Reporters and Journalism at Risk in America?

According to Reporters Without Borders, an international organization dedicated to the protection of press freedom and journalists around the world, approximately one-third of the world's people live in a country with no press freedom. Most often, these countries are in Eastern Europe, Africa, Asia and South America, where laws restricting press freedom are generally wide open to interpretation, giving governments extensive power to censor news media and to press charges against journalists in the course of their work.

The Middle East is the world's most restrictive area when it comes to press freedom, and the war in Iraq has been the deadliest for journalists since World War II. After the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, Iraqi journalists began to experience unprecedented freedom. They had previously suffered torture, imprisonment and even death for criticizing the former regime, and some news outlets existed solely to promote Saddam Hussein's rule. Immediately after the war began, more than 150 new newspapers and many local television and radio stations were established. This was seen as one of the biggest success stories of the invasion.

However, journalists have begun to suffer abuses of press freedom at the hands of the Iraqi government, Iraqi insurgent forces and the U.S. military. Journalists have been beaten and detained in the country, their videotapes and cameras seized and smashed. Al-Jazeera's Baghdad bureau has been censored for government criticism, and a reporter from Al-Arabiya was detained by Iraqi forces for two weeks "because he had footage of insurgent attacks". Four journalists are being held at U.S.-controlled detention centers in Iraq, with no specific charges being cited. Journalists covering such conflicts, as well as corruption and human rights abuses, are the ones most at risk in the profession.

Conflict and human rights abuses are present in the countries of Russia and the United States as well, making the situation for journalists in these industrialized countries just as difficult. Russia's role in the conflict in Chechnya amounts to the single largest human rights crisis in Europe. Civilians are killed and several "disappear" on a daily basis as a result of the conflict. According to Human Rights Watch, both parties are guilty of violations of human rights and international humanitarian law.

According to Reporters Without Borders, violence against journalists in Russia remains the biggest threat to press freedom in the country. On Oct. 7, U.S.-born Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was found murdered in her apartment. She had been shot four times, once in the head, and her murder is widely believed to be a contract killing. As a journalist, her writings were often critical of the Russian army and Russian government, and in support of human rights and the rule of law.

Alarmingly, the United States is exhibiting characteristics similar to that of Russia and seems to be beginning to join the ranks of countries with limited press freedom. The imprisonment of New York Times reporter Judith Miller in 2005 is one notable case. Federal courts convicted her of contempt of court because of her refusal to reveal confidential sources after CIA operative Valerie Plame had been named in the media. She spent nearly three months in jail before agreeing to reveal her sources, though she had not actually written one published word about the Plame case.

The United States' suspension of civil liberties and human rights during the War on Terrorism is indicative of the possibility of less than a free press. The Military Commissions Act of 2006 was signed into law by President George W. Bush on Oct. 17. This law violates the constitutional right of habeas corpus, which is a legal challenge to a government's ability to detain an individual. Though there is some question as to whether the Constitution grants the right of habeas corpus to non-citizens, the United Nations Human Rights Committee and Committee Against Torture found that "secret detention, indefinite detention without charge, and denial of habeas corpus violate the U.S.'s treaty obligations."

Though the press in the United States still remains the most free in the world, the suspension of human rights during wartime, the treatment of journalists by U.S. military, and the imprisonment of journalists on American soil for failure to reveal confidential sources are indicative of the fact that even if we are not moving towards less than a free press, a journalist's ability to gather and report the news is being seriously eroded. Protection of sources is not yet guaranteed by federal law, but is considered an industry standard in the fact that the right of a free press should include the right to not reveal how a journalist obtains information for a story. Imprisonment for failing to reveal sources is just one dangerous trend that has begun in the United States in the last few years.

The murder of journalist Politkovskaya occurred as a result of her writings on the abuses of human rights in that region. Is it possible that a journalist reporting on the human rights abuses in the United States would also be subject to violence and death threats in the coming years?

Whether the United States is moving towards less than a free press, which is entirely possible given the recent erosion of human rights at the hands of our government, at the very least the actions of our government towards journalists here and abroad will result in the hampered ability of reporters to do their jobs. That in itself results in a less than free press.