Sat 08th May 2021 | 11:00 AM
Bamako, May 8 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 8th May, 2021 ) :Recent killings and kidnappings of reporters in the Sahel have highlighted the severe risks faced by journalists in the war-torn African region, with some describing themselves as sick with fear .
A brutal jihadist conflict in the Sahel nations of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso has left vast swathes of territory outside of state control, and thousands of people dead.
Journalists covering the insurgency often find themselves targeted by armed groups, either because of their reporting, or their ransom value.
The considerable risks involved in practising journalism in the vast semi-arid region were underscored this week when it emerged that French reporter Olivier Dubois, who had gone missing, was likely being held captive by jihadists.
Revised Windhoek Declaration Promotes Journalists Safety, Media’s Economic Viability And Internet Transparency
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Carol Guensburg, Ndimyake Mwakalyelye
Gwen Lister co-chaired a 1991 journalism seminar in Windhoek, Namibia, whose participants produced an influential text calling for a free, independent and pluralistic press. The Windhoek Declaration led to World Press Freedom Day.
Thirty years ago, dozens of African journalists gathered at a conference in the then-new nation of Namibia to strategize how to better serve the public and minimize risks of their jobs.
“In Africa today … in many countries journalists, editors and publishers are victims of repression – they are murdered, arrested, detained and censored …” the journalists wrote in a document that denounced government controls and economic and political pressures.
Two Spanish journalists and an Irish citizen killed in Burkina Faso
Two Spanish journalists and an Irish citizen have been killed after they were kidnapped during an anti-poaching patrol in Burkina Faso on Monday.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez confirmed the deaths of the Spanish nationals Tuesday in a post on Twitter. “The worst news has been confirmed. All of our affection for the families,” he wrote.
Sánchez identified them as David Beriain and Roberto Fraile.
The pair were part of a group of 40 people patrolling a national park near the border of Burkina Faso and Benin in West Africa, Spain’s Foreign Minister Arancha González Laya told a press conference in Madrid Tuesday shortly before their deaths were officially confirmed.
More than 17,500 people in Burkina Faso have been forcefully displaced from their homes in the past 10 days due to a series of attacks by unidentified armed groups that have killed 45 people, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said.
Attacks by armed groups linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State in the West African Sahel region have been rising sharply since the start of the year, particularly in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso, with civilians bearing the brunt.
A UNHCR statement on Friday said gunmen had carried out a series of attacks in three separate regions, burning down houses and shooting civilians dead. The assailants also ransacked health centres and damaged homes and shops.