The
dangers of reporting
The
news media takes a regular beating for its inaccuracies,
invasions of privacy and herd-like thinking. Many of
these faults are true and must be watched. But then
consider how many reporters are killed in combat or
otherwise die by simply trying to do their jobs. The
point is driven home by the murder of Wall Street Journal
reporter Daniel Pearl by thugs in Pakistan.
Much
has been written about Pearl's death, but his killing
is just one of several dozen each year. According to
the Committee to Protect Journalists, last year, 37
reporters and photographers were slain around the world,
including nine in Afghanistan. In one case, four reporters
from Reuters and European newspapers were machine-gunned
after being dragged from an ambushed convoy. Other slayings
are planned assassinations, such as that of Salvador
Medina Velazquez, a Paraguyan community radio station
executive who was stalked and shot.
As
for me, I'll never forget Oct. 3 and 4, 1993. I was
bureau chief for BusinessWeek in Moscow. Armed combat
broke out between government troops loyal to President
Boris N. Yeltsin and fascists who wanted to overthrow
Russia's nascent democracy and bring on an authoritarian
nationalist regime.
On
the night of Oct. 3, four reporters were slain after
being caught in a cross-fire as rebels tried to seize
a national television station. About that time, I was
driving our bureau car to the scene - heading directly
to a spot where opposing lines of bright red tracer
fire from machine guns were connecting. I turned around.
Early
the next morning, a column of government tanks appeared
in front of my apartment. A full-day battle began with
the rebels holed up in the legislature building down
the street. My colleagues and I were on the streets
reporting as tanks, troops and rebels blasted away.
Every now and then scythes of bullets would cut down
onlookers. Not far away in our apartment, my wife did
her best to keep our two young daughters away from the
windows. At one point, my four-year-old daughter pointed
at the window and asked, "Mommy, why are the people
outside clapping so hard?"
All
in all, seven reporters from different countries were
slain in that coup d-etat attempt, along with at least
150 Moscovites and soldiers. Our BusinessWeek team made
it through unscathed. But one of our free-lance photographers,
a Briton named Malcolm Linton, was shot in the hand
and shoulder, and had to be medevaced to Western Europe.
Later, he joked about it, saying that he'd also been
wounded during the U.S. invasion of Panama three years
earlier. "Now I've been shot by both the Americans
AND the Russians," he said.
So,
the next time you get mad at the media, you certainly
might be justified. But please remember that a lot of
journalists can and do face incredible danger armed
with nothing more than a camera or a notebook.
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