The political conflict between Catalonia and Spain has reached its most critical point with a week of protests against the sentence that condemned Catalan leaders between 9 and 13 years of prison. Some of the demonstrations have turned into a scenario of violence between protesters and police officers. The journalists, in between, are suffering the consequences of this confrontation: 59 journalists had been injured as for today (65 according to Mèdia.cat, but some of them are still unidentified), some of the reporters have been held in custody and informing about the situation is becoming more and more difficult.

The European Federation of Journalists and the International Federation Journalist have joined the Manifesto initiated by one of our Spanish affiliates’ member Sindicat the Periodistes de Catalunya (Federation de Sindicatos de Periodistas FeSP) calling for the respect for the rights of journalists to freedom of information and stop violence against journalists covering the protests.

The full manifesto:

With all the aggressions that we, journalists, are suffering from these last days, we want to warn the citizens that their rights are being violated. Our insistent and repeated calls to stop aggressions against information professionals go far beyond a corporatist claim, it is an alarm cry over the deterioration of freedom of expression and freedom of the press.

Journalists play a key role in informing the public on issues of public interests so that citizens can make an informed decision on public policy. Every time when someone deprive this right of a journalist, he/she  is undermining the democratic system.

Almost 65 journalists (according to the latest figure) became victims of attacks while doing their jobs. This is absolutely intolerable. We reject each and every one of these attacks, wherever they come from.   Because of this, the citizens’ right to receive information is also under attack. We note, however, that they are especially serious when the attacks come from public servants.

For these reasons, the undersigned entities:

1. We strongly disapprove the actions of the police forces, both of the Mossos d’Esquadra and the Policia Nacional. The majority of the assaulted journalists were perfectly identified as such with the corresponding vest and / or the orange bracelet. The indiscriminatory attacks by the police suggest that these attacks are aimed at intimidating journalists, resulting them to move away from the centre of the event.  Thus, it prevent journalists from exercising their role as watchdog.
2. We demand both the Ministry of Interior of the Catalonia and the Ministry of Interior of Spain to investigate these attacks. Likewise, we demand that, from the respective administrations, sufficient actions are taken to ensure that media professionals can carry out their works in the public space without hindrance and fearing for their safety. The undersigned entities offer to train police forces on the obligations of public officials to guarantee the right to information of citizens in order to prevent these situations from recurring in the future.
3. We further disapprove the detention of a journalist by agents of the Policia Nacional. It is totally unacceptable both in the ways in which these agents treated the partner and for the fact of doing so.
4. We ask all citizens and participants in demonstrations and protests to respect our work in order to guarantee their democratic rights to information. We, media professionals, are nothing more than the rest of the citizens and we want all the protests to be peaceful and that no one is the object of any violent act. But we also know that sometimes this has not been possible and we are there to report the event as it happens. That is why we ask for respect for our rights to freedom of expression and the right to information, which are enshrined in our democracy.
5. We ask the political parties, once again, for the respect and recognition of our work.
6. We understand that there may be people upset by the editorial policy of some media. This policy is not decided by media professionals who are covering these events on the streets. We remind you that to complain about the information that anyone receives, you can go to the Information Council of Catalonia and the Audiovisual Council of Catalonia if you believe that information violates the Code of Ethics of journalists. But the outrage they may feel cannot be directed against the media workers that cover the events.

Barcelona, ​​October 22, 2019

You can read the ,manifesto in Spanish here.