)

UAIRP protects interests of independent regional press publishers, forms and spreads ethical principles of mass media activity, establishes contacts with partners in Ukraine and abroad.

Among the main activities of the new professional association is partnership on the advertising market in Ukraine, involvement of national advertisers into regional press, experience exchange, common trainings, professional development workshops, abroad internships, conducting of sociological studies of readers’ audiences, organization of effective press distribution systems, creation of common Internet resources, lobbying regional press publishers’ interests, etc.

Association unites 20 newspaper market leaders from Vinnytsya, Dnipropetrovsk, Dniprodzerzhynsk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya, Melitopol, Ivano-Frankivsk, Luhansk,  Lviv, Poltava, Kremenchuk, Rivne, Sumy, Ternopil, Kherson, Khmelnytskyy, Cherkasy, chernivtsi and Feodosiya. Total circulation of the newspapers of UAIPR makes up 2 million copies.

The highest UAIRP body is General meeting of Publishers-Members, operational management is done by the Board of Directors, which consists of 7 publishers.

Contacts:

• Iryna Sadova – UAIPR Executive Director
•  Nadiya Serdyuk – UAIPR office manager

UAIPR address: Kyiv, Vul Hertsena 7 room 2, Tel/fax: (044) 483 57 55, E-mail: sadova@voliacable.com