Media watchdog group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) yesterday said government support for press freedom has been declining worldwide, as it unveiled its annual world rankings, highlighting Argentina among the countries where the situation has deteriorated.
Norway retained its top position, while Eritrea came last, taking over from last year’s lowest-ranked country, North Korea. Among the most significant declines were Afghanistan, which fell 26 places to 178th; Togo, down 43 to 113th; and Ecuador, down 30 to 110th. The bottom 10 included China, Iran, North Korea, Syria and Eritrea.
The watchdog said that politicians across a wide range of countries were targeting the media.
Photo: AFP
“Some political groups fuel hatred and distrust of journalists by insulting them, discrediting them and threatening them,” it said. “Others are orchestrating a takeover of the media ecosystem.”
It singled out Argentina under newly elected President Javier Milei, down 26 places to 66th, saying his decision to shutter the public press agency Telam was a “worrisome symbolic act.”
It also highlighted Italy under Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, where a member of her coalition is trying to acquire news agency AGI.
Respondents in three-quarters of countries reported to RSF that political actors were often involved in disinformation and propaganda, and that this was systematic in 31 countries.
RSF said there was “spectacular mimicry of Russian repressive methods” across Eastern Europe and Central Asia, stretching as far as Serbia, “where pro-government media carry Russian propaganda and the authorities threaten exiled Russian journalists.”
The most challenging region remained the Middle East and North Africa, where the situation was “very serious” in nearly half the countries, with Qatar now the only country where the situation was not classified either as “difficult” or “very serious.”
Europe was the only region to include any countries classed as “good.” Greece was ranked worst in Europe — 88th overall — coming below Hungary and Poland. Despite improvements in its score, Greece was criticized over its continued failure to deal with a scandal around wiretapping journalists by the intelligence service and the murder of veteran crime reporter Giorgos Karaivaz in 2021.
Now in its 22nd year, the RSF report is based on data collected by the group about abuses against journalists, and questionnaires sent to professionals, researchers and rights defenders.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver