Petra Blažić, Project Manager at Centre for European Perspective from Slovenia. Photo: Meta.mk, used with permission. This article was originally published by Meta.mk. An edited version is republished here under a content-sharing agreement between Global Voices and Metamorphosis Foundation. Meta.mk spoke with Petra Balažič, project manager from the Slovenian Center for European Perspective (CEP), which works in the Western Balkans region on increasing resilience to disinformation. She pointed out that spreading disinformation is a matter of security and stability of the countries of the Western Balkans, but also that different age groups in societies should be approached differently when dealing with disinformation. Meta.mk: Do you or your organization consider the disinformation issue to be a stability and security issue? Petra Balažič (PB): Disinformation is most definitely a stability and security issue. What disinformation tries to do is to expose and abuse the vulnerabilities of societies to tear those societies apart. If disinformation campaigns are successful and you lose societal cohesion, then you come into a situation where implementing democratic principles, standards and practices becomes very difficult. With a lack of societal cohesion, you have greater antagonism in society, and that also invites, in the worst case scenario, even aggression, violence and unwillingness to work together for a common future. Meta.mk: Please tell us more about CEP's work on countering disinformation in Western Balkan countries. PB: The Center for European Perspective is an institution that was established in 2020 by the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of Slovenia. We have since then grown considerably and are now implementing a vast number of successful projects, because we have, with our hard work, proven that we are trustworthy, and because of that, we have had a lot of projects coming in. We implement projects in regional cooperation, in peace and security, in strategic communications, strengthening societal resilience and countering disinformation, and of course the flagship Bled Strategic Forum, which is very well known in this part of the world. And it’s really something that we as Center for European Perspective and as Slovenia are really proud of. We are trying to get the government, the media and civil society organizations to work together to maintain a dialogue and to eventually come to a point where they can together establish national mechanisms for the fight against disinformation. Having a strategy in place means that you know how you define disinformation, who is responsible for countering it and in what way, how you will communicate the response to the people as well as which sector will be responsible for which part of the defense. That concerns both the sectors within the government, and the sectors of the overall societies. I would also like to mention another project that has been very successful and that is complementary to the project that I just described, and that is the European digital diplomacy exchange. This is a project that is focused on the proactive strengthening of social resilience to disinformation through successful strategic communications of governments, to the societies in order to inoculate societies when it comes to disinformation. This project has been running for six years now, and it has truly been a very successful one. And it doesn’t include only the Western Balkans, but also the Eastern Partnership countries, the Baltics and the US and Canada. Meta.mk: Do you think it is possible for the government, civil society, the media, to sit on one table and discuss strategy for combating disinformation? PB: I have to believe that it’s possible. And I do. I do, honestly in my heart believe that it is possible. I think it takes time. I think it takes a lot of energy and unwavering commitment. It does require an investment both in terms of time and in terms of many frustrations that we encounter along the way. It’s not stopping us. And I do believe that there is the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. To some extent, the mistrust between sectors makes sense, but it is also not a finality. It doesn’t have to be this way. If we maintain this dialogue, we will be able to rebuild that trust. Three good people — one in each sector — can be enough for a step forward to be taken. We obviously hope that there is more than three, but we are confident that as time progresses we will get more people on board and be able to rebuild trust. I want to mention at this point that we had in June in Portorož, in Slovenia, a regional training on countering disinformation.