B’desh journalists face death, attacks at work

BANGLADESH: Four journalists were killed and 158 wounded in Bangladesh over the past year while discharging professional duties, a local media monitoring group said on Thursday at a seminar to observe World Press Freedom Day.

“During the last 12 months, from May 2006 to April 2007, a total of 498 journalists were harassed during their professional duties,” said Kamrul Hassan Monju, executive director of the Mass-line Media Centre (MMC).

Among them four were killed, 158 wounded, 99 more attacked, two jailed, and six arrested, he said, while others were subjected to harassment including the filing of false cases by police or those unhappy with their reporting.

MMC records showed at least 13 journalists had been killed and 38 jailed in the last five years in Bangladesh, Monju said.

Dhaka, Friday, Reuters