By Afnan Khan

LAHORE: Reporters and photographers working in Pakistan lack basic safety facilities and their lives are put in jeopardy as they cover terror attacks, senior American journalists Frank Folwell and Sherry Ricchiardi said on Sunday.

Talking exclusively to Daily Times during their visit to the country, the married couple said that journalists in Pakistan were extremely dedicated, passionate and professional.

Dr Sherry is a senior writer for the American Journalism Review and specialises in international issues and is a professor at the Indiana University School of Journalism while Frank is the deputy managing editor in the photo and graphics department of the USA Today and also works as a teacher and consultant in China.

“Journalists here are performing their duties despite being underpaid in most situations and face a direct threat to their lives while reporting incidents of terrorism,” they said, adding that journalists need proper safety measures to cover the ongoing wave of terrorism across the country and the news organisations, the government or journalists’ groups should organise programmes to safeguard the rights of reporters and cameramen in Pakistan.

They said that Pakistani journalists should be given better training facilities so that they can perform their professional duties at par with their counterparts around the world, as the country has become a centre of attraction due to terrorism and its proximity with Afghanistan, thus increasing the demand for news coming in-and-out of the country.

“It is absolute necessary that journalists who are exposed to danger need to be trained,” Frank said.

Dr Sherry said that journalists in Pakistan were incredibly dedicated and they should just keep in mind while reporting a conflict situation like Friday’s attacks that a journalist’s responsibility in such a situation is to be as accurate and as thorough as possible.

“It is the right of the public to know all aspects of an issue and it is the duty of journalists to provide them with these aspects. The global recession has left very bad scars on the profession of journalism, as a large number of reporters and photographers have been laid off,” she said.
Source: Daily Times
Date:5/31/2010