Global, Global Geopolitics, Headlines, Human Rights, Middle East & North Africa, Press Freedom

MEDIA-IRAQ: A Voice From the Most Dangerous Place on Earth

Fritzroy A. Sterling

UNITED NATIONS, Jul 18 2006 (IPS) - For IPS and those closely associated with slain reporter Alaa Hassan, Jun. 28 was a day unlike any other – for the first time since the beginning of the war in Iraq, IPS lost a reporter in the line of duty.

Hassan’s killing marks the second time in its 42-year history that IPS has lost one of its own to violence. In February 1990, an armed gang abducted and killed IPS journalist Richard De Zoysa in Sri Lanka.

Hassan’s vicious killing – he was shot five times when his car was sprayed with bullets – was a shocking reminder of the perils facing many independent, non-embedded journalists reporting from war-torn areas of conflict.

Early reports of the shooting suggested that Hassan was not targeted for being a journalist – or more specifically, an Iraqi journalist – he was merely “in the wrong place at the wrong time,” as a previous IPS report stated. But the brutal attack incited statements of condemnation and calls for more effective measures to ensure the safety of journalists in Iraq.

Koichiro Matsuura, the director-general of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), the only U.N. agency with a mandate to defend freedom of expression and a free press, issued a statement denouncing Hasaan’s killing.

“I condemn the killing of Alaa Hassan,” Matsuura said. “Murders are part of the tragic daily reality of Iraq today, and journalists have to confront this reality more than any other profession.”

Seventy percent of the 75 reporters killed in Iraq since the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion have been Iraqi, Frank Smyth, the Washington representative of the Committee to Protect Journalists, recently told IPS.

However, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) puts that number higher. In a statement condemning Hassan’s killing, IFJ said the total number of journalists killed in Iraq, including Hassan, since the start of the war is 131.

“The death of another Iraqi fills us with sorrow and anger,” said IFJ General Secretary Aidan White. “This is a country in which violence and killing has become a routine and intolerable feature of daily life and in which journalists continue to be prominent among the victims.”

IFJ and IPS have both called for a full and immediate investigation of Hassan’s killing.

“IPS calls on the Iraqi government to conduct a full investigation to determine the motive for the killing of a journalist on assignment,” IPS Director General Mario Lubetkin said in a letter to Iraqi President Jalal Talabani

“IPS is one the few media organisations covering stories from an Iraqi perspective – and on the ground,” Lubetkin said in a separate letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. “As a part of this arduous journalistic task, our reporters and stringers have to regularly interact with people living in a hostile environment of growing and deadly violence.”

Telling the story from an Iraqi perspective as a non-embedded journalist in Iraq is dangerous business. It requires extensive travel into insurgency strongholds and other areas not controlled by coalition forces to accurately assess how those people are living and hear their opinions.

“Being embedded allows journalists to tell the troops’ side, but it does not answer the question about the other sides of the event,” Thomas Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ), told IPS.

Furthermore, because the conflict in Iraq – and more recently, the violent flare-ups between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon – is not between two legitimate governments, but rather between one government, an occupying power, and an insurgent group, targeting journalists has become a new battlefield strategy, according to Rosenstiel.

“Modern warfare in the 21st century is about publicity,” Rosenstiel said. “Some people think it’s in their strategic military interest to kill journalists.”

“To continue to do their job of informing the public without restrictions, they are permanently exposed to the violence that has become so horrifyingly commonplace,” Matsuura said of journalists in his statement condemning Hassan’s killing. “We salute their courage, but we must also do the utmost to improve their security, as the work of journalists is essential to bring democracy back to a country has endured decades of oppression and violence.”

Rosenstiel added that journalists who travel alone, as Hassan had traveled, must do so “judiciously” because of the many dangers. He said that having a security force is costly and can be conspicuous, especially in areas where blending in reduces the risks of being targeted.

As an Iraqi, Hassan did not have to blend in, yet he is still the victim of a vicious cycle of violence that has marred attempts at democratising the country. Hassan, who was just 35 years old when he was killed, is survived by his pregnant wife, his mother, five brothers and five sisters.

Other media outlets also sent messages of condolence and solidarity. “We at Antiwar.com are saddened and shocked to hear of the death of Mr. Hassan,” Eric Garris, managing editor of Antiwar.com, a popular anti-imperialist website, wrote to IPS. “He was an excellent and courageous journalist. He will be missed by many.”