A Free and Diverse Media is Essential to Protecting Democracy in the 21st Century

Images of protestors flooding the streets – whether in Caracas, Bucharest, Istanbul or Washington DC – send a powerful message to those in power, especially when they are plastered across newspaper front pages.

Repression 2.0: An Updated Global Censorship

Censorship tactics have become more complex, posing new challenges for journalists and non-journalists alike, a new report finds.

Trolling of Women Journalists Threatens Free Press

“It’s not what you say that prompts it—it’s the fact that you are saying it,” says Mary Beard, a Cambridge University classics professor about online trolling. “If you venture into traditional male territory, the abuse comes anyway. It is the many ways that men have silenced outspoken women since the days of the ancients.”

‘Fake News’ is not Journalism…

Would you trust your news from any source? How are we able to ensure that ‘fake’(d) news does not overtake the flow of information?

Protection of Journalists Fails in Latin America

Mexican journalist Cecilio Pineda Brito covered drug trafficking issues in a region of the southern state of Guerrero where criminal groups are extremely powerful.

Video message by UN Secretary-General António Guterres on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day 2017

Video message by UN Secretary-General António Guterres on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day 2017

IPS Journalists Who Perished in the Line of Duty

In the politically-risky world of professional journalism, news reporters are fast becoming an endangered species.

Double standards: Do all journalist lives matter?

Taha avoids giving his last name to journalists, but not out fear of the Sudanese government, whose harassment he fled in 2015.

Worrying about Fake News Has Become All the Rage

Rogue interests, perhaps even foreign, are said to be trying to interfere with the electoral process in the U.S. and European Union members. Senior government officials glibly endorse what they themselves call “alternative facts” and even openly describe the media as their enemy.

FEATURED VIDEO: World Press Freedom Day 2017

Journalists are not only major users of the cherished right to freedom of expression but also symbols of the extent to which a society tolerates and promotes freedom of expression. The current state of safety of journalists worldwide is alarming. Over the last decade 827 journalists and media workers have been killed. Even more alarming is the fact that in less than one out of ten cases have the perpetrators been apprehended.

With an Eye on Electoral Violence, Kenya Keeps Tight Rein on Media

As the clock ticks down to Kenya’s general elections slated for Aug. 8, a move by the Kenya Communication Authority (CAK) to make journalists adhere to guidelines on election coverage has elicited fear that the government could be trying to control how they report on the polls.

“We Can’t Protest So We Pray”: Anguish in Amhara During Ethiopia’s State of Emergency 

As dawn breaks in Bahir Dar, men prepare boats beside Lake Tana to take to its island monasteries the tourists that are starting to return.

Journalism in Nicaragua under Siege

During the 161st session of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), an empty chair across from the OAS Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, Edison Lanzas, sums up the Nicaraguan government’s relationship with this issue in the country: absence.

Under Fire, Journalism Explores Self-Preservation

With widespread attacks on professional journalists and the rise of a fake-news industry, media experts agree that journalism is increasingly under fire. But how can the press fight back and ensure its survival?

Half a Century of Struggle Against Underdevelopment

The idea of creating Inter Press Service (IPS) arose in the early 1960s in response to awareness that a vacuum existed in the world of journalism, which had two basic aspects.

Community Stations Fight for Frequencies in El Salvador

The Izcanal Radio and Television set is simple and austere, but this TV station made history in El Salvador, being the first, and until now the only one, to make the leap from community radio to community TV channel, in 2006.

Confusion over U.S. Travel Ban Grounds Foreign Correspondents

New restrictions on immigrants and refugees coming to the United States are also posing challenges for foreign correspondents covering news in the United States. Some have had to indefinitely postpone plans to report on conflicts in the Middle East while others have found an unfriendly reminder of their past treatment as journalists in less free countries.

Sri Lanka Shines Light on Public Sector Governance

Sri Lanka’s long-awaited and much-debated Right to Information (RTI) Act became law this month without much fanfare.

Pakistani Reporters in the Crosshairs

The Federally Administered Tribal Areas located on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border remain one of the most perilous places in the world to be a reporter, with journalists walking a razor’s edge of violence and censorship.

‘For Trump, Media Is Public Enemy Number One’

"Alarmed by the new administration’s repeated attacks on the media and blatant disregard for facts in the first three days of Donald Trump’s presidency," Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has called on Trump and his team "to stop undermining the First Amendment and start defending it."

Social Networks in Mexico Both Fuel and Fight Discontent

The scene in the video is simple: a bearded man with a determined look on his face sitting in front of a white wall witha portrait of Emiliano Zapata, symbol of the Mexican revolution.