COUNTDOWN NAIROBI! Get our message into the media!

Dear campaigners

The Nairobi Summit is now just around the corner – it takes place in less than 20 days!

Here, in the fifth Action Alert for COUNTDOWN NAIROBI, we ask you to make contact with media sources in your country and provide them with ideas, information, contacts and materials to help get great worldwide coverage of the landmark event in Nairobi. (NairobiSummit: 29 November – 3 December)

Also, for those of you working to publicise the Landmine Monitor 2004, please find ways to combine media outreach on the report with media outreach for the Summit. (Landmine Monitor release: 18 November)

Media coverage matters because: it helps spread awareness about the continuing landmine crisis and the importance of solving it; it keeps up pressure on everyone to adhere to the worldwide ban; and it helps push treaty member states to do all they can, including accelerated demining and more comprehensive victim assistance. Together we can make a big splash at the Nairobi Summit!

Resources are listed below to use in your media outreach. Also, feel free to contact Sue Wixley (wixley-insert 'at' sign-icbl.org) or others in the ICBL media team in Nairobi for help or advice.

Thanks a lot!

ICBL staff

Contents

1. Media activities
2. Tools
3. Previous countdowns
4. To-do list

1. MEDIA ACTIVITIES

• Send out an advisory telling the media about the Summit. Here is an advisory you can adapt and use.
• Call or visit your media contacts (newspapers, wire services, radio, tv, websites, magazines) to explain why the Nairobi Summit is important and encourage them to cover it.
• Suggest ways the media can cover the Summit:
  • Suggest and discuss possible angles for their coverage. See this list of ideas and angles and add your own ideas. Also see this list of side events of the Nairobi Summit (a document of highlights for the media should be ready in the coming period).
  • Arrange an interview before/during and after the event. You could do this interview yourself or you could suggest setting up interviews with ICBL campaigners, survivors, deminers, and experts who’ll be in Nairobi.
  • Invite them to cover your campaign’s preparatory events for the Summit (press conference, briefing session, training, Landmine Monitor release events...)
  • Ask them to organise a talk show or panel discussion on the landmine issue and Summit with a high-profile supporter of the campaign in your country (e.g. religious leader, celebrity).
• Write an opinion article on why the Summit is important in your country. Or contact Sue Wixley if you are interested in getting one of the opinion pieces by a high-profile ICBL supporter published in one of your newspapers. Email: wixley-insert 'at' sign-icbl.org
• Combine media outreach on the Landmine Monitor release and the NairobiSummit. For example you could talk about expectations and activities for the Summit during an LM press conference or in LM media kits.
• Say that the ICBL will release a press statement on 29 November for the opening day of the Summit. This will be available for campaigns from 22 November for you to adapt and translate. Contact Sue if you would like a copy of the embargoed release: wixley-insert 'at' sign-icbl.org
• Pass on your contact details in Nairobi or those of the ICBL media team contacts in Nairobi (from 15 November onwards: 254 (0) 735 337 396 (mobile) and media-insert 'at' sign -icbl.org.
• Bring your contact list with you to Nairobi so that you can follow up with phone calls and send them information.

2. TOOLS

• Media Advisory
• Q and A on the Summit
• Q & A : answers to topical questions from the media
• Ideas and angles for stories on the Summit
• Contacts for the press:
  • ICBL contacts
  • UN/ICRC/Government contacts
  • accreditation contacts
• Tips for campaigners on publicity
• ICBL Nairobi Summit media room: more items for the Summit will be posted in the coming weeks
• B-roll film: comprehensive background footage has been compiled and reproduced by the States Parties’ Implementation Support Unit and the United Nations. These can be obtained in Nairobi and also through direct contacts with the ISU and UN.

3. PREVIOUS COUNTDOWNS

• Is your government delegation to the Summit well-prepared and does it include Ministerial or Head of State representation? See: Countdown Nairobi 1 and this article on VIPs.
• Did your government make input on the Summit documents? If not there is still a chance to do so during the first three days of the Nairobi Summit. Encourage them to support wording on strong commitment to clearing mined areas in the final Action Plan and Review documents? See: Countdown Nairobi 3. Also, encourage them to work for clarity and common understanding in order to ensure the treaty is fully upheld by making statements on their positions on definition issues, mines retained for training and joint operations (Articles 1, 2 and 3 of the treaty). Encourage their support of New Zealand’s proposal on mines retained for training. See: Countdown Nairobi 2 and update from the consultation meeting
• have you asked young people in your country to endorse the youth declaration? This will to be adopted at the International Youth Symposium during the Nairobi Summit.

4. TO-DO LIST

List of tasks for a succesful Nairobi Summit on a Mine-Free World!