Jelena Kulidžan

Jelena Kulidžan works for Vijesti, a private TV broadcaster in Montenegro. Her main tasks including daily reporting but she also works as the co-editor and presenter of Prime Time News.

She got her first TV journalism work experience with the television channel IN, while studying for the third year of her journalism degree at the University of Montenegro’s political science faculty.

Up until early 2011, Kulidžan completed a six-month internship at Germany’s Deutsche Welle in Bonn.

Kulidžan was awarded second prize in the 2011 fellowship programme for her investigation into rape sentencing.

She discovered convicted rapists in Montenegro usually serve two years and eight months in jail, while the average sentence is eight years in other European countries.

Kulidžan visited Serbia, Brussels and the UK to compare sentencing policy and find out why custodial sentences for rapists vary so widely across Europe.

Fellowship Article

http://fellowship.birn.eu.com/en/file/show/Around-45-per-cent-of-rape-victims-in-the-UK-have-had-a-sexual-relationship-with-their-attacker.jpg

Rough Justice for Balkan Rape Victims

Convicted rapists in Montenegro and Serbia routinely receive minimal jail terms of around three years, while their victims face years of trauma and distress. Yet in other European countries like the UK, the average sentence is eight years.

Diary

20 Sep 2011 / 10:51

The Fellowship Endgame

Jelena Kulidzan

After three months of research, 300 sent emails, 30 interviews, days of reading and quite a few stress symptoms, Jelena Kulidzan completes her Balkan Fellowship for Journalistic Excellence story. Was it worth the 2,500 words?

03 Aug 2011 / 11:29

UK Rape Survivors Demand Justice

Jelena Kulidzan

Women had to fight hard to reform the way the state handles sexual violence in the UK, but the results include specially trained police, prosecutors and judges, plus a rise in the number of reported rapes.

05 Jul 2011 / 10:35

Rapes Go Unreported in Serbia

Jelena Kulidzan

A leading criminologist describes Serbia’s sentencing guidelines as “catastrophic”, as just five women came forward with rape complaints in Belgrade last year.

22 Jun 2011 / 12:19

Greetings from Grey Brussels

Jelena Kulidzan

My investigation has finally started with the Zero Tolerance on Domestic Violence: Towards a Comprehensive EU-Wide Policy conference in Brussels. Next stop: London.

02 Jun 2011 / 11:49

Hard Times: Getting the Facts

Jelena Kulidzan

Getting your factual research under way is vital but not always as easy as you might think, finds our 2011 fellow from Montenegro.

Topic

Topic 2011: Justice

The topic for this year’s programme is justice and fellows are investigating subjects as diverse as privatisation, organised crime, employment law, rape convictions and extradition treaties.