Reporters Without Borders has released its 2006 Worldwide Freedom of Press Index and the news is not good for the United States. The U.S. has fallen nine places down the scale to rank 53rd out of 168 countries in terms of how much freedom the press enjoys — this after coming in 17th in 2002, the first year the index was produced.
Reporters Without Borders uses 50 criteria in compiling its rankings and then sends a questionnaire to journalists and free press groups worldwide to ask them to rate the various countries according to the criteria. The war on terror, and the current administration’s crack-down on journalist access to information related to the war on terror, is the cause for the fall.
Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of “national security” to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his “war on terrorism.” The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media’s right not to reveal its sources, even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism.
Freelance journalist and blogger Josh Wolf was imprisoned when he refused to hand over his video archives. Sudanese cameraman Sami al-Haj, who works for the pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera, has been held without trial since June 2002 at the US military base at Guantanamo, and Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein has been held by US authorities in Iraq since April this year.
Other countries that came out far lower this year: France (35th), which slipped five places due to a rise in government searches of media offices and Japan (51st), which fell fourteen places due to rising nationalism and a system of press “clubs.”
Rounding out the bottom of the list are North Korea (168) Turkmenistan (167th) and Eritrea.
Cynthia Brumfield at 3:31 PM|Comments(0)
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