Reporters getting killed while chasing a story. Online attacks against women journalists, including death and rape threats. Targeted electronic surveillance to intimidate and silence investigative journalism.
This is the dangerous reality for many journalists around the world as media freedom and safety have diminished in the digital age with a grave impact on human rights, democracy and development, a UN expert warned.
“The decline of media freedom and the rise in threats to the safety of journalists is a worldwide trend, most sharply evident in backsliding democracies and recalcitrant totalitarian States,” said Irene Khan, UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression. “The consequences for human rights, democracy, public participation and development are worrying.”
In a report to the Human Rights Council, Khan said digital technology has opened great opportunities for journalists and media freedom, including ground-breaking investigative reporting, cross-border collaboration, fact-checking with audiences, and access to treasure troves of data and sources.
However, Khan pointed out the digital age also poses serious challenges and threats. As examples, she cited online and offline attacks and killing of journalists with impunity; criminalization and harassment of journalists; and the erosion of independence, freedom and the plurality of voices and opinions in state and corporate media, including digital companies.
“Silencing journalists by killing them is the most egregious form of censorship,” Khan said, urging the Council to consider measures to address impunity, including an international taskforce on the prevention, investigation and prosecution of attacks against journalists.
She cited a database site compiled by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) that reported that 455 journalists had been killed while doing their jobs between 2016–2021. In more than eight out of ten cases, the perpetrators have not been brought to justice.
Source: United Nation Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner
