Last few days i was in Sudbury with the invitation of Laurentian University speaking on Freedom of Expression.

Battle rages for freedom of expression; Around the world, journalists lead the charge
Rob O'Flanagan
For: www.thesudburystar.com

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- Friday, March 09, 2007 @ 11:00

Discussions around freedom of expression can be abstract and complex, but for the majority of journalists around the world, the issue is a simple matter of life and death.

Journalist Arnold Amber, president of Canadian Journalists for Free expression, was one of a strong slate of speakers at Laurentian University's Colloquium on freedom of expression, held Thursday on campus.

Amber appreciated the philosophical papers on the subject presented by a pair of Laurentian students to start the discussion. But he brought the issue down to harsh reality when he spoke of the reporters who die for writing and speaking freely.

The fight for the freedom of expression among the world's journalists goes on year after year, generation after generation, Amber said. And every year, more of them are murdered for doing their jobs.

"The reality is, you can be killed," he said to an audience numbering more than 100 - most of them students.

Amber said 86 journalists were killed last year "for being journalists," and another 40 to 50 people died serving them. Many were killed while covering wars and disasters, but others were thrown out of windows or shot in the back.

Nine of those were reporters murdered in Mexico, a country which has a free-trade agreement with Canada, but which is run by an increasingly lawless regime, Amber said. In Russia, which has seemingly embraced democracy and free speech, 44 journalists have been murdered since 1994.

"They get killed for doing a job that people in this city, reporters here, would never get killed for," he said, adding that of the world's 160 countries, only 30 to 40 of them allow journalists to do their job freely, without threat of reprisals.

Hassan Cherif Kala fled his native Chad in 2000, after being repeatedly jailed and harassed for doing his job as a journalist, and for promoting freedom of expression, democracy and good governance. He came to Canada, where he found a new level of free expression.

"Now, I am able to fight for Africa from here," he said. "Now I can write what I want to write."

Kala has written numerous articles and editorials for newspapers and websites, discussing Chad's involvement in the crisis in Darfur in the western Sudan. The Chadian regime, he said, has directly contributed to that crisis.

"freedom of expression means a lot for journalists, means a lot for writers," he said.

"But we have to ask, in terms of freedom of expression, what is our limit? What we want to do when we express, is help a part of the population. There has to be a sense of responsibility and a respect for rights."

In the 1980s, Iranian poet and human rights activist Morteza Abdolalian was imprisoned for his efforts to promote freedom of expression in his homeland. He escaped his captors and made his way to Canada in 1990.

While a reform movement managed to take hold in Iran throughout the 1990s, Abdolalian said the present regime under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has turned back the clock and is stripping away freedoms in that country.

An "anti-woman" policy, he told the audience, has been implemented in an effort to reduce the number of women in colleges and universities.

A growing militarism in the country, he added, threatens to escalate conflicts in the Middle East, a region of the globe desperately in need of liberal democracy. The young people of Iran, which make up a significant portion of the population, are the country's only hope for democracy, he added.

Most of them are connected to the Internet and are accustomed to free expressions and access to information.

A country can't be a democracy without the freedom of information, Amber said. An individual can only grow, mature and thrive when they are free to explore the world of knowledge, free to explore the truth.

"freedom of expression does affect all of us as individuals," he said.

"It speaks to our ability to be a complete citizen. We need the ability to reach our full potential in life."

Canada is not guilt-free when it comes to allowing free expression among journalists, Amber added. Too much information is derived from the press releases of companies, government and institutions, he said - all of it biased in favour of the issuer.

And there is inadequate protection for sources in this country, to the point where a reporter can be forced to divulge sources in a court of law, or face charges.

roflanagan@thesudburystar.com