Journalism Still Under Siege on World Press Freedom Day
The marking of this year’s World Press Freedom Day was no celebration but a remembrance for journalists jailed, killed, assaulted and besieged by governments wanting to prevent them from revealing wrongdoing, especially over the COVID-19 pandemic, equipment shortages and misappropriated gear.
“Now more than ever, truth-tellers play a vital role in maintaining free expression and free societies,” Summer Lopez, Senior Director of Free expression Programs at PEN America, said.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for greater protection of journalists he said are the pipeline of truth against against COVID-19 misinformation being peddled by some governments trying to use the crisis to consolidate power.
“As the pandemic spreads, it has also given rise to a second pandemic of misinformation, from harmful health advice to wild conspiracy theories,” he said.
“The press provides the antidote: verified, scientific, fact-based news and analysis,” he said. Meanwhile, the UN has done essentially nothing about authoritarian governments targeting the journalists he said he wants protected.
That’s especially in China – where the virus originated and as the Five Eyes intelligence network said whistleblowers were disappeared to keep them from talking, and as Chinese journalists and social media were muzzled.
The One Free Press Coalition urged immediate release of all imprisoned journalists amid increasing threats to press freedom worldwide, but, as have other press groups, was routinely ignored.
The group, made up of prominent news organizations and publishers, monthly posts the 10 “most urgent” cases of journalists whose freedoms are being suppressed, including being jailed and tortured for doing their jobs.
Added Lopez of journalists: “Their lives are imperiled. We’ve seen reporters risk their own lives in emergency rooms in Queens, New York; face detention for reporting on the COVID-19 outbreak in China; seen their work criminalized in Bolivia and Thailand.”
China also expelled reporters from The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Voice of America and TIME, further putting a shroud of secrecy over the country and government just when news was most needed.
PEN American noted, “Journalists in the Philippines, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Russia, Venezuela, and Haiti have been threatened, harassed, attacked, and arrested for their COVID-19 reporting.”
“Journalism has never been more vital and has never been more at risk,” Lopez said.
However, she said that while abuses were happening abroad, it was also important for Americans to “pay special attention to the threats here in the United States,” it said.
Nora Benavidez, PEN America’s U.S. Free Expression Director told Newsweek said there is a worrying trend of government officials “at all levels of government” refusing to cooperate with journalists.
Attacks on the press accelerated after US President Donald Trump took office, branding stories he didn’t like “fake news,” a term picked up by authoritarian leaders and more governments seeking to suppress the news.
“Communities are wanting and turning to news more and governments are targeting news outlets and reporters in a growing fashion, including the President himself, who removes reporters from press briefings and denigrates reporters when he doesn’t like them,” Benavidez said.
Guterres urged governments to protect journalists and also others who work in media, and uphold press freedom. He said the fight against COVID-19 “must not be abused as an excuse to crack down on journalists’ ability to do their work,” but hasn’t used his office to stop it.
David Kaye, an independent human rights analyst, reported to the UN that since the COVID-19 Coronavirus outbreak worsened he received “alarming accounts” of retaliation against journalists, falsely charged with spreading disinformation.
“The criminalization of journalism must end. That can start with releasing journalists from detention as a matter of urgency,” he said.