COLOMBO (AFP) — Sri Lanka has the lowest press freedom rating of any democracy and has been the first to use anti-terror laws to prosecute journalists, international rights groups said Friday.
Five organisations, including the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF), said journalists and media institutions seeking to report independently on the island's Tamil separatist conflict were being "attacked and intimidated."
Following a fact-finding mission to Sri Lanka this month, the panel said in a joint statement that they found a deterioration in the press freedom situation since their last visit in June 2007.
It was "marked by a continuation in murders, attacks, abductions, intimidation and harassment of the media," they said.
In the recent World Press Freedom Index published by RSF, Sri Lanka was given the lowest press freedom rating of any democratic country worldwide, they noted.
"In recent months, journalists and media institutions seeking to report independently on the ongoing conflict have been attacked and intimidated in a seeming effort to limit public knowledge about the conduct of the war and to reveal their sources.
"This is a violation of the public right to know and the accepted norm that media sources should be protected," the group said.
The International Federation of Journalists noted the unprecedented use by a democratic nation of terrorism legislation to punish journalists for what they have written.
In August, Sri Lankan authorities used anti-terrorism laws to charge local journalist J.S. Tissanayagam and two colleagues with inciting racial hatred and bringing disrepute to the government.
They have been in detention since being arrested in March.
Media rights activists have described Sri Lanka as one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists due to a worsening climate of violence and unofficial censorship.
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved. More »
