Al Jazeera Balkans Goes on Air

Al Jazeera launches its new branch, Al Jazeera Balkans, on Friday at 6pm, a new service broadcasting in the main languages of the former Yugoslavia.

The station’s headquarters are in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, with offices in Zagreb, Belgrade and Skopje. Correspondents are also based in Podogorica, Pristina, Mostar and Banja Luka.

Beyond the region, the channel will have its own reporters in Washington, London, Berlin, Vienna, Moscow, Istanbul and Jerusalem – as well as being able to draw on the resources of 70 Al Jazeera bureaux worldwide.

It will be mark the first region-wide TV news service since the 1990s when the former Yugoslavia broke up.

Al Jazeera is an independent broadcaster owned by the state of Qatar through the Qatar Media Corporation and headquartered in Doha.

Launched in 1996 as an Arabic news and current affairs satellite TV channel, Al Jazeera has since expanded into a network with several outlets, including the Internet and specialty TV channels in multiple languages.