Press freedom under siege in many states

Sri Lankan journalists wears black cloth as they participate in a march near the Sri Lankan Parliament yesterday protesting the killing of Tamil Editor Sivaram Dharmeratnam (46), last month. Journalists are demanding action to bring the killers and perpetrators to justice. PHOTO: AFP

"The press is simply muzzled in many countries," said a report from the WAN Board, meeting on the eve of the 58th World Newspaper Congress and the World Editors Forum.

"Attacks on journalists are common. Too many killers of journalists remain free.

"A total of 38 journalists have been killed since November 2004. Hundreds more have been arrested, assaulted and harassed."

The report said that in the past six months, the Philippines and Iraq were the most deadly places for the media, with a total of 19 journalists killed in both places.

The report also targeted autocratic regimes throughout the world which repress freedom of expression.

"The suffocation of independent media continues unabated in countries throughout the world," said the report.

"The governments of Nepal, Cuba, Belarus, Turkmenistan, Eritrea, China and Zimbabwe, to name only a few of the worst offenders, have refused to surrender their monopoly on information, finding more and more audacious mechanisms to maintain their vice-like grip on media."

Investigative journalists challenging some of those regimes told the congress, at a Sunday discussion, of the risks and sometimes fatal dangers of their work.