SWI swissinfo.ch 2024 Annual Report
Swiss review of Global, European and U.S. occurrences in the world today and its impact upon their country and its people and well as others. It is interesting if you have time to read such. I would read their news when I could as well as the German reports while in Europe.
SWI swissinfo.ch 2024 Annual Report – SWI swissinfo.ch
April 28, 2025
Dear friends of SWI swissinfo.ch, dear Swiss Abroad, dear readers everywhere who are interested in Switzerland.
Global crises and power shifts over the past year have further shaken the foundations of the world order. Switzerland is one of the most globalised countries in the world, with multiple economic, political and cultural interdependencies, and cannot but be affected by this. While conflicts such as the war in Ukraine and the humanitarian disasters in the Middle East dominated the headlines, the Alpine nation again found itself torn between a sense of international responsibility and its historical neutrality. This tension came to the fore especially during its time as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council, when it was at the heart of global decision-making processes. Meanwhile, the collapse of major bank Credit Suisse shook world trust in the Swiss financial sector.
Against this backdrop, SWI swissinfo.ch has a crucial role to play. On the one hand, it is a platform for the more than 813,000 Swiss citizens who live abroad, to whose specific needs and interests we cater in our reporting. On the other hand, SWI swissinfo.ch offers interested audiences around the world a multifaceted view of topics of concern to them, and for which we can highlight connections and draw international comparisons. Providing this perspective is more important today than ever before, in the face of the global rise of disinformation and threats to media freedom. If we did not project Switzerland’s voice and image abroad ourselves, then others would surely step in to interpret decisions and events in our country for us.
In 2024, SWI swissinfo.ch underwent a strategic reorganisation in order to better serve these two target groups. We thus restructured our editorial office, establishing dedicated teams focusing specifically on reporting for the Swiss Abroad and for an international audience interested in Switzerland.
This annual report provides an overview of the main issues that underpinned our work in 2024 and gives a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the work of our editorial teams.
Combating disinformation and fake news: protecting the truth
In 2024 at SWI swissinfo.ch we worked harder than ever to counter disinformation and strengthen trust in independent media. Our reporting in ten languages sheds light on current events, when necessary debunking the propaganda of authoritarian regimes, such as in Russia or China, and globally disseminated fake news.
We thus created formats specifically directed at audiences in countries where free media is reined in. In Russia, many Western news websites – including SWI swissinfo.ch – are blocked or hard to access. People can, however, still watch the video platform YouTube, which is accordingly widely used. Our “On the Record” format, which was created especially for YouTube, provides in-depth, detailed interviews, including with prominent figures from, or knowledgeable, about Russia – such as Swiss-based writer Mikhail Shishkin.
Mikhail Shishkin is a prominent author of fiction and essays. His work has been recognized with multiple awards, including the Russian Booker, the National Bestseller Prize, the Big Book Prize, and, most recently, the Italian Strega Prize. He is a long-standing and outspoken critic of the Putin regime whose essays have been published in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Le Monde, and elsewhere. Since 1995, he has lived and worked in Switzerland.
Russia is, of course, by no means the only country where freedom of the press is severely restricted. Many journalists at SWI swissinfo.ch hail from countries where the media is censored, persecuted or fully clamped down on. For World Press Freedom Day 2024, our staff shared some of their experiences, including what it’s like to be on the receiving end of direct attacks on media freedom.
Press Freedom Under Attack
A record year for democracy
Disinformation poses a massive threat to democracy. This was never truer than in the “super election year” 2024, when people went to the polls in around 75 countries – from the US to India, from Western Europe to Russia. Overall, more than half of the world’s population was called upon to vote – a record.
2024 Represents Critical Juncture for Future of Democracy
But by no means were all the elections free and fair. The presidential elections in the US, for instance, were accompanied by a surge in AI-generated fake news. Switzerland, too, is far from immune to the effects of disinformation.
US Disinformation Surge Rings Alarm Bells for Swiss Direct Democracy
While Switzerland is not impervious to fake news, it still serves as a role model with regard to democratic values and processes. It is also keen to share its expertise – as in Moldova, where Swiss funding supports a school subject, Education for Society, which promotes democracy, critical thinking and civic values.
School Kids Ready for Moldova’s Democracy
Tailored reporting for Swiss Abroad
Around a tenth of Swiss citizens do not live in Switzerland. A core project for SWI swissinfo.ch in 2024 was the expansion of our targeted reporting for the Swiss Abroad, both with content of our own and from other channels of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation (SBC), our parent company. Since September 1, 2024, we have had a dedicated editorial team focusing on the Swiss Abroad. They report on issues of concern to Swiss voters abroad, explain Swiss politics as specifically relevant to them and, in the busy 2024 voting year, kept them up to date on developments with our own four-language newsletter.
One key issue was the controversial vote on the pension initiatives, from which we drew five lessons.
Five Key Take Aways from Switzerland’s Vote
Postal voting and digital communication have strengthened the political clout of the Swiss Abroad. Yet this same digitalisation is drastically changing their community and how it interacts. In 2024, the Swiss Abroad met for not only their 100th but also their last joint congress in this format.
After 100 Years the Swiss Abroad Congress Remains Politically Active
Promoting Switzerland’s image abroad
SWI swissinfo.ch is aimed not only at the Swiss Abroad but also at audiences with a general interest in Switzerland. As an international media from neutral Switzerland, the platform enjoys a high level of trust. This gives us a duty to critically examine different positions on current topics, draw international comparisons and provide Swiss perspectives. An important aspect of Switzerland’s role abroad was its two-year membership of the UN Security Council, which came to an end in 2024. Specialists in the field Lucile Maertens and Sara Hellmüller analysed for SWI swissinfo.ch just what a country like Switzerland can achieve in this forum.