Producer Bohdan Bitik killed, reporter Corrado Zunino injured by sniper fire covering Ukraine war
Paris, April 27, 2023—Russian and Ukrainian authorities should swiftly investigate the recent attack that killed Ukrainian producer Bohdan Bitik and injured Italian correspondent Corrado Zunino, and hold those responsible to account, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday. On Wednesday, April 26, snipers opened fire on Bitik, a Ukrainian producer with the Italian daily La…
CPJ: Shuttering of RFE/RL Kyrgyz service sends ‘chilling message’
Stockholm, April 27, 2023—In response to news reports that a court in Kyrgyzstan on Thursday ordered the closure of Radio Azattyk, the local service of the U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the Committee to Protect Journalists issued the following statement condemning the ruling: “The shuttering of Radio Azattyk, one of Kyrgyzstan’s most popular…
Fragile Progress: The struggle for press freedom in the European Union
By Jean-Paul Marthoz and Tom Gibson The European Union is facing numerous challenges as it seeks new ways to uphold its commitment to press freedom. This special report – a follow-up to the Committee to Protect Journalists’ 2015 report “Balancing Act: Press freedom at risk as EU struggles to match action with values” – examines…
Fragile Progress: Part 1
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the EU Introduction European Union countries have traditionally been considered among the safest and freest places for journalists in the world. Yet, as the European Commission noted in November 2021, “the number of threats and attacks against them [journalists] have been on the rise in…
Fragile Progress: Part 2
Upholding the law Other governments, like those headed by Slovenia’s “pro-Trump populist”80 Prime Minister Janez Janša from 2020-2022 and Greece’s conservative Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, also adopted illiberal practices, from media capture to public denigration of critical journalists.81 Yet the European Union can only act in those areas where its member states have authorized it…
Fragile Progress: Part 3
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the EU Spyware and the EU In July 2021 the Pegasus Project, an investigation led by Forbidden Stories with the assistance of Amnesty International’s Security Lab,112 revealed how some EU countries, in spite of being officially committed to protect journalists’ freedom, had used surveillance…
Fragile Progress: Part 4
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the EU EU access and transparency The press corps remains a major actor in Brussels in spite of a decline in the number of accredited correspondents as many legacy media downsized staff or began covering the EU from outside of Brussels. The European Commission’s…
Fragile Progress: Part 5
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the EU Fighting impunity CPJ’s 2022 Global Impunity Index found that no one has been held to account for nearly 80% of 263 journalist murders over the past 10 years worldwide. Could the EU play a more active role in the fight against impunity,…
Fragile Progress: CPJ’s recommendations to the EU
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the European Union The Committee to Protect Journalists’ 2023 report, Fragile Progress, highlights the EU’s responses to the complex and severe challenges currently facing journalists. As a critical juncture for continuing the defense of democracy approaches with the 2024 elections, CPJ believes that the…
Fragile Progress: Source notes
A CPJ special report on the struggle for press freedom in the EU 1 Pol Morillas, editor, “Illiberal Democracies in the EU: the Visegrad Group and the Risk of Disintegration,” January 2017 2 CPJ, “Balancing Act,” 2015 https://cpj-preprod.go-vip.net/reports/2015/09/press-freedom-at-risk-europe-summary/ 3 Some sources asked not to be named in this report in order to speak frankly or because they…