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NEW YORK, May 2: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) marked World Press Freedom Day by naming the world’s worst places to be a journalist—10 places whose dangers and restrictions represent the full range of current threats to press freedom.
Topping the list is the West Bank, where Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon’s government has used extraordinary force to keep journalists from covering its recent military incursion.
Next is Columbia, where violent reprisals against the press by all factions in the civil conflict have made this the most deadly beat in the Western Hemisphere. Meanwhile, dangers persist in Afghanistan, where eight journalists were killed in the line of duty in late 2001, and where US government actions have hindered independent reporting on the war.
“In these countries where press freedom is under attack, journalists endure violent assaults, crackdowns by authoritarian regimes, danger from military operations, and harsh financial reprisals designed to bankrupt independent voices,” said CPJ executive director Ann Cooper.
“Incredibly, in many of these places, journalists still manage to report the news—even under extremely difficult circumstances and at great personal risk,” said Cooper.
WEST BANK: When Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon launched a massive military offensive in the West Bank in late March, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) used threats, intimidation, and, in some cases, potentially lethal force to prevent journalists from covering its military operations. In one notorious incident, IDF troops fired stun grenades and rubber bullets at reporters waiting outside the Ramallah compound of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. IDF soldiers have also fired live rounds at working reporters, detained several journalists, confiscated film or press cards from others, ransacked the offices of private West Bank television and radio stations, and repeatedly attacked the Palestinian National Authority’s broadcasting facilities in violation of international humanitarian law. Meanwhile, Israeli officials have expelled one foreign correspondent and refused to accredit Palestinian journalists, the CPJ said.
AFGHANISTAN: In November 2001, eight journalists were killed reporting on the US-led military offensive in the country, and post-Taliban Afghanistan remains dangerous and chaotic. But US government actions have also hampered independent reporting. CPJ documented three instances where journalists were forcibly prevented from covering US military activities in Afghanistan. In one case, US soldiers threatened to shoot a Washington Post reporter who was attempting to report on a US missile strike that may have killed a group of civilians in eastern Afghanistan. In mid-November, US bombs destroyed the Kabul bureau of the Qatar- based Arabic satellite channel Al-Jazeera. To date, Pentagon officials have provided no evidence to back their claim that the building was “a known Al-Qaeda facility.”
CPJ also placed Eritrea, Belarus, Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Iran, Kyrgzstan, and Cuba on the list of worst places to be a journalist.
