With journalists working in dangerous parts of the world being thrown in jail or murdered in record numbers, veteran reporters today urged the UN Security Council to act against suppression of media freedom.
"When journalists are killed, information about threats to international peace and security is often buried," UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson told the Council in a special meeting devoted to the protection of journalists in armed conflicts.
He added that the 15-member body may wish to consider the targeting of journalists and other threats to freedom of expression when addressing situations on its agenda.
Journalists who gave chilling accounts of the dangers they and their colleagues faced in the field included Kathleen Carroll, Associated Press executive editor and vice chair of the board of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Richard Engel of NBC News, Ghaith Abdul-Ahad from the Guardian, and Mustafa Haji Abdinur of AFP working in Somalia.
"I'm here simply because I'm lucky; because the gunmen who have killed so many of my friends have not yet found me. Still, it's not a matter of if, but when," Abdinur told the Council sombrely.
Eliasson said that in the past decade, more than 600 journalists had been killed, the majority being local media staff often reporting on corruption and other illegal activities.
It is "shocking and unacceptable" that more than 90 per cent of the assassinations of journalists go unpunished, he noted, urging that "the least we can do when a journalist is murdered, is to ensure that the death is investigated swiftly and justice is served."
Carroll stressed that journalists represent the ordinary citizen saying, "An attack on a journalist is a proxy for an attack on the people, an attack on their right to information about their communities and their institutions."
Engel argued that protecting journalists is harder than ever because of the blurred delineation between a journalist and an activist.
"If the discussion today is about protecting journalists, you have to decide who gets protection? Who deserves it? And who forfeits it," Engel asked, noting that professional journalists for state and private media, as well as freelancers who join rebel groups and carry guns, are often lumped in the same category.
"We're all troublemakers," Engel said stressing how journalists are perceived by governments.
"The guild of professionals isn't recognised anymore. It should be. Just like you in the diplomatic community need protection to be objective. If you want professionals who are also objective we need protection as well," he said.
