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2024 Assistance Report

  • RSF

Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has released its 2024 Assistance Report, revealing a growing trend of forced exile among journalists worldwide. In 2024, the organization allocated 70% of its emergency funds to relocating over 700 persecuted journalists and provided financial aid to 42 media outlets facing crises.

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Editor in exile: One journalist’s daring escape from Myanmar

  • Index on Censorship
  • Ian Wylie

Kyaw Min Swe, the former editor-in-chief of weekly newspaper Aasan (The Voice) and executive director of the Myanmar Journalism Institute, has been a journalist for more than 25 years. He had been detained before, but this time was different. Index traveled to Germany to meet exiled newspaper editor Kyaw, who faced torture and imprisonment at the hands of the military junta.

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Flight and Fight: Supporting Journalists in Exile

    The issue of exiled journalists goes beyond individual stories of courage. It strikes at the heart of human rights. Journalists are in exile because their most basic human rights—particularly the right to freedom of expression—are being systematically denied. These are not isolated incidents; they are symptoms of broader failures to uphold international norms and hold oppressive regimes accountable.

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    China, Israel, and Myanmar: Top Jailers of Journalists

    • Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)

    China, Israel, and Myanmar emerged as the world’s three worst offenders in another record-setting year for journalists jailed because of their work, the Committee to Protect Journalists’ 2024 prison census has found. Belarus and Russia rounded out the top five, with CPJ documenting its second-highest number of journalists behind bars.

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    Activist and Blogger Lu Yuyu On Escaping China

    • The Guardian
    • Amy Hawkins

    Chinese dissident Lu Yuyu’s perilous escape from China reveals the high stakes of documenting unrest under an authoritarian regime. Once jailed for exposing protests, Lu now rebuilds his life in Canada while navigating China’s growing digital censorship.

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    Syria: “I Haven’t Cried So Much in so Long”

    • CNN

    At the start of the Syrian civil war, citizen journalist Rami Jarrah picked up a camera to document Assad government atrocities. He says, “We’ve been given our country back, and we have the opportunity now to build it.”

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    Adapting to Survive: How Exiled Media Lead Innovation

    • JX Fund

    With the increasing monopolization of information infrastructures on one side and targeted disinformation campaigns and propaganda by authoritarian regimes on the other, facts have become lonely things. However, for many exiled media outlets, this isn’t breaking news but rather a reality they have already adapted to. The constant need to innovate in response to new circumstances has given rise to unconventional business models.

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    A North Korean Voice That Kim Jong-un Would Like to Silence

    • The New York Times
    • Choe Sang-Hun

    Defying cancer and constant threats, North Korean defector Kim Seongmin broadcasts uncensored news into North Korea, challenging Pyongyang’s grip on information. Through Free North Korea Radio, he inspires hope among those isolated by censorship—even as Kim Jong-un tightens his authoritarian rule.

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    Media Freedom in Afghanistan

    • UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) & UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR)

    The joint report by the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) and the UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) documented 336 cases of human rights violations against media professionals between August 2021 and September 2024.

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    “Journalists Will Continue Their Work Despite Repression”

    • Confidecial / Havana Times
    • Carlos F. Chamorro

    After 813 days in solitary confinement, Guatemalan journalist Jose Ruben Zamora returns home, committed to exposing corruption despite heavy repression. In this interview, Zamora discusses the ongoing threats to press freedom under Guatemala’s authoritarian regime and his determination to continue the fight.

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    Exiled Journalist Communities in Germany

    • Körber Stiftung

    As global crises, authoritarianism, and threats to press freedom escalate, more journalists are forced to flee their home countries, making independent journalism one of the most dangerous professions today. The recently published study by Körber Stiftung sheds light on the growing scale and challenges of exiled journalism in Germany.

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    Chinese Journalist Dai Qing’s Quiet Life in Exile

    • Radio Free Asia

    Veteran Chinese journalist Dai Qing, 83, now lives in exile in Chiang Mai, Thailand, where she is working on her forthcoming book “Notes on History”. A prominent critic of the Three Gorges Dam project and a supporter of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, Dai now enjoys a quiet life among a community of exiled Chinese intellectuals, reflecting on her past activism while staying informed about China’s current political climate.

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    Journalists In Exile Expose Government Brutality

    • Outlook
    • Shweta Desai

    Netra News, an independent news outlet in exile, is known for its rare feat in investigative reportage exposing corruption in the Bangladesh government and abuse of security agencies. Outlook spoke to its founder Tasneem Khalil on running an online news platform from Sweden, tracking political instability and protests in Bangladesh.

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    Yavuz Baydar Reflects on Life as a Turkish Exiled Journalist

    • Körber Stiftung

    Yavuz Baydar is an award-winning journalist, editor and analyst in Turkish and international media. Since the failed Turkish coup d’etat in 2016 Yavuz Baydar has had to live and work in exile. In conversation with Diana Huth, Yavuz Baydar analyzes the geopolitical implications of the 2024 elections and calls for greater support for exile journalism.

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    Georgia: A Crisis Point For Press Freedom

    • European Centre for Press and Media Freedom

    In Spring 2024, a delegation from the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) conducted a press freedom fact-finding mission to Tbilisi, Georgia as part of a project funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). Today, ECPMF publishes a report detailing the findings of the mission, which paint a picture of independent media in the midst of an existential crisis.

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    Attacks on Media Workers in Russia in 2021-2023

    • Justice for Journalists

    This report covers the period from 2021 to 2023, during which almost 70% of all attacks on media workers in Russia have been recorded since monitoring began in 2017. The attacks of the Russian authorities on journalists and bloggers over the past three years have taken on an unprecedented scale.

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    Digital News Report 2024

    • Reuters Institute

    The 2024 Digital News Report Reuters Institute reveals new findings about the consumption of online news globally. It is based on a YouGov survey of more than 95,000 people in 47 countries representing half of the world’s population. The report looks at the growing importance of platforms in news consumption and production, including more visual and video-led social media such as TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.

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    Drug-related Violence Fuels an Exodus of Ecuador’s Press

    • Committee to Protect Journalists
    • John Otis

    On the only radio station in the remote Ecuadorian town of Baeza, morning show host Juan Carlos Tito updates listeners on the weather, recent power outages, and repairs to a bridge spanning a nearby river. For the last 24 years, Tito, 53, has been the trusted voice of Radio Selva, broadcasting important community news to this town of 2,000 in the Andean highlands. But now, Tito’s voice is beamed into Baeza from abroad.

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