Shooting of Dutch Crime Journalist Rattles Reporters Groups, EU
Following the murder of Greek investigative journalist Giorgos Karaivaz in April, the shooting and critical wounding of another specialist crime reporter, Dutch journalist Peter R. de Vries, has left media groups and European Union officials reeling in dismay.
The veteran journalist was fighting for his life in an Amsterdam hospital from wounds suffered when he was shot in the head following a TV appearance.
Like his Greek counterpart, de Vries was known for his fearless reporting on the underworld and crime figures, but while Karaivaz's case remains unsolved, Dutch police quickly took two men into custody.
They were identified only as a 35-year-old Polish citizen living in The Netherlands and a 21-year-old Dutchman. A third person who was detained was released, police said. No further information was made available.
Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Justice Minister Ferdinand Grapperhaus held an emergency meeting with security authorities. This was “an attack on a brave journalist and with that an attack on free journalism,” Rutte said.
Renate Schroeder, Director of the European Federation of Journalists, told Blueprint for Free Speech that, “It has been extremely shocking that within a few months two crime reporters have been severely attacked.
“We know that investigative reporters dealing with crime and drugs and corruption face great safety risks … that we have had several murders in Europe lately proposes that the killers and masterminds do not shy away anymore in EU heartland,” she added.
The Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, Dunja Mijatović, tweeted, “Everything should be done to bring perpetrator(s) and mastermind(s) of this horrific crime to justice and ensure #SafetyOfJournalists in #Europe.”
Dutch King Willem Alexander called the shooting “an attack on journalism, the cornerstone of our constitutional state and therefore also an attack on the rule of law,” the attack jarring the country's society.
The shooting of de Vries happened less than a block from the capital's famous Rijksmuseum, and set off trepidation about security and the rule of law as well as the safety of journalists who find themselves in peril for their profession.
Laurens Hueting, Advocacy Officer for the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPM) told Blueprint that, “The nature of watchdog journalism entails that investigative reporters often make powerful enemies in criminal circles. These people use violence as a 'tool of the trade.' … they won’t hesitate to use it against journalists who (un)cover their dirty business, when they think that they will get away with it”.
Risky Business
The European Union is considering a Media Freedom Act and bloc leaders have denounced violence against journalists, including the murders of investigative reporters Ján Kuciak in Slovakia and Daphne Caruana Galizia in Malta.
“It’s particularly poignant to see a grave attack like the one on de Vries in the Netherlands. It’s a country with high levels of press freedom, which has also been setting the trend in developing good practice on safety of journalists,” said Heuting.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told European Parliament lawmakers said, “We might disagree with a lot we see in our media, but we have to agree that journalists investigating potential abuses of power are not a threat but an asset to our democracies and our societies,”
De Vries, 64, gained recognition for his covering of the kidnapping of a Heineken heir in 1983 and has been a fixture on TV news shows while continued to break stories about the Dutch underworld.
He reportedly had long been considered a possible target of the criminals he went after but police and prosecutors would not say whether he was under any kind of protection.
Dutch authorities should “determine if he was targeted for his work, and ensure that the attacker and the masterminds of the attack face justice. Journalists in the EU must be able to investigate crime and corruption without fearing for their safety, said Tom Gibson, the Committee to Protect Journalists’ EU representative.
De Vries had been an adviser and confidant to a witness in a major trial of the alleged leader of a crime gang, Ridouan Taghi, who was extradited to the Netherlands from Dubai in 2019 and is in jail awaiting trial with 16 other suspects.
Jamie Wiseman, Advocacy Officer for the Vienna, Austria-based International Press Institute (IPI) told Blueprint that the shooting was “another dark day for media freedom in the European Union.
“To see yet another journalist who has spent their career fighting for justice and exposing criminal acts gunned down in broad daylight in the street is shocking, and highlights the significant threats that investigative journalists are under,” he added.
While police haven't publicly talked about a motive, he said that, “all signs point to this being a targeted and calculated attack aimed at silencing de Vries’s journalistic work. Coming so soon after the assassination of Greek crime reporter Georgios Karaivaz, this is a heavy blow to take.”