KUALA LUMPUR
Anadolu Agency has signed cooperation agreements with Mongolia's state news agency, Montsame, and Malaysia's national news agency, Bernama.
The deals were signed on Saturday at the 38th Organisation of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA) Executive Board Meeting hosted by Bernama in the Malaysian capital.
Ahmad Shabery Cheek, Malaysia's Minister of Communication and Multimedia, told Anadolu Agency: "This is an important and beneficial agreement which would help both sides increase their news sources."
Bernama General Manager Zulkefli Salleh and Montsame Deputy Director Batbold Shoovdor both said the deal would contribute to furthering relations between Turkey and Malaysia.
Ercan Gocer, AA Head of International Relations Department and OANA Secretary-General, added that attacks against media professionals should be condemned by the organization as part of its ethics policy.
Under the deals AA will be able to offer the world its products including news, photos, and footage from Mongolia and Malaysia.
Established in 1961 under a UNESCO initiative, OANA is comprised of 44 Asia-Pacific news agencies from 35 countries including Russia's Itar-Tass, China's Xinhua, South Korea's Yonhap, Indonesia's Antara, Iran's IRNA, the Australian Associated Press (AAP) and Azerbaijan's AzerTAc, which together comprise two-thirds of information circulated throughout the world.
The organization aims to "secure direct and free exchange of news among the news agencies of a region inhabited by more than one half of the world's population".
Anadolu Agency chaired OANA between 2010 and 2013 before handing over the following three-year presidency to Itar-Tass in September 2013.
