Syria, France most deadly countries for journalists – CPJ

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says 2015 was one of the deadliest years on record for members of the press worldwide, with 69 journalists killed in line of duty between January 1 and December 23.  61 were killed in 2014. In a report published yesterday, the CPJ said of 69 journalists killed in 2015, […]

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says 2015 was one of the deadliest years on record for members of the press worldwide, with 69 journalists killed in line of duty between January 1 and December 23.  61 were killed in 2014.
In a report published yesterday, the CPJ said of 69 journalists killed in 2015, 28 journalists (about 40%) died at the hands of Islamic militant groups such as Al-Qaeda and Islamic State. Nine were killed in France, which was second only to Syria as the most dangerous country for the press in 2015.
The death toll among journalists in Syria topped CPJ’s 2015 list with the current figure standing at 13 – a sharp decline from previous years; 31 journalists were killed in Syria in 2012; 29 and 17 were killed in 2013 and 2014, respectively.
In 2012, 2013, and 2014, deaths in Syria far outnumbered those in the rest of the world. The report said the declining number of deaths in Syria “reflects in part the reduced number of journalists working there, after many major international news organizations chose not to send staff to the country and local journalists fled into exile.”
For the death of journalists in France, CPJ said eight of the killings took place at the office of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on January 7, and one (43-year-old freelance journalist Guillaume B. Decherf) who was reporting on a concert at the Bataclan Theater in Paris when gunmen attacked on November 13.
Unlike in the past three years, the deaths were widely distributed across countries. France is followed by Brazil where six journalists in connection with their work. Five were killed in each Iraq, Bangladesh, South Sudan, and Yemen.