Last year, UNESCO reported that a mere eight-percent of the legal cases involving the murders of journalists have been resolved. This statistic does not include the larger number of journalists who suffer from non-fatal injuries each day. Those regimes and individuals who commit violence against journalists are emboldened when they know they can attack their victims and not face justice.
When attacks on media workers go unpunished, a harmful message is sent that reporting unwanted information or compromising truth will get regular citizens into serious trouble. Obviously the public not only loses their main source of information about their governments, there is a loss in confidence in their judiciary systems. When journalists are “disappeared” or harmed, all of society suffers.
Each time a crime against a media worker goes unpunished, the impunity encourages other perpetrators to commit similar crimes. The atmosphere of impunity causes other journalists to self-censor their work…
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