It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, December 10, 2021
COVID-19 discovery: Researcher in Canada invents coating that can kill virus on a mask, prevents transmission Elisabetta Bianchini Thu., December 9, 2021 Dr. Seyyedarash Haddadi, winner of the Mitacs & NRC-IRAP Award for Commercialization
A University of British Columbia, Okanagan researcher has invented a coating that can be applied to face masks to prevent the transmission of COVID-19, and has now received the prestigious Mitacs & NRC-IRAP Award for Commercialization.
Dr. Seyyedarash Haddadi, a postdoctoral fellow working under the supervision of Dr. Mohammad Arjmand of the UBC Okanagan School of Engineering, developed this coating, which has now received Health Canada approval and is being incorporated into millions of face masks worldwide.
Haddadi discovered that this fabric coating, made from a combination of graphene oxide and silver, reduces transmission of active pathogens - including COVID-19 viral particles - by more than 99 per cent, when incorporated in a four-ply mask.
“Wearing a mask is one of the most effective ways to protect ourselves against active, airborne, viral and bacterial pathogens,” Haddadi explained.
“If a mask [with this coating] is used,...after a while the infection on the surface of the mask cannot be active. This mask can protect the person from another person’s infection and also kill pathogens on the surface of the mask.”
Working with industrial partner Zentek (formerly ZEN Graphene Solutions) and under the direction of Dr. Colin van der Kuur in a Guelph, Ont., lab, Zentek made its first commercial sale of this coating, marketed as ZenGuard, to TreborRX Corp. of Collingwood, Ont.
Zentek is also investing $6 million to build its own manufacturing capacity to produce enough coating for up to 800 million antimicrobial face masks per month in early 2022.
Dr. Seyyedarash Haddadi, winner of the Mitacs & NRC-IRAP Award for Commercialization
In terms of having support from Mitacs for his research, Haddadi stressed that in order for a researcher to conduct “high quality research,” they need “peace of mind.”
“Mitacs provides a good atmosphere for all researchers to do high quality research,” he said. “Also, through Mitacs, we can connect to industries and collaborate with different industries, and share our results, share our research and produce a commercialized product.”
“When I started this project, I was just thinking about being a part of a global team who are stopping the COVID-19 pandemic. I recommend all researchers who think they have knowledge or they have any good material to fight COVID-19, I do recommend they keep going and share their results…to be commercialized in the near future.”
For next steps, Haddadi indicated that masks are just the first application for this material and there could be additional uses in the future.
RIP
Wertmueller, 1st woman nominated for directing Oscar, dies
Thu., December 9, 2021,
ROME (AP) — Italy’s provocative filmmaker Lina Wertmueller, whose potent mix of sex and politics in “Swept Away” and “Seven Beauties” made her the first woman nominated for an Academy Award for directing and a cult figure on the New York film scene, has died, the Culture Ministry said. She was 93.
Wertmueller, who won a lifetime achievement Oscar in 2019, died overnight in Rome surrounded by her family, the LaPresse news agency reported, quoting her relatives.
Culture Minister Dario Franceschini paid tribute to Wertmueller Thursday, saying her “class and unmistakable style” had left its mark on Italian and world cinema. “Grazie Lina,” he said in a statement.
Political, controversial and often erotic, her films were filled with social commentary and satirical anti-establishment messages. Wertmueller, who also wrote the scripts for her films, described them as Marxist comedies.
“I refuse to make films without social themes,” said the woman once dubbed “five feet of film controversy.”
Five feet tall with dramatic eye makeup, colorful hair and rings on all her fingers, Wertmueller’s extravagant appearance was an integral part of her persona. In an interview with The Associated Press, she admitted that she owned hundreds of her trademark white-rimmed glasses.
She was born Arcangela Felice Assunta Wertmueller von Elgg Spanol von Braueichjob in Rome to an aristocratic Swiss family. Apparently rejecting her parents' wishes to study law, Wertmueller instead went to drama school where she acted, wrote and directed plays. After graduating from Rome’s Theatre Academy, she toured Europe with Maria Signorelli’s puppet troupe.
In 1963, Italian actor Marcello Mastroianni, the husband of a schoolfriend, introduced Wertmueller to Federico Fellini, who asked her to be his assistant on “8 1/2.” Wertmueller later said Fellini proved to be her greatest influence.
“It’s illuminating to be close to him, because you are close to a character who’s so profoundly nonconformist, who runs with himself like a child with a kite,” she said.
That same year, with Fellini’s encouragement, Wertmueller went to Sicily to make “The Lizards,” her first feature film. It was favorably received but the director herself criticized it as being “too rarefied,” too difficult for people to understand. She wanted to make films for the masses.
Wertmueller’s series of hits began with the “Seduction of Mimi” (1972), whose title was abbreviated from “Mimi the Metal Worker Wounded in his Honor” — Wertmueller told the AP that long titles amused her. The New Yorker called it “a wonderfully funny sexual farce” and Time magazine named it one of the year’s 10 best films. Other box-office success included “Love and Anarchy” (1973), “Swept Away” (1974) and “Seven Beauties” (1976), which earned her one Oscar nomination for directing, one for best original screenplay and another for her leading man, Giancarlo Giannini.
She didn’t win then, but the Academy acknowledged the milestone in awarding her a lifetime achievement more than four decades later, in 2019.
Film critic Roger Ebert gave “Swept Away” his top rating, saying despite the movie’s clash between a wealthy capitalist and her Marxist employee it “persists in being about a man and a woman.” Other critics were uncomfortable with its violence against women, with Anthony Kaufman calling it “possibly the most outrageously misogynist film ever made by a woman.” The film won the 1975 National Board of Review award for top foreign film.
The lure of sex was a constant theme. In the “Seduction of Mimi,” a man is attracted to Communism partly because it allows him to have an affair with a sexy communist. In “Seven Beauties,” Pasqualino, played by Giannini — for years Wertmueller’s favorite leading man — decides to survive a concentration camp at all cost, even by making love to the fat, brutal Nazi woman in charge.
Yet with 1977’s “A Night Full of Rain,” Wertmueller’s first film in English, U.S. critics were no longer so enthusiastic.
Wertmueller loved to bring together apparently contradictory forces. Her 1992 movie “Ciao, Professore!” tells the story of Neapolitan school children forced to deliver drugs and kill, but she called the film “an act of love for the south and the children.”
“I see the possibility for humor in the most serious things,” she said.
Full of energy, Wertmueller had the reputation of being a slave driver on the set, dominating actors and changing scenes at the spur of the moment.
“She’s a tempest,” Ingmar Bergman, the Swedish director, once said.
But Giannini said the director was always open to suggestions.
“Lina asks everyone for advice, camera operators and actors alike. She believes that a film is the product of collaboration,” he said.
Wertmueller was also a member of the Venice Film Festival jury in 1988 and served as the director of Italy’s film acting school.
She worked closely with her set designer husband, Enrico Job, for all her successful pictures, calling him “my best critic.” He died in 2008.
Wertmueller is survived by their daughter, Maria Zulima Job.
Rome’s city hall announced it would host a wake on Friday in one of its main reception halls.
__
Former AP writer Deborah Faraone Mennella contributed to this report.
The Associated Press
UN HUMAN RIGHTS DAY Top Philippine court: Anti-terror law largely constitutional
Thu., December 9, 2021
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — The Philippine Supreme Court largely upheld on Thursday the legality of an anti-terrorism law that opponents fear could threaten democracy and muzzle dissent, but struck down a provision preventing street protests, activism and labor strikes from being branded as terrorism by authorities.
The court’s decision, only portions of which were released, was generally welcomed by government officials. But left-wing activists and liberals expressed alarm, with a group of leftist lawmakers calling the ruling a “devastating blow to human rights” and another vowing to stage a protest against it on International Human Rights Day on Friday.
“We will march to the streets and amplify our voices against the perils of this terrifying law as well as the resurgence of any form or variant of authoritarianism,” said Edre Olalia of the National Union of People's Lawyers.
Sen. Panfilo Lacson, who sponsored the legislation, praised the court decision, which he said generally upheld the legality of the law and would arm the government with a legal weapon in the battle against terrorism.
Many Filipinos remain hypersensitive to any threat to democracy more than three decades after an army-backed “people power” revolt ousted dictator Ferdinand Marcos in massive pro-democracy protests that became a harbinger of change in authoritarian regimes across the world.
Known as the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020, the law allows the detention of suspects for up to 24 days without charge and empowers a government anti-terrorism council to designate suspects or groups as suspected terrorists who could then be subject to arrest and surveillance. It replaces a 2007 anti-terror law called the Human Security Act which was rarely used, largely because law enforcers feared a provision that imposed a fine of 500,000 pesos ($10,000) for each day they wrongfully detained a terrorism suspect.
Opponents filed 37 petitions asking the court to declare the current law, which was signed by President Rodrigo Duterte in July last year, unconstitutional. But except for at least two provisions, the court declared in a statement that all the other parts of the law which came under legal challenge “are not unconstitutional.” Twelve of the 15 justices voted to strike out a line that says public protests, dissent, work stoppages and other exercises of political rights would not be considered as acts of terrorism as long as these “are not intended to cause death or serious physical harm ... or to create a serious risk to public safety.” They said the qualifying conditions were “overbroad and violative of freedom of expression.”
Nine justices also declared it was unconstitutional for the anti-terrorism council to be allowed to designate people and groups as terrorists based on the requests of other countries or international organizations. The human rights group Amnesty International said the law “remains deeply flawed and open to abuse by government authorities” and renewed a call to the Philippine government to ensure the law is consistent with international human rights law and standards.
“Until this happens, the law will continue to pose a threat to human rights defenders, activists ... and others wrongly accused of terrorism by granting the government excessive and unchecked powers,” said Butch Olano, the Philippine director of the London-based group.
Jim Gomez, The Associated Press
DEC 10 UN HUMAN RIGHTS DAY
How to hold the line: 4 journalism survival tips from 2021 Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa
The champion of press freedom shares insights for journalists who are fighting to hold power to account amid relentless harassment and misinformation on social media.
Maria Ressa speaks at Harvard Kennedy School on Nov. 29. (Carmen Nobel)
Nobel Prize winner Maria Ressa believes newsrooms around the world need to band together — and stop thinking of each other solely as competitors — in order to fight the good fight against misinformation.
“We’re on the same side,” says Ressa, co-founder of Rappler, an independent Philippine news outlet known for its deep-dive investigations into the administration of Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte and the spread of online disinformation on social media. “If you are a news group, you are on the side of facts. I think we should be sharing each other. I think we should be working together — letting go of the old-school idea that everything is homegrown, that this is our brand. Because we’re in a battle for facts.”
Ressa received the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, along with Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov, “for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression.” The Nobel committee noted the laureates “are representative of all journalists who stand up for this ideal in a world in which democracy and freedom of the press face increasingly adverse conditions.”
For the past year, Ressa and Rappler have been fighting multiple court cases that threaten the future of the publication and Ressa’s personal freedom. In June 2020, she was found guilty of “cyber libel” for a story published on Rappler in 2012. Ressa was executive editor of Rappler at the time, but she neither wrote nor edited the story, which was published four months before Philippines’ cybercrime law even existed.
In general, laws can’t be enforced retroactively in the Philippines. But in 2014, Rappler corrected a typo in the 2012 story – changing the word “evation” to “evasion.” The Department of Justice decided this counted as a republication, and thus decided the story was published after the law went into effect. Ressa is appealing the case, and she implores journalists to keep holding the line for press freedom.
“I appeal to you — the journalists in this room, the Filipinos who are listening — to protect your rights,” Ressa said in a press conference immediately following that ruling. “We are meant to be a cautionary tale. We are meant to make you afraid. So, I appeal again: Don’t be afraid. Because if you don’t use your rights, you will lose them. Freedom of the press is the foundation of every single right you have as a Filipino citizen. If we can’t hold power to account, we can’t do anything.”
In early November, the Philippine Court of Appeals permitted her to travel to Harvard Kennedy School, where she is a Fall 2021 Hauser Leader at the Center for Public Leadership and a Fall 2021 Joan Shorenstein Fellow at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy — also home to The Journalist’s Resource. The same court granted her permission to travel to Oslo to receive her Nobel Peace Prize this week.
Before returning to the Philippines at the end of November, Ressa sat down with JR to share tips and insights for journalists who are fighting to hold power to account in the face of relentless harassment and misinformation on social media.
These are four key takeaways from our conversation.
1. Online attacks are harmful to journalists’ mental health. Newsroom managers can help ensure journalists get the counseling theyneed, but professional counselors need to understand the specific needs of journalists.
Last spring, UNESCO published a discussion paper called “The Chilling,” a report of online attacks against women who are journalists, based on a book-length study by the International Center for Journalists. The research included a survey of 901 journalists from 125 countries; long-form interviews with 173 international reporters, editors, and press freedom and safety experts; and two case studies of attacks against women whose journalism has exposed problems with online platforms like Facebook — one focusing on Ressa, the other on Carole Cadwalladr, the British journalist who exposed the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica data scandal in 2018.
Of the survey respondents who identified as women, 73% said they had experienced online violence (including misogyny and other forms of hate speech), 25% said they had been threatened with physical violence online, and 20% said they had been attacked or abused offline in connection with the online attacks they had experienced. Some 11% reported missing work to recover from online attacks and 2% quit journalism altogether.
The case study on Ressa includes a big-data analysis of nearly 400,000 tweets targeting Ressa from December 2019 to February 2021, and more than 56,000 Facebook posts and comments about her, published between 2016 and 2021. The data shows that 60% of these online attacks seek to damage Ressa’s professional credibility — calling her a “fake news queen,” for example, or a “presstitute.” Some 40% are personal, including death threats and attacks on her personal appearance.
“Name any animal, I’ve been called it,” Ressa said calmly during the 2021 Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press on Nov. 16, which was livestreamed internationally. “I have eczema, extremely dry skin — and the meme they created was ‘Scrotum Face.’”
This is all to say that Ressa understands the importance of anticipating a harassment onslaught, the importance of transparently acknowledging personal and professional threats, and the importance of helping journalists deal with them.
While Ressa gets the worst of it, she’s just one of many Rappler journalists facing a routine barrage of hate on social media. “When we all came under attack, we actually became better friends,” she says.
A couple of years ago, the news organization actively started offering professional counseling for its reporters and social media team. “Because you’ve got to,” Ressa says. “You’ve got to take it home.”
Asked whether anyone accepted the therapy offer, “Yeah, of course,” Ressa says. “But then, you know what we realized? That our counselors in the Philippines didn’t understand the impact of exponential attacks. So, we had to then go to Dart and ask them to train the trainers.”
She’s talking about the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma, which last summer launched the Journalist Trauma Support Network, a pilot program that teaches therapists about the types of trauma and harassment journalists encounter in the course of their work.
Early in 2018, the Philippine government initiated multiple legal proceedings against Rappler, including revoking its operating license. Before holding a press conference to tell the world what was happening, the Rappler leadership team met with the newsroom’s reporters.
“We held a general assembly among our people, and we flagged it for them,” Ressa says. “We’re walking into a different era and a different time. They’re actively trying to shut us down, and everyone is facing different risks. And we told them, ‘If you want to move to another news organization, we will help you.’ No reporter came to us. …Because when we were transparent and told them what to expect and gave them a choice, they committed even more.”
2. In the battle against misinformation, journalists must promote and share the work of other journalists.
“The biggest shift in the world was that the creation of journalism was separated from distribution,” Ressa says, referring to the way information is spread on social media platforms. “And the principles of distribution allowed facts and lies to be [treated as] identical.”
She notes that research indicates lies have a distribution edge on social media. In addition to citing reports that Facebook’s algorithms prioritize hateful messages, Ressa points to a 2018 study in the journal Science, “The spread of true and false news online,” in which researchers analyzed the spread of true and false news stories on Twitter from 2006 to 2017.
The study finds that fake news stories were 70% more likely to be retweeted than real news stories, even when controlling for factors like the age of the Twitter account, the number of followers and followees of the original tweeter, and whether Twitter had verified the account with a blue check.
“70% more,” Ressa says, her voice rising. “70% more! That’s part of the reason I think you need journalists all around the world to keep standing up to power. Now what we do have are standards and a mission. And courage. Because we’re foolish enough to keep standing up to power even at the detriment to the organization or to the journalist. So that’s what we have. But how can we then get the distribution? We should be thinking about strategies of distribution. So my solution to that is we should be sharing each other. That’s what is in our control, right?”
3. For journalism to matter, journalists must empower the communities they serve.
Rappler’s name combines the root words ‘rap’ (to discuss) and ‘ripple’ (to make waves).
“It was born to a new world of possibilities — driven by uncompromising journalism, enabled by technology, and enriched by communities of action,” reads the organization’s mission statement. “For journalism to matter, the community must be a part of it.”
Ressa maintains that one the biggest and important challenges for news media outlets is to warn their readers, viewers and listeners about the dangers of misinformation on social media.
“How are you going to tell your communities that they’re being manipulated?” she says. “And how can you pull the community together? Think of it like this: If we’re prioritizing toxic sludge, if we’re prioritizing anger, hate, conspiracy theories — everything that feeds on your fear and your us-against-them — then you’ll also preclude the best of humanity, the miracle of how we do impossible things together. And that’s the opportunity loss that I see.
“I get emotional when I talk about this,” she adds, with tears in her eyes.
Ressa now spends more time focused on technology regulation and distribution issues than she does on reporting the news. “If I write something today, it will be about how tech and data are manipulating you, or how it is impacting the world today,” she says.
4. Accept that it’s a terrifying but vital time be a journalist.
“We have to accept that in this time period, it will be thankless,” Ressa says. “We will be vilified. Everyone will attack us. But we must keep doing what we’re doing because no one else is doing it.”
“You have to hold the line,” Ressa says. “The quality of the democracy is as good as the quality of the journalist. If the questions aren’t asked, then power gets away with what it wants.”
To learn more:
Among Rappler’s investigations is this recent series of stories about state-sponsored killings under the Duterte regime. The series highlights a lengthy affidavit by a former police officer in the Philippines, which was accepted by the International Criminal Court. “It should have been published by everyone,” Ressa says. (Information about using Rappler’s content can be found on its Site Use Policy page.)
Frontline produced the documentary “A Thousand Cuts,” which follows Ressa as she navigates Duterte’s crackdown on the news media in the Philippines. You can watch it in full on YouTube.
In “The Chilling: Global trends in online violence against women journalists,” UNESCO presents an edited excerpt of a book-length study by the International Center for Journalists. The report begins with a quote from Ressa: “The easiest part is dealing with the impact of online violence and disinformation on me. I just see the impact on the world, and I don’t know why we’re not panicking.”
The Journalist’s Resource recently published a list of self-care tips and resources for journalists who cover and experience trauma, featuring insights from Dr. Elana Newman, research director at Columbia University’s Dart Center.
Reporters Without Borders publishes an annual index ranking press freedom in 180 countries. Norway tops the list for having the most press freedom in 2021, while Eritrea ranks last. The Philippines is 138th on the list. The United States is 44th.
Ressa was the featured speaker for the 2021 Salant Lecture on Freedom of the Press. The title of her talk: “What Would You Sacrifice for the Truth?” Watch it below.
About The Author Carmen Nobel Program Director Carmen Nobel joined The Journalist’s Resource in 2018 after serving as senior editor of Harvard Business School Working Knowledge, where she covered economic research and forged content partnerships with Quartz, Forbes, HBR Ascend and the World Economic Forum. Her work also has appeared in the Boston Globe, Boston Magazine, Inc., NPR Science Friday, PC Magazine, eWeek and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency.
Hold the line': Maria Ressa fights for press freedom under Philippines' Duterte 'Hold the line': Maria Ressa fights for press freedom under Philippines' DuterteRessa co-founded investigative news site Rappler in 2012 (AFP/JOEL SAGET)
Thu, December 9, 2021
Veteran Philippine journalist Maria Ressa, who will accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo on Friday, has battled multiple legal cases and online abuse in her campaign for press freedom under President Rodrigo Duterte.
The former CNN correspondent co-founded investigative news site Rappler in 2012, bringing together multimedia reporting and social media to offer an edgy take on Philippine current events.
Ressa, 58, has been a vocal critic of Duterte and the deadly drug war he launched in 2016, triggering what media advocates say is a grinding series of criminal charges, probes and online attacks against her and Rappler.
She was named a Time Person of the Year in 2018 for her work on press freedom, but a series of arrests and one conviction for cyber libel further grew her international profile and drew more attention to her struggle.
Rappler has had to fight for survival as Duterte's government accused it of violating a constitutional ban on foreign ownership in securing funding, as well as tax evasion.
It has also been accused of cyber libel -- a new criminal law introduced in 2012, the same year Rappler was founded.
Duterte has attacked the website by name, calling it a "fake news outlet", over a story about one of his closest aides.
Though the government has said that it has nothing to do with any of the cases against her, press freedom advocates disagree.
Yet through the campaign against her, Ressa, who is also a US citizen, has remained based in the Philippines and continued to speak out against Duterte's government despite the risks.
Ressa is on bail pending an appeal against a conviction last year in a cyber libel case, for which she faces up to six years in prison.
It is one of seven cases she is fighting after two cyber libel suits were dismissed earlier this year. - Threats and abuse -
Ressa's position at the head of the Rappler news site meant getting, by her own estimate, up to 90 abusive messages per hour online at one point towards the end of 2016.
The threats came in the months after Duterte took power and launched his narcotics crackdown that rights groups estimate has killed tens of thousands of people.
Rappler was among the domestic and foreign media outlets that published shocking images of the killings and questioned its legal basis.
International Criminal Court judges have authorised a full-blown investigation into a possible crime against humanity during the bloody campaign.
It was an entirely new set of threats for Ressa, who was a veteran of conflict zones before co-founding Rappler.
As CNN's former bureau chief in Manila and Jakarta, Ressa specialised in terrorism, where she tracked the links between global networks like Al-Qaeda and militants in Southeast Asia.
The Princeton graduate later returned to the Philippines to serve as news chief at the nation's top broadcaster ABS-CBN, which has also fallen foul of the Duterte administration.
Ressa's new book "How to stand up to a dictator" is due to be released ahead of the country's 2022 presidential elections, which Duterte is not allowed to contest due to constitutional term limits, although he is planning to run for the Senate.
But the son and namesake of former dictator Ferdinand Marcos has a commanding lead among front runners for the top job.
After the Nobel Prize was announced in October, Ressa was defiant in her defence of her battle for freedom of expression and independent journalism.
"What we have to do as journalists is just hold the line," she said.
bur-amj/je/jah
Filipino journalist shot dead while watching TV in store
Jim Gomez The Associated Press Thursday, December 9, 2021 \ Calbayog City is seen in this Google Maps image. (Google Maps)
MANILA, PHILIPPINES -- A gunman shot and killed a journalist who was watching TV at a store in a central Philippine city, in a brazen attack in what has long been regarded as one of the world's most dangerous countries for journalists.
Jesus Malabanan, a 58-year-old provincial correspondent for the Manila Standard newspaper, died while being transported to a hospital after being shot once in the head by one of two motorcycle-riding men Wednesday night at a family store he was tending in Calbayog city in Samar province, police and officials said Thursday.
The suspects escaped and a police investigation is underway to identify them and a motive for the attack.
Media watchdog groups condemned the killing, including Malabanan's colleagues in Pampanga, a province north of Manila where he was based and worked for years as a news correspondent and as a stringer for Reuters.
A media protection body created by President Rodrigo Duterte strongly condemned the killing and vowed to arrest the killers. But Duterte himself has long been in the crosshairs of media watchdogs and human rights groups, which have repeatedly condemned him for fostering impunity among the police forces that have enforced his crackdown against illegal drugs and left thousands of mostly petty suspects dead.
Dozens of journalists have been killed or come under attack under Duterte and his predecessors. In 2009, members of a powerful political clan and their associates gunned down 58 people, including 32 media workers, in a brazen execution-style attack in southern Maguindanao province that horrified the world.
While the mass killing was later linked to a violent electoral rivalry common in many rural areas, it also showcased the threats faced by journalists in the Philippines. A surfeit of unlicensed guns and private armies controlled by powerful clans and weak law enforcement in rural regions are among the security concerns journalists face in the poverty-stricken Southeast Asian country.
Thirty-two of those gunned down in Maguindanao's Ampatuan town were local reporters and media workers. It was the deadliest single attack on journalists in recent history, media watchdogs say.
A Philippine court found key members of the Ampatuan family guilty of the mass killings in 2019 but many more suspects remain at large.
DEC 10 UN HUMAN RIGHTS DAY Global media group says journalist imprisonments on rise
Thu., December 9, 2021
BRUSSELS (AP) — Media freedom continued to be under attack across much of the world in 2021, with nine journalists killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan alone and 102 imprisoned in China, according to a new report released Thursday.
The International Federation of Journalists said in a bleak assessment that imprisonments were especially on the rise, with 365 journalists behind bars compared to 235 last year.
“The world needs to wake up to the growing violations of journalists’ rights and media freedoms across the globe,” IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger said. The report was released on the eve of the United Nations’ Human Rights Day.
Apart from China, Turkey had 34 journalists in prison, Belarus and Eritrea 29, Egypt 27 and Vietnam 21.
The IFJ said that the rise of detentions in China was linked to the coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in Wuhan, the further arrests of Uyghur journalists reporting on the treatment of the Muslim minority in western China. Many have called it genocide. It said that coverage of the demonstrations in Hong Kong also led to further arrests.
Bellanger said the attacks on journalists went well beyond the personal losses suffered and affected society as a whole. “They also point to the violation of the people’s fundamental right to access accurate, objective and fair information so that they can make properly informed choices about public affairs.’’
With three weeks left in the year, overall deaths in the line of duty were set to go down this year, with 45 so far, compared to 65 overall last year. With Afghanistan topping the list with nine journalists killed, Mexico came close behind with eight, all of them murders. India had four and Pakistan three.
The Brussels-based IFJ represents 600,000 media professionals from 187 trade unions and associations in more than 140 countries.
The group also highlighted a “rare positive development,” which was the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to two journalists. Maria Ressa of the Philippines and Dmitry Muratov of Russia won for their fight for freedom of expression in countries where reporters have faced persistent attacks, harassment and even murder.
Russia still has 12 journalists behind bars, and three reporters were killed in the Philippines.
Raf Casert, The Associated Press
Champions of press freedom to accept Nobel Peace Prize
Maria Ressa, co-founder of the news website Rappler, and Dmitry Muratov, chief editor of the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, won the Nobel Prize for 'their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression' (AFP/Torstein Bøe)
Pierre-Henry DESHAYES Thu, December 9, 2021
She risks prison, he has buried several colleagues: Maria Ressa of the Philippines and Dmitry Muratov of Russia, two champions of the free press, will on Friday receive this year's Nobel Peace Prize honouring a profession under attack.
Ressa, co-founder of the news website Rappler, and Muratov, chief editor of the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, won the Nobel Prize in early October for "their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression."
"A healthy society and democracy is dependent on trustworthy information," the head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee Berit Reiss-Andersen said on Thursday, taking a swipe at propaganda, disinformation and fake news.
Free and independent journalism is however under threat around the world.
Asked whether the prestigious award had improved the situation in the Philippines -- currently ranked 138th in freedom of the press by Reporters Without Borders -- Ressa said on Thursday it had not.
"It's like having a Damocles sword hang over your head," the 58-year-old journalist said.
"Now in the Philippines, the laws are there but ... you tell the toughest stories at your own risk."
She mentioned her compatriot and former colleague, Jess Malabanan, a reporter for the Manila Standard who was fatally shot in the head on Wednesday.
Malabanan, who also worked for the Reuters news agency, had reported on the sensitive subject of the war on drugs in the country.
If the murder is confirmed to be linked to his profession, he would be the 16th journalist killed in the Philippines since the start of Rodrigo Duterte's presidency in 2016, according to Reporters Without Borders.
Ressa, a vocal critic of Duterte and his deadly drug war, is herself facing seven criminal lawsuits in her country.
Currently on bail pending an appeal against a conviction last year in a cyber libel case, she had to apply to four courts for permission to travel to Norway for Friday's ceremony. - Foreign agent? -
Meanwhile, 60-year-old Muratov heads one of the rare independent newspapers in a Russian media landscape largely under state control.
Known for its investigations into corruption and human rights abuses in Chechnya, Novaya Gazeta has seen six of its journalists killed since the 1990s, including famed investigative reporter Anna Politkovskaya murdered in 2006.
"If we're going to be foreign agents because of the Nobel Peace Prize, we will not get upset, no," he told reporters when asked of the risk of being labelled as such by the Kremlin.
"But actually... I don't think we will get this label. We have some other risks though," Muratov added.
The "foreign agent" label is meant to apply to people or groups that receive funding from abroad and are involved in any kind of "political activity".
It has however been given to many Kremlin-critical journalists and media, rendering their work exceedingly difficult.
Russia is in 150th spot on the Reporters Without Borders country ranking of freedom of the press.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that the Nobel Prize is not a "shield" protecting journalists from the status. - 'Reporting shouldn't be deadly' -
According to a report compiled by Reporters Without Borders up to December 1, at least 1,636 journalists have been killed around the world in the past 20 years, including 46 since the beginning of the year.
"Reporting the news should cease to be a deadly activity," the organisation's secretary general Christophe Deloire said as he presented the report this week.
The number of journalists imprisoned around the world has also never been higher, the Committee to Protect Journalists said on Thursday, with 293 currently behind bars.
The Nobel Peace Prize will be presented to Ressa and Muratov at a ceremony -- scaled back due to the pandemic -- at Oslo's City Hall on Friday at 1:00 pm (1200 GMT).
The award consists of a diploma, a gold medal and a cheque for 10 million Swedish kronor (975,000 euros, $1.10 million) to be shared by the two laureates.
This year's other Nobel laureates in the fields of medicine, physics, chemistry, literature and economics would normally receive their prizes at a separate ceremony in Stockholm on Friday.
But due to the pandemic, they received their awards in their home towns earlier this week.
A ceremony will be held in their honour in the Swedish capital on Friday, attended by the royal family.
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Muratov and Novaya Gazeta: Russia's independent media stalwarts Nobel Peace Prize goes to journalists Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov (AFP/Viken KANTARCI)
Michael MAINVILLE Thu, December 9, 2021
Newspaper Novaya Gazeta, whose editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov won the Nobel Peace Prize, is a bastion of independent media in Russia with a commitment to free speech that has cost some of its journalists their lives.
Muratov, who was among a group of journalists who founded Novaya Gazeta in 1993 after the fall of the Soviet Union, dedicated the award to the paper's murdered journalists and jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.
It came amid a historic crackdown on the opposition and independent media in Russia.
A number of outlets were forced to close this year and several prominent journalists fled the country. Navalny, 45, was jailed in February and his organisations were subsequently outlawed.
Novaya Gazeta has paid a heavy price for its independent stance and investigative coverage.
Since 2000, six of its journalists and contributors have been killed in connection with their work, including top investigative reporter Anna Politkovskaya. Their black-and-white portraits now hang in the newspaper's offices in central Moscow.
Politkovskaya, a critic of President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin's wars in Chechnya, was shot dead on October 7, 2006, in the entrance hall of her apartment building.
In an interview with AFP in March, Muratov said the newspaper's reporters knew their work put their lives at risk, but that unlike some other Kremlin critics they would not go into exile.
"This newspaper is dangerous for people's lives," Muratov said. "We are not going anywhere." - Putin's warning -
Grey-bearded and round-faced, Muratov has been one of Russia's most prominent independent journalists for decades.
He and Novaya Gazeta's other founders were inspired by the newfound freedoms that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
A key early supporter was former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, who donated part of his 1990 Nobel Peace Prize money to buy the new publication its first computers -- one of them still on display in their office.
The heady optimism of those early days is long gone. In the years since Putin came to power in 1999, critical voices have been increasingly pushed to the sidelines.
Novaya Gazeta has become one of the few remaining independent voices in a grey media landscape.
Kremlin critics say authorities are waging a campaign against independent and critical media, with many branded "foreign agents" and others forced to shut down.
Novaya Gazeta is one of the few prominent independent outlets that still do not carry the "foreign agent" tag, a status reminiscent of the Soviet-era term "enemy of the people".
While the Kremlin congratulated Muratov on winning the prize, Putin warned the editor not to use it as "a shield" to break Russian laws.
While the Kremlin congratulated Muratov on winning the prize, Putin warned the editor not to use it as "a shield" to break Russian laws (AFP/Natalia
- Investigative journalism -
Novaya Gazeta, which is published three times per week, focuses on deep-dive investigative reports into corruption and rights abuses, and its journalists have long faced intimidation and violence.
In 2018, a funeral wreath and a severed ram's head were delivered to the newspaper's offices with a note addressed to one of its reporters who covered the shadowy Wagner mercenary group operating in the Middle East and Africa.
The investigations had shed light on Wagner's operations abroad and on its alleged ties to a Kremlin-linked businessman, Yevgeny Prigozhin.
Earlier this year, the paper was again targeted in what editors said was an apparent chemical attack.
Despite the pressure, the newspaper has refused to shy away from tough investigations. It was one of the publications that dug through the trove of documents leaked in the Panama Papers scandal, exposing offshore wealth of Russian officials.
Muratov was born in the southwestern city of Kuybyshev, now called Samara, on October 30, 1961.
He worked early in his career for the populist daily Komsomolskaya Pravda, but left with several of his colleagues who were not happy with its editorial policies. Together, they founded Novaya Gazeta and Muratov has served several times as its editor-in-chief since 1995.
Novaya Gazeta has a print circulation of around 100,000 and, according to the paper, had 18.4 million online views in November.
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CANADA In scathing report, auditor general says feds failed to protect foreign farm workers from the pandemic
Thu., December 9, 2021 A temporary foreign worker from Mexico plants strawberries on a farm in Mirabel, Que., Wednesday, May 6, 2020. (Graham Hughes/Canadian Press - image credit)
The federal department charged with inspecting farms that hire temporary foreign workers failed to keep tabs on how well employers were protecting their staff during the pandemic, Canada's auditor general reported today.
Auditor General Karen Hogan said inspectors working for Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) did not properly enforce new pandemic regulations designed to protect workers from COVID-19 — frequently skipping checks on whether employers offered drinking water, cleaning products, separate accommodations for infected workers and dedicated quarantine spaces for workers who were supposed to self-isolate for 14 days upon arrival in Canada.
Foreign farm workers — who come to Canada on a seasonal basis to fill labour shortages in the agricultural sector — are uniquely vulnerable to COVID-19 because they often live in tight quarters in shared employer-provided accommodations.
There were large outbreaks on some farms in the early days of the pandemic. At least three foreign farm workers have died from COVID-19, the AG found.
To address the gaps that were making workers sick, the federal government in July 2020 earmarked $16.2 million in new funding to ramp up ESDC's agricultural inspections. The AG found the new money did little to improve the quality of their work. Jacques Boissinot/Canadian Press
The auditor general found that, over a two-year period, the department's inspectors produced shoddy reports most of the time.
The AG found problems in 73 per cent of all quarantine inspection reports filed in 2020. The AG reports that even though her office flagged these "significant" shortcomings to the department's most senior bureaucrat earlier this year, the problem only got worse in 2021 — when 88 per cent of all inspections examined showed deficiencies. Inspectors also failed to "complete the vast majority of inspections in a timely manner," the AG said in her report. Department 'did not do a good job'
Speaking to reporters after the report's release, Hogan said the department "did not do a good job." She said ESDC is grappling with "systemic problems throughout the entire regime" and needs to "step back" and "do things differently going forward" to show they actually care about the welfare of temporary foreign workers.
WATCH: AG says there is a 'systemic problem' with inspections in the temporary foreign worker program
The AG's report shows that, in many cases, ESDC inspectors approved employers' pandemic protocols even though "poor-quality evidence or no evidence was collected" in most inspections "before employers were found compliant or the inspection became inactive."
In other cases — 16 per cent of all inspections reviewed by the AG — inspectors had actual evidence that an employer wasn't compliant with the pandemic regulations, but ESDC bureaucrats gave them a passing grade anyway. A lack of 'diligence'
This year, 100 per cent of all inspected employers were found to be in compliance, despite the fact that in many instances, ESDC inspectors did not actually verify if workers' housing was free from serious health and safety risks.
The AG said the inspections lacked "diligence" and "urgency," shortcomings that left workers exposed to a dangerous virus during a health crisis.
While ESDC investigators were tasked with ensuring farm workers had space to quarantine for 14 days upon arrival in Canada, the AG found many inspections were delayed for so long that reviews "were still incomplete and inactive long after workers' quarantines had ended."
And when COVID-19 outbreaks were identified on farms, the AG found inspections were initiated quickly "but were inactive for long periods" — meaning ESDC investigators did little to help curb active infections.
Ryan Remiorz/Canadian Press
In one particularly troubling case cited by the auditor general, it took a week for an ESDC inspector to first make contact with an employer after they reported an outbreak.
The auditor's report says that during an interview with the inspector, the employer said they weren't offering separate accommodations for workers who tested positive — both infected and non-infected workers were also sharing a bathroom and a kitchen.
After learning of this serious breach, the ESDC investigator "did not follow up on corrective measures for more than one month," the AG found.
The AG provided other examples of inadequate work produced by ESDC over the last two years.
During one 2020 inspection, bureaucrats were trying to determine whether 26 temporary foreign workers could safely quarantine at a particular farm. The evidence collected to show there was adequate social distancing in the workers' quarters amounted to just two photos — one of a table and one of a single bedroom.
"No follow-up occurred, and the employer was found compliant," the AG said.
'Poor-quality evidence'
During another 2020 inspection, bureaucrats assessed the quarantine accommodations for three temporary foreign workers. The employer sent along photos that clearly demonstrated the distance between workers' beds in a shared bedroom was far less than the required two metres.
Again, "no follow-up occurred, and the employer was found compliant," the AG said.
In a 2021 inspection to assess whether 10 workers could safely live in a particular facility, inspectors found the employer compliant after only reviewing "one photo of one bedroom." This review was also conducted two months later than required by departmental guidelines.
These are not unique cases. The AG found that in 76 per cent of all inspections reviewed, EDSC bureaucrats collected "poor-quality evidence or no evidence" to show compliance with the two-metre distancing regulation.
Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press
While ESDC inspectors were tasked with interviewing workers about their living conditions as part of their checks, most didn't bother. In half of all inspections, ESDC inspectors did not interview the required number of workers. In some cases, no workers were interviewed at all.
And even when the workers interviewed flagged serious concerns — some workers said they had no access to food while in isolation — the AG found no evidence that inspectors had acted to address these issues.
Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough, the minister responsible for ESDC, said Thursday she accepts the AG's findings.
Qualtrough said the department hired more inspectors, implemented a tip line and invested money in migrant workers' associations last year.
"Clearly, despite our efforts, we fell short," she said.
Qualtrough pledged to "rebuild" the temporary foreign worker inspection program and do more to support the inspectors tasked with carrying out this work in the future. "Rest assured, we'll do better," she said.
Syed Hussan, executive director of the advocacy group Migrant Workers for Change, said the AG's report is "deeply, deeply concerning" but not all that surprising, given ESDC's track record in this area.
"The auditor general is saying what we already know — inspections cannot and will not protect migrant farm workers," Hussan said in an interview. "ESDC was not created to protect migrant farm workers. It was created to ensure a steady supply of cheap labour.
"The fact that these inspections found all employers are compliant shows that the federal government is unable and unwilling to protect migrant farm workers."
Hussan said the federal government should make all would-be farm workers permanent residents so they can enjoy more legal protections.
Conservative MP Stephanie Kusie, the party's employment critic, called the situation "simply unacceptable." She said that even though the auditor general warned earlier this year that ESDC's processes were "flawed", the track record of the inspectors only got worse.
"Once again, this Liberal government has been caught saying the right things to reassure Canadians, but failing to take action," Kusie said.
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