Journalists groups, editors, media owners and press freedom campaigners are joining forces today, 2 November, to demand urgent action by the United Nations to tackle impunity for crimes against journalists. With figures showing the number of killings of journalists rising in comparison to the same period last year and impunity in 9 out of 10 cases, the unprecedented coalition of professional journalists’ organisations is calling on UN member states to back media industry demands for a convention on the protection of journalists. Representatives of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), the World Association of Newspapers (WAN-IFRA), the European Broadcasting Union…

On 16 October 2017, Maltese investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered by a car bomb in the town of Bidnija, near her family home. One year after, the International and European Federations of Journalists (IFJ-EFJ) deplore the lack of independent public inquiry and the unwillingness of the Maltese government to take concrete action to end impunity around this crime. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a 53 year-old prominent investigative journalist who kept a blog labelled Running Commentary, one of the most widely read websites in Malta. The journalist had been targeted and sued many times for her writings in which…

Ukrainian journalist Pavel Sheremet was murdered on 20 July 2016. On the second anniversary of his death, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) believes that the investigation into his assassination failed to look properly into who committed and commissioned the crime. “Two years after his assassination, we should consider the journalist’s murder as an impunity case. That is why the European Federation of Journalists asked the Council of Europe platform for the protection of journalism to change the status of the alert on Pavel Sheremet’s killing to the category of “impunity”. Ukraine will become one of the worst European States…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) has backed its affiliate the Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (SMCG) in demanding the authorities in Montenegro to urgently “secure the conditions for carrying out an independent investigation of assassination of Dusko Jovanovic, the editor-in-chief of newspaper “Dan”. It has passed 14 years since our colleague Jovanovic was murdered, and state authorities failed to detect, find and arrest the perpetrators and masterminds of the most grave violation against journalists in the history of Montenegro. Dusko Jovanovic was killed on May 27, 2004 in front of the editorial offices of his newspaper in Podgorica. After 14…

On 2 November 2017, the EFJ Vice President Nadezda Azgikhina wrote a letter from Russia. The letter focused on fighting against hate and impunity towards journalists. Here, the EFJ publishes this letter: The first conference devoted to Impunity in Russia took place just before the Moscow IFJ Congress in 2007. It focused mainly on the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya, the journalist murdered on 7 October 2006, and focused on other colleagues who were murdered too. For the first time, a list of deceased Russian journalists, prepared by Glasnost Defense Foundation, was presented to the international professional community. It consisted of…

Impunity is when threats, attacks and crimes against journalists go unpunished. It results in a high level of fear, intimidation, censorship and self-censorship that undermines press freedom, the public right to know and leaves victims and their relatives powerless. The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joins the International Federation of Journalists’ (IFJ) campaign to #endimpunity, which aims at holding governments and de facto governments accountable for their impunity records and denouncing any crimes targeting journalists that remain unpunished. Murder is the highest form of these crimes but all attacks targeting journalists that remain unpunished must be denounced. In Europe, the EFJ…

Following two cases of impunity and careless investigation in Ukraine, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) renews its calls for an end to impunity for crimes against journalists and action to protect the safety of media professionals in the country. The first case involves a TV crew of local TV station attacked in front of police officers – who didn’t intervene – on 10 June 2016 in Berdyansk Zaporizhia region. Journalists went to cover the illegal seizure of a hotel building, when the unidentified men in a military uniform beaten up reporter Volodymyr Holovatiy, took away the camera and seized…

by Mogens Blicher Bjerregård, EFJ President 827 journalists were killed during the last decade and paid the ultimate price for exercising their job. An appalling and worrying fact documented by the biannual report from the Director General at UNESCO. The safety of journalists and fighting impunity was on top of the agenda during the UNESCO IPDC Council meeting, 17th-18th November 2016 in Paris. IPDC is an UNESCO program for safety of journalists, press freedom and media development. As the representative of Denmark, I delivered the following speech: Eight hundred and twenty seven, 827 journalists, have been killed since 2006. This is…

Today only one out of 10 killings in the media is investigated. Get involved in the IFJ #endimpunity campaign 2015, from 2 to 23 November 2015. Many thanks to contributors! #EndImpunity Remember the UN End of Impunity Day today @coe @Europarl_da @IFJGlobal https://t.co/BRjagQBYtw #journosafety #PressFreedom — Mogens B. Bjerregård (@mogensbb) November 2, 2015 IFJ launches 2015 global campaign to end impunity for crimes against journalists https://t.co/5PagHlA2ni pic.twitter.com/1ElMaSfN50 — Anthony Bellanger (@abellanger49) October 21, 2015 More than 700 journalists have been killed in the last 10 years. #EndImpunity https://t.co/tyLFaw1G0r pic.twitter.com/HuX8xrf5xq — UNESCO (@UNESCO) November 2, 2015 President @PutinRF_Eng, on @UN Day…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) has joined the IFJ #endimpunity campaign. We call on the European journalists and the EFJ partners to participate in the ceremony organised by the IFJ today, from 16:00 to 16:30, at the Residence Palace’s patio, in Brussels, in partnership with the Association Générale des Journalistes Professionnels de Belgique (AGJPB) and the United Nations. 2 November 2015 will mark the second commemoration of the killing in Kidal, Mali, of Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon, RFI reporters. To date, the criminal investigation launched by French and Malian authorities has yet to identify the killers and bring them to…

As a follow-up to the case of Željko Peratović, a freelance journalist and blogger who has been attacked at his home on May 28, 2015 in an attempted murder, the Croatian Journalists’ Association (Hrvatsko Novinarsko Drustvo, an EFJ-IFJ affiliate) is reminding the authorities with several cases of death threats and attacks on journalists which are still not resolved. “It is one year since freelancer Domagoj Margetić has been beaten up in front of his apartment in Zagreb. The Croatian State Attorney defined that attack as attempted murder but not the attacker or motifs, nor the person(s) who possibly ordered it…

The EFJ in cooperation with its affiliate  the Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (TUMM), sent letters to the President, the Prime Minister and other high officials of Montenegro to express its concerns about the increased lack of respect for journalists’ and media workers’ right by the employers on decent salaries, fair remuneration for freelances, trade union rights and the rights to collective bargaining in Montenegro and the region. The EFJ draws particular attention to the case of journalist Tufik Softic who because of his investigative reporting, was brutally beaten eight years ago. Two years ago, a bomb was thrown…

On 5 July 2024, the Athens Court of First Instance will hold the start of the trial of suspects accused of murdering Greek investigative journalist Giorgos Karaivaz in 2021. The trial which was initially scheduled on 26 May 2024, must conclude by 28 October this year, when the suspects’ pre-trial detention ends. The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) and its Greek affiliates (JUADN, ESIEMTH, PFJU, PEPU – ESPIT) welcome the steps taken to prosecute Karaivaz’s murder and urge authorities to conduct an independent and transparent investigation to ensure that all perpetrators are held to account, including those who ordered the…

Another alarming report on the deterioration of media pluralism in Europe. The latest edition of the “Media Pluralism Monitor” (MPM2024) is out. Of the 32 European countries analysed, barely seven (Germany, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Finland and Lithuania) have a satisfactory situation. Everywhere else, European citizens are not fully guaranteed access to diversified and independent sources of information. Overall trends show increasing commercial and political interference in the media. The report also demonstrates the passivity of European governments and media companies in the face of this democratic threat. The latest MPM report was released today by the Centre for…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joins the undersigned members of the Media freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) in welcoming the start of the trial, on 26 June, of two suspects accused of the 2021 killing of Greek investigative journalist, Giorgos Karaivaz. We also call on the authorities to redouble efforts to identify those who ordered his murder.  Giorgos Karaivaz was shot dead on 9 April 2021, near his home in Alimos, by professional hitmen who then escaped on a motorbike. The suspects were apprehended in April 2023, and have since been held in pretrial detention. The trial must conclude by…

The European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) joins the Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) coalition partners in standing in solidarity with the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation, which has unwaveringly campaigned against the continued impunity for the 1999 murder of Serbian journalist Slavko Ćuruvija. New legal action brought by two of the individuals acquitted of Ćuruvija’s murder now threatens to undermine the foundation’s campaign for justice. For over a decade, the Foundation has sought justice for Ćuruvija, an esteemed editor and publisher who was shot in front of his home in Belgrade in 1999. Twenty years later, four former state security officers were…