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REPORTS: COLOMBIA |
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Tuesday 30
September 2003
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Self-Protection
Manual for Journalists
María
Isabel García
BOGOTA, (IPS) - Do not wear military
fatigues, make deals in exchange for
information, or carry messages to
conflict zones are just a few of the
recommendations contained in a new
manual for journalists in Colombia,
where 36 reporters have been killed
since 1995.
Amidst a debate on the complex
relations between the media and
Colombia's four-decade conflict, the
Foundation for Freedom of the Press
(FLIP) published the manual, aimed at
keeping journalists safe from attacks
by the armed factions involved in the
civil war.
To their cassette recorder, pen and
camera, reporters in Colombia should
add a first-aid kit, bullet-proof vest
and helmet, says the manual.
To their proficiency in grammar and
syntax they should add knowledge about
ballistics, first aid and survival.
And to their journalistic instinct,
the reflex to ''drop to the ground at
the first shot.''
The manual includes a map showing the
areas over which each armed group
holds sway, and details the different
sub-groupings of the irregular armed
organisations: the leftist
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia
(FARC) and National Liberation Army (ELN),
and the right-wing paramilitary United
Self-Defence Forces of Colombia (AUC).
It also warns that ''on some
occasions,'' members of the security
forces have attacked or tried to
intimidate reporters.
Among the behaviour and attitudes
described as risky, the manual lists
''showing fear'' towards armed groups,
wearing fatigues as ''camouflage'',
carrying ''souvenirs'' from any
organisation, and taking messages or
packages to someone in a conflict
zone.
Getting carried away by eagerness to
get the big scoop or making a deal
with any group in exchange for
information or protection might win a
reporter a front-page headline, but it
can also cost their life, the manual
warns.
In a country where ''democratic values
are under fire from all sides,'' the
purpose of the manual, published as a
pocket-sized notebook, is to orient
reporters and help them take
precautions and minimise the risks
inherent to exercising their
profession in a country torn by civil
strife.
The risks faced by reporters have
grown worse as the armed conflict has
increased in both scope and brutality.
FLIP has documented threats received
by 150 journalists since 2000, and the
murders of seven and self-imposed
exile of five so far this year.
Described as ''tools for reporting
freely,'' the recommendations range
from how to obtain information and get
their reports published, to how to
behave in emergency situations and how
to handle the effects a report might
have once published.
Marta Ruiz, one of the editors of the
manual, told IPS that it ''has an
ethical focus'' and is based on the
view that ''the more serious and
reflective and the less reckless and
emotional a reporter is, the better
will be his or her chances of
survival,'' although risks always
exist.
That is one of the main focuses of the
series of seminars and workshops in
which the first print-run of 5,000
copies began to be distributed, on
Sep. 16.
Another of the manual's basic premises
is that truth must always form the
foundation of investigating and
writing journalistic reports.
It also tells reporters to resist
pressure from those who want to use
them to forward their own agendas, and
to present different sides and sources
objectively, while putting them into
context.
The media in Colombia tend ''to focus
much more on the violent incident
itself rather than on its context,
cause or remedy,'' states the Colombia
National Human Development Report
2003, published this month by the
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
The UNDP report also urges reporters
to ''rethink their methods, emphasis
and silences, to help understand the
conflict and resolve it sooner and
with lower costs.''
The editor of the manual's chapter on
the media, Carlos Chica, noted in a
conversation with IPS that the main
sources quoted in reports on the armed
conflict are the army, police, and
intelligence services.
The news ''must open up to all
voices,'' and especially to
non-combatants, in order to ''multiply
the ways of perceiving and
transmitting reality, keeping in mind
that sources might have knowledge and
information, but they also have their
own interests,'' said Chica.
The plan for publishing the manual,
which began to take shape two years
ago, involved several local
non-governmental organisations (NGOs)
that work in favour of freedom of the
press.
The groups form part of the Antonio
Nariño Project, named in honour of
Colombia's independence hero, who was
imprisoned for secretly translating
and distributing copies of The
Declaration of the Rights of Man
As well as FLIP, which has run a
Network of Alert and Protection for
Journalists since 1998, the Antonio
Nariño Project involves the New
Journalist Foundation, created by
Colombian Nobel Literature laureate
Gabriel García Márquez, the National
Newspapers Association, Media for
Peace, and the Fescol foundation.
Although the NGOs have different
focuses, their shared objectives are
protection and safety for reporters,
training of journalists from around
the region on coverage of the armed
conflict, and raising awareness among
government and business sectors on
citizens' right to be informed.
The United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organisation
(UNESCO) also sponsored the manual.
One of the manual's reference points
was a similar publication distributed
in Europe by Reporters Without
Borders, based on interviews with
Colombian and foreign journalists who
have worked in this South American
country.
But the main difference is that the
Reporters Without Borders manual ''is
designed for people who go to cover a
war, not for those who live in it,''
said Ruiz.
In her view, one of the aspects that
merits greater attention are the
working conditions faced by provincial
reporters, who work in areas where
danger is heightened ''by the close
link between the journalist and the
conflict, the high levels of
corruption, the state's lack of
legitimacy, and the power of the local
elites.''
It is not reporters on the staff of
papers of national circulation or
powerful radio and TV stations that
face the worst harassment from the
armed groups, but free-lance
journalists working as stringers for
the large media outlets or journalists
with small local press or broadcast
media, who do not even have social
security coverage.
''There is a major political angle to
the question of safety,'' and specific
measures are needed to keep reporters
safe, which has not yet become a
priority for the media outlets, said
Ruiz.
One of the reasons, she said, is that
protecting reporters requires an
investment that many companies are not
willing to make, such as purchasing
life insurance policies, or vehicles
so their ''special envoys'' do not
have to capture the images of the
conflict from army helicopters.
The manual also calls for a change of
mentality among reporters, who after
four decades of civil strife have
internalised survival strategies
imposed by the armed actors or
generated by the way media companies
function.
For example, how many deals and
''silences'' does an interview with a
drug baron, insurgent commander or
paramilitary chief cost?
And in the midst of the dogmatic views
of each of the warring parties, how
neutral can a reporter be in a small
town dominated by one of the armed
groups, when writing news reports that
have to classify for the headlines of
a national paper or newscast?
For the reporters covering Colombia's
armed conflict, these questions are as
valid as they are for their
counterparts in other places where
press workers are at great risk, like
Liberia, Chechnya or Azerbaijan.
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