Eight years ago, horrifying video of the murder of veteran Wall Street Journal correspondent Daniel Pearl by terrorists in Pakistan surfaced, sending shivers down the spines of journalists everywhere. But this week, President Obama signed legislation that underscores the country’s commitment to press freedom, reports The Wall Street Journal.
The bipartisan measure, called the Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act, requires the State Department to expand its reporting on press freedom; to identify countries in which there were violations of press freedom; determine whether the government authorities of those countries participate in, facilitate, or condone the violations; and report the actions such governments have taken to preserve the safety and independence of the media and ensure the prosecution of individuals who attack or murder journalists.
The new law “puts us clearly on the side of journalistic freedom,” Obama said, adding:
“It has the State Department each year chronicling how press freedom is operating as one component of our human rights assessment, but it also looks at [ ... ] governments that are specifically condoning or facilitating this kind of press repression, singles them out and subjects them to the gaze of world opinion in ways that I think are extraordinarily important.”
But just how important is this measure? Frank Smyth at the Committee to Protect Journalists, this measure “allows for a complete discussion of the forces responsible” for violence against journalists, and holds governments accountable for “failing to bring them to justice.” Smyth added that when it comes to violations of press freedom and violence against journalists, “the worst thing you can do is not talk about it,” and this law will ensure that a light is shone on these human rights violations around the world.
The CPJ says that since 1992, 521 journalists have been murdered, and that in nine of out 10 cases, the perpetrators get away with it, in part because their governments do not hold them accountable. What’s worse is that in many cases, including those where terrorists are the perpetrators, those behind the murders are governments or paramilitary actors. CPJ publishes a list of the worst offenders every year in its “Impunity Index,” a list of countries where journalists are killed regularly and governments fail to solve the crimes.
Obama was joined in the Oval Office by Pearl’s widow, Mariane, and the couple’s son, Adam, who was born several months after his father’s death. He will turn 8 this month.
Pearl was reporting on terrorist groups in Pakistan when he was kidnapped and beheaded in early 2002. Four men were convicted in Pakistan soon afterward, and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of 9/11, confessed to Pearl’s murder in 2007.
Photo by US Senate via Wikimedia Commons.