A little more than two weeks ago, precisely on 3rd May the world celebrated one of the most important human rights, the freedom of the press and expression. We all must help to defend this important human right to democracy, justice, development, etc. This important right must include too the right to earn money with the monetization of the work of many activists or also called citizen journalists around the world nowadays, who are divulging their works on YouTube channels, blogs, Facebook, X, Tik Tok, Instagram or any other social media. They all deserve the right to become professionals and to improve their works, of course, they all mustn't spread fake news, hate speech, discrimination etc. For some unknown reason the counter of this blog never worked, but I know that there are millions of readers, Now the same have been happening with my YouTube Channel since I created it in 2020, here is the link, https://www.youtube.co/@lucianofietto4773 I really don't know why I've been being so harmed in so many ways and for decades, but now all the world is demanding that these violations I've been being victim stop. This post is a summary of two articles. The first was published at https://cpj.org/reports/2023/10/haiti-joins-list-of-countries-where-killers-of-journalists-most-likely-to-go-unpunished/. The second was published at https://edition.cnn.com/2024/05/03/americas/world-press-freedom-day-latin-america-latam-intl/index.html
The persistent lack of justice for murdered reporters is a major threat to press freedom. Ten years after the U.N. declared an international day to end impunity for crimes against journalists and more than 30 years after Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) began documenting these killings, almost 80% of their killings remain unsolved. Crisis-hit Haiti has emerged as one of the countries where murderers of journalists are most likely to go free, CPJ'23 Global Impunity Index has found. A devastating combination of gang violence, chronic poverty, political instability and a dysfunctional judiciary are behind the Caribbean country's first inclusion on CPJ's annual list of nations where killers get away with murder. Haiti now ranks as the world's third-worst impunity offender, behind Syria and Somalia respectively. Somalia, Iraq, Mexico, Philippines, Pakistan, India, South Sudan, Afghanistan and Brazil have been there for years, a sobering reminder of the persistent and pernicious nature of impunity. The reasons for these countries' failure to prosecute journalists' killers range from conflict to corruption, insurgency to inadequate law enforcement, and lack of political interest in punishing those willing to kill independent journalists. A 78% impunity rate is a slight improvement on the 90% rate CPJ recorded a decade ago. The pernicious effects of impunity extend beyond the countries that have become fixtures on CPj's annual index. Unpunished murders have an intimidating effect on local journalists everywhere, corroding press freedom and shrinking public-interest reporting. In the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Palestinian journalists interviewed by CPJ said their coverage had been undermined by escalating fears for their safety after the Israel Defense Forces fatally shot Al-Jazeera correspondent Shireen Abu Aklen in May 2022. In several countries in the European Union, typically considered the safest places for journalists, press freedom has come under increasing pressure, with journalist murders remaining unsolved in Malta, Slovakia, Greece and the Netherlands. Brazil did not record any new journalist muders in 2023, but the killers, mostly believed to be criminal groups, of 11 journalists murdered in Brazil during the Index period remain at large. The 2022 murders of British journalist Dom Philips and indigenous issues expert Bruno Pereira in the Amazon underscore the dangers faced by reporters in the region. In a report published in March, Amnesty International and CPJ defined Mexico as "the most dangerous country for the press in the Western hemisphere". According to the CPJ report, Mexico has "the highest number of missing journalists in the world" with at least 15 professionals in 2023. According to the Rights group Article 19, in 2023 a total of 561 aggressions against the press have been registered in the country and the murders of 5 journalists. An emblematic case was that of journalist Lourdes Maldonado Lopez, killed in the border city of Tijuana. In 2019, Maldonado, who worked for several media outlets, including Televisa, told that she feared for her life and asked for protection. Three people were arrested in connection with that homicide. "In Cuba, they have killed journalism," journalist Abraham Jimenez told CNN. Jimenez left the island in 2021 after a period of threats, arbitrary interrogations and house arrests. The harassment was fueled by his reporting on Cuba's street protests of 2021. As he recounted, Jimenez was portrayed in state media as a CIA agent, causing his friends to stay away out of fear and causing his famiy to lose their jobs. "They didn't need to shoot me, they had killed me civically," he said. "Doing journalism in Venezuela implies a daily effort to overcome the cemsorship mechanisms that have consolidated in the country," Edgar Lopez told CNN. "In Venezuela, secrecy is a state policy. The state expect the media and journalists to limit themselves to disseminating official narratives without any questioning," he said. "The govenment perceives the independent press as an internal enemy. This has resulted in the consolidation of aggression patterns that range from stigmatizing discouse to physical aggressions," he said. The National College of Journalists estimated that close to 4,000 journalists emigrated from the country due to threats in the last 20 years. In January 2024, 33 Venezuelans faced arrest warrants or have been detained by authorities for political reasons, among them several journalists. With political polarization across Latin America, countries across the region can shift from left to right or right to left depending on the president in power. But across the spectrum, many of the region's current leaders seem to show a hostility toward journalism, particularly on social media. Both the far-right Milei in Argentina and Leftist Colombian president Gustavo Petro have used their social networks to attack journalists and independent media, for example. All part of a dangerous erosion of one of the fundamental pillars of democracy, the same democracy that brought these leaders, at least temporarily, to the most powerful seats in their countries.
No comments:
Post a Comment