Belga News Agency

Belga News AgencyTemplate:Efn (abbr. Belga) is the only national news agency of Belgium and serves as the main supplier of daily news to Belgian media. It was founded in 1920, primarily by Maurice Travailleur, as the . Following a reform in 1970, the agency consists of two independent departments for Dutch and French-language reporting. As of 2024, Belga employs around 80 permanent journalists and 30 local correspondents, overseen by an editor-in-chief. Since December 2014, the agency has been headquartered in the Quays or Sainte-Catherine/Sint-Katelijne Quarter of Brussels.Template:Sfn It is an active member of the European Alliance of News Agencies.

History

Founded by engineer Maurice TravailleurTemplate:Efn with the key involvement of journalist Pierre-Marie Olivier, King Albert I of Belgium, and the king's secretary M. L. Gérard on August 20, 1920,Template:Sfn the (Template:Lit; abbreviated to Belga)Template:Sfn was established to position Belgium in the international information process after World War I, when its policy of obligatory neutrality had ended.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The starting capital amounted to five million francs, almost entirely provided by industrial and banking companies.Template:Sfn The agency began functioning on January 1 the next year, with Travailleur serving as the first president of its board of directors.Template:Sfn During the Nazi German occupation of Belgium, Belga was shut down, its board and editors-in-chief were arrested, and the agency was restarted by the occupation government in January 1941 as "Belga Press," which almost exclusively sourced information from the Nazi press agency Template:Ill.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Following the Allied liberation of 1944, Travailleur, Antoine Seyl, and a few former staff members reestablished Belga, with operations continuing again on September 5 that year.Template:Sfn Also in the same year, Belga began issuing reports in Dutch, previously being an exclusively Francophone agency.Template:Sfn Increasing regionalist sentiments in the 1960s provoked a reform of the production process in 1970: two equally-sized departments, one for Dutch and the other for French, would produce content independently of the other within the same newsroom.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Description

Structure

Belga is the main and only national news agency in Belgium,Template:Sfn relying on some 80 permanent journalists working in the two main national languages, as well as on 30 local correspondents,Template:Sfn since 2024Template:Dated maintenance category (articles).Template:Efn The newsroom is headed by the editor-in-chief (currently Hans Vandendriessche) and divided into two language-based departments, each overseen by their own deputy editor-in-chief.Template:Sfn Since January 2016, the CEO of the agency has been Patrick Lacroix.

Content

Aside from minor reporting on European politics in Brussels, the agency primarily produces news video, photographs or audio regarding domestic affairs within Belgium. News regarding international affairs is translated from foreign European agencies.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

External links

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