Doubling the percentage of imprisoned female journalists in five years

Reporters Without Borders’ annual measure of the number of journalists imprisoned and killed shows that 73 women journalists are currently imprisoned worldwide. This is a significant increase in five years.

– As a share of the total number of imprisoned journalists, it is double what it was five years ago, Erik Halkyr, head of Reporters Without Borders in Sweden, tells SVT Kulturnyheterna.

More than 500 imprisoned

Female journalists make up 13 percent of all imprisoned journalists according to the report, five years ago that figure was 7 percent.

Today, there are approximately 550 women journalists imprisoned worldwide, which means that the number of imprisoned women journalists has quadrupled in the past five years, says Eric Halkier.

In countries like China, Vietnam, Belarus, Iran and Afghanistan, the situation for women journalists is the worst.

In a year and a half, 9 out of 10 female activist journalists have been forced out of work. Eric Halkier says they basically deleted all the women journalists in Afghanistan.

Historical development

The increase in the number of imprisoned female journalists is partly due to the fact that it has become more common for female journalists to review and criticize the system in countries with strict freedom of the press. But the report also notes that it is becoming more common for journalists to be imprisoned in general.

And according to Reporters Without Borders, the development will not slow down in the future.

There haven’t been many jailed journalists in the world for as long as we measure. It’s a very long time, and looking back I would say there have never been so many journalists imprisoned, says Eric Halkier and adds:

It has become an increasingly powerful tool for authoritarian leaders around the world to imprison journalists to silence them