[Reporter Marina Anohina:] The year 2008 was full of events. While we can't remember them all, we can talk with some people that have kept their fingers on the pulse all the year round. They've been the first to inform us about all the events happening in the country. Of course, we are talking about the news agency Info-Prim Neo. Let's see how the year 2008 was for this agency and its director, Valeriu Vasilica. [Valeriu Vasilica:] 2008 was a fairly good year and in this definition of 'good' I mean that it was also a difficult year. For a team of professionals, as we like to think of ourselves, good things come hard... I must thank my colleagues first for having a year as we had in 2008, thank our readers, our subscribers, the visitors to our website, for being faithful, for following and, I hope, for believing in what we informed of during the year. [M.A.:] Info-Prim Neo publishes news stories practically on a daily basis. I'm curious, how many were they in a year? [V.V.:] In total, I believe 7,500 or so. [M.A.:] In this case, quality is not affected by quantity, even if it's not so easy to write a news story... [V.V.:] I would compare each of the 7,500 articles with other genres of writing. Because I think the difference about writing a news story and, say a novel, is the amounts of time required. {Otherwise, both have to follow strict rules and are in many things alike...} [M.A.:] Info-Prim Neo doesn't write novels yet. But recently a book saw the light of the day here. It is titled... [V.V.:] ... “Electoral Lessons at the Moldovan School of Democracy”. It is a bilingual publication, in Romanian and Russian, representing a collection of news articles and feature stories by Info-Prim Neo, covering the election campaign that preceded the general local elections in 2007, the polls themselves, and the post-election period. {Its on-line version can be viewed on our website www.info-prim.md } [M.A.:] And this is not the only significant event that marked the development of the Agency in 2008. [V.V.:] In 2008, we got some young blood in the Agency. We are now raising a new team, which proved to have met the requirements of the times, of the internal standards and of the modern journalism. [M.A.:] 'Modern journalism' is difficult to imagine without a room for news conferences. In 2008, the agency Info-Prim Neo hosted a big number of actors representing various fields of activity. Today, the agency also hosts an exhibition. [V.V.:] For approximately a month we have been hosting an exhibition of paintings – {by young and talented Gheorghe Lisita} – which is the first but certainly not the last one. [M.A.:] In time we'll get to see other exhibitions as well on the walls of this conference room. But what are Mr. Vasilica's expectations for 2009? [V.V.:] 2009 will be a difficult year … because, again, it will require much professionalism from us. The run-up to the 2009 parliamentary elections will be a major challenge for the agency, because we have the ambition to treat everyone without any bias, to comprise, as previously, every electoral actor, to provide a picture of the electoral activity as thorough as possible. It is a very difficult task, including out of such considerations as human resources, financial resources, but anyway this is the goal we strive for: to cover, in a professional manner, all the developments of the election campaign. click here to see interview