I
am happy to participate in the Prize Awarding Session
which concludes the UNESCO celebration of ‘World
Press Freedom Day’, which falls on the 3rd of
May each year.
It is indeed an honour for Sri Lanka
to have been chosen as the venue for this year’s
events. At the same time, news of the cruel attack on
the Udayan newspaper yesterday, tempers our sense of
honour. With profound regret for those who lost their
lives and those who were injured, my government and
I condemn this outrage in the strongest possible terms.
We see this attack as an attempt to destroy values and
principles that are both sacred and dear to all freedom
loving societies and peoples. I have instructed the
law enforcement authorities to spare no effort to bring
the criminals involved in this senseless act to justice.
But even as the attack on the Udayan
newspaper was being planned and carried out, I am aware
that many of you, including our distinguished guests
from abroad, were participating productively in the
successful conference on “Media Development and
Poverty Alleviation”. And by doing so, you were
contributing to the advancement of media freedom, as
a part of the UNESCO celebrations over the past two
days.
And today, we salute a Columbian
Journalist who was assassinated in 1986, by awarding
an international prize in his memory. And in doing so,
we recall and honour all those who suffered, over the
years, fighting for the Freedom of the Press. We specially
recall and honour the memory of the many journalists
who have been brutally assassinated by those whose interest
it was to repress freedom and democracy. And our thoughts
go out to the 126 journalists and 70 internet communicators
who, at the beginning of this year, were reported to
be suffering in jail around the world. In 2005 alone,
63 journalists were killed while doing their job, for
expressing their views in a spirit of freedom.
Let us also remember that Sri Lanka’s
journalists too had to endure their share of repression,
in the past. Our mind goes back to the early nineteen
nineties when the lives of journalists were under threat,
and media freedom was seriously challenged in our own
country. We salute the memory of the Sri Lankan journalist
Richard de Zoysa, who was abducted from his home, killed
and dumped in the sea.
As a human rights activist and lawyer,
I remember fighting on their side, at risk to my own
life and security. We are happy that these are things
of the past, and that today the media can legitimately
criticize anyone holding high office or position, -
even the Head of State, - without fear of revenge or
retaliation. I wish to inform you that we are pursuing
the killing of Mr. Shivaram.
In functioning democracies, the
people are the masters and the elected governments are
their servants or trustees. An important function of
the media is to ensure that the servants don’t
try to become masters and transform the masters into
servants. It is the responsibility of a free press to
keep the people informed about the conduct of their
trustees, - the elected governments and their officers.
It has always been my conviction that if a person has
chosen the career of a public officer or politician,
he or she must be ready to face the glare of the spotlight
at all times.
Media freedom therefore is an important
instrument for the protection of democracy, and an insurance
against a possible drift towards authoritarian rule.
While this is so, we must also remember that the press
is also vulnerable to manipulation and temptation. It
can be turned in the direction of serving the vested
interests of particular groups, instead of serving the
broader interests of the people at large. This is no
doubt a problem. But I do not believe that censorship
is the answer to it, except perhaps in the circumstances
of a threat to national security as required by a democracy.
To hold itself in check against
these possible abuses, the media must devise its own
corrective tools and instruments. It must evolve its
own ethical code, and its own mechanism for sanctioning
it. It can think of an internal Ombudsman to investigate
grievances and malicious reporting. The media should
not leave it to the State to impose these mechanisms.
Instead, it must develop its own mechanisms of self
control and self discipline, through processes internal
to its own community of journalists.
The threat to a people’s freedom
– and especially to the freedom of expression,
the threat to human rights and in particular to the
right to disagree, and the challenge to democracy, can
come not only from the State and its functionaries.
It can also come from terrorist groups that have decided
to adopt the path of violence. Such groups will direct
their violence against multi-ethnic societies as well
as against long standing traditions of democracy.
It is the duty and responsibility
of a free world press to expose their true nature and
rally the freedom loving people of the world against
their real objects and their activities. We invite you
to use the powers at your disposal to persuade them
to shun the path of violence and, in good faith, cooperate
with the continuing efforts made by governments, to
craft a lasting peace with dignity, through negotiation.
There is yet another responsibility
a free press needs to undertake in the current age of
globalization. Global economic enterprises such as the
trans-national companies and banks are increasingly
enjoying a power that enables them to decide the well-being
of countries and peoples across the world. The global
economic system, of which they are a part, is seen to
rapidly bring prosperity to certain segments of the
population, - such as the middle classes and the professionals.
At the same time it is seen to be increasing the levels
and intensity of poverty at the other end of the social
scale.
Some commentators have even gone
to the extent of concluding that an Economic Construct
thrust on the entire world, by the engines of commerce,
is resulting in an cruel increase of poverty at one
end of society and an ugly increase of wealth and affluence
at the other: That this global economic system over
which Nation States and their peoples have little or
no control, is resulting in serious ecological damage,
social and political instability, and in moral, ethical
and spiritual decline, across the world.
A new responsibility therefore falls
on you: Namely, to expose the impact of the globalized
economic enterprise on the weaker segments of society
in particular, and on the human condition in general.
Not only Nation States and groups dedicated to violence,
but nameless, faceless economic systems too, operating
on a global scale, can harm the rights, the freedom
and the well-being of different segments of a population.
It is your duty as journalists to help them restore
their rights and their freedom.
I trust you not to fail in your
many responsibilities. The journalists of the world
must find the space to move forward fearlessly to play
their role in protecting the people’s rights and
freedom, from the State as well as from other agencies,
and also from the unfolding of faceless global systems
of commerce and exchange.
And as they do so, it is the responsibility
of all of us who value freedom and cherish the democratic
way of life, to join together to safeguard the Freedom
of the Press, which we ask you to enjoy not only with
courage, but also with responsibility. Thank you.
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