OCTOBER 22, 2008 It is reported that scores of women media persons were compelled to quit their profession due to mounting threat from various armed Tarai outfits while collecting and disseminating news in the region.
Women journalists poured out pains and plights they came across in course of discharging responsibility as a journalist.
Speaking at a workshop organized on October 21 by Federation of Nepali Journalists (FNJ), Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and UNESCO at Lalgadh, Dhanusha, participants demanded that the government ensure security for journalists working in the region. Over a dozen armed outfits are active in Tarai now.
Some 200 women journalists were working in Tarai during the Maoist insurgency. The number has declined to about 100 now.
Freedom Forum expresses its serious concern over the rising threats against journalists and draws the attention of the government towards the volatile situation of Tarai where women journalists are forced to terminate the job. The Forum also asks the government to take up ways to settle this type of problem and make workable environment for journalists. It is a serious threat against journalist’s right to flow information and people’s right to know, and the rights of people and journalists should not be curtailed in any pretexts, the Forum stressed.
For more information,
Freedom Forum
monitoring@freedomforum.org.np
01-4102030/ 4102022