Colombia: The War Against Journalists
Reporting on Colombia’s war is extremely dangerous for journalists. For what they publish and broadcast, reporters are threatened and harassed, kidnapped and beaten, driven into exile and murdered. Only in Algeria have more journalists been murdered during recent years in retaliation for the work they do.
In a seminar with reporters new to Washington beats, Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel, co-authors of “The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect” (Crown Publishers, March 2001), spoke about the ways in which sources and journalists operate in the nation’s capitol. As Tom Rosenstiel says in excerpts from this discussion, “We have come to recognize that sources—those who want to manipulate members of the press—are gaining the upper hand in their relationships with journalists today, particularly in Washington.”
