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More Journalists Jailed in China for the Fourth
Straight Year
NEW YORK, March 31 (AFP) - The number of journalists
killed for their work fell to its lowest recorded
level in 2002, but the number behind bars rose sharply,
with China topping the list of countries imprisoning
reporters.
In its annual report on attacks on the press released
Monday, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)
said a total of 19 journalists were killed worldwide
last year as a direct result of their work.
The figure was down from 37 killed in 2001 and marked
the lowest toll since the CPJ started tracking
journalist deaths in 1985.
The majority of those killed in 2002 were not covering
conflicts but were murdered in direct reprisal for
their reporting on sensitive topics, including
official crime and corruption in countries like
Colombia, the Philippines, Russia and Pakistan.
"Most of the killers in these 19 cases have not been
brought to justice -- a record of impunity that
threatens press freedom worldwide," said CPJ Executive
Director Ann Cooper.
Cooper attributed the decrease in fatalities to an
easing of conflicts in key regions, including
Afghanistan -- where eight journalists were killed
covering the war in 2001 -- as well as Sri Lanka and
Angola.
The most dramatic exception was the West Bank, where
three journalists were killed by gunfire from Israeli
Defence Forces last year.
The 2002 report highlighted the international
attention garnered by the kidnapping and murder of
Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan
as he sought to meet with the leader of a radical
Islamic group.
"In the wake of Pearl's death, journalist safety
became a renewed priority for news organisations,"
Cooper said.
The CPJ applies stringent guidelines and journalistic
standards to determine whether reporters were killed
on assignment or as a direct result of their
professional work. Cases are not included if the cause
of death is deemed accidental.
While the death toll fell in 2002, the number of
journalists in prison rose sharply for the second year
in a row.
By the end of the year, there were 136 journalists in
jail, a 15 percent increase from 2001 and a 68 percent
spike from 2000.
For the fourth year in succession, the world's leading
jailer of journalists was China, which held 39 in
prison -- five of them jailed in 2002.
As well as maintaining a rigid grip on the mainstream
media, the Chinese authorities also cracked down on
the Internet, utilising innovative new technologies to
curb online speech.
"As in the past, Chinese journalists who overstepped
boundaries faced censorship, harassment, demotion, or
even arrest," the report said.
The CPJ also singled out the Himalayan kingdom of
Nepal for a "spectacular abuse of press freedom" after
a violent uprising by Maoist rebels prompted the
government to declare a state of emergency and
introduce sweeping anti-terrorism legislation in
November 2001.
Hundreds of Nepalese journalists were detained and 16
were formally incarcerated in 2002 as press freedom
and other civil liberties were effectively suspended.
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