Thousands of journalists fled homelands due to repression, threats and conflict: UN expert

Thousands of journalists have fled their home countries in recent years to escape political repression, save their lives and escape conflict – but in exile they are often vulnerable to physical, digital and legal threats, a U.N. investigator said.

Irene Khan said in a report to the U.N. General Assembly that the number of journalists in exile has increased as the space for independent and critical media has been “shrinking in democratic countries where authoritarian trends are gaining ground.”

Today, she said, free, independent and diverse media supporting democracy and holding the powerful to account are either absent or severely constrained in over a third of the world’s nations, where more than two-thirds of the global population lives.

The U.N. independent investigator on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression said most journalists and some independent media outlets have left their countries so they can report and investigate freely “without fear or favor.”

But Khan, a Bangladeshi lawyer who previously served as secretary general of Amnesty International, said exiled journalists often find themselves in precarious positions, facing threats against them and their families.