Magnum Blog / Shooters at risk

Shooters at risk

Although war reporting demands physical proximity to a story, the risks that photographers and journalists face worldwide don't always involve bombs and grenades. Uncovering certain stories may be more dangerous, as illustrated by the many local journalists who are killed in direct retaliation for their work. Cape Town, South Africa. Feb. 11, 1990. Magnum photographer Patrick Zachmann was wounded by a rubber bullet when taking this picture during a police altercation with a crowd awaiting the liberation of Nelson Mandela. Patrick Zachmann/Magnum Photos It's an unconventional memorial. A heavy slab of gray rock sits outside the elevators in the foyer of Reuters' Washington bureau. Propped up against a polished wooden stand, the face of the granite is hand etched with white letters to read: In memory of Roberto Navas Alvarez Reuter [sic] Photographer Born 12 December 1960 Died March 18 1989 Shot while covering Presidential elections in El Salvador. The small Central American nation was packed with foreign journalists. At least a dozen of them lived in San Salvador at the time, while a few dozen more had just parachuted in to cover national elections to be held the following day. Many foreign news organizations, especially the wires, hired locals to help report and take pictures. Navas was a newly hired photo-stringer for Reuters, and he was giving his more established Reuters colleague, Luis Galdámez, a ride home on his motorcycle after a long day’s work. Things were tense, as leftist guerrillas were boycotting the elections being organized by the Salvadoran government and backed by the United States. Many Salvadoran Army officers complained that the foreign press in particular gave the Marxist rebels too much ink.

John Vink

I know it is bickering because there are no heroes out there and it doesn't matter if a killed journalist was a writer, a photographer or a cameraman. It is always a shattering personal event and a step ahead towards totalitarianism... But the number of 7.4 percent of journalists worldwide that were killed from 1992 to 2006 who were photographers against 32 percent of writers is maybe not reflecting the situation. The interesting number would be to have the proportion of photographers killed among the photographers compared to the proportion of writers killed among the writers etc... There are much more writers killed than photographers because there are much more writers out there.

Michael Bel

@John - Yes, it seems statistics are quite meaningless without context and I couldn't find much more info on the cpj.org website. Also, in the actual study the total percentages add up to more than 100% because people sometimes have multiple roles, which makes it even more difficult to assess. But the rest of the article is still interesting and the statistics do serve to stimulate thought and discussion... for me at least.

Animesh Ray

Naively speaking, it is to the strategic advantage of all parties, especially of the underdogs, to actually allow information or photographs to be publicized because these information can be used for propaganda purposes in certain clever ways. Fascist organizations, however, may wish to control all information and therefore possibly work under the assumption that they do not need these opportunistic publicities. The increase in violence against reporters and photojournalists indicates to me the increasingly fascist characteristics of all parties involved. During the cold war the warring parties had some apparently lofty ideals in the background--free-market capitalism versus socialism---now there is no rational idealism; only blind faith in religious extremism or in the equally blind demagogy of "global war on terrorism". Lamentable indeed. Meanwhile our journalists are sacrificed.

Peter

True. Same for humanitarian staff trying to alleviate the suffering. Wars are changing in that those formerly recognized as bystanders are becoming targets.