Environmental journalism: reporters increasingly threatened
Many climate reporters in India investigate the "sand mafia", this very lucrative business that serves as construction material, but has serious health consequences and pollutes enormously.
In fact, reporters who tackle this subject are regularly threatened and intimidated by these industries.
AP - Rajesh Kumar Singh
Text by: Louise Huet
10 mins
In the space of ten years, it is estimated that at least 30 journalists specializing in the environment have been killed around the world.
To mark the international day to end impunity for crimes against journalists, instituted after the murder of our colleagues Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon in 2013 in Mali, environmental journalists are sounding the alarm on the dangerousness of profession, as ecology imposes itself in public opinion.
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Exposing climate scandals kills.
On June 18, 2022, Brazilian police confirmed the death of British journalist Dom Phillips and indigenous populations expert Bruno Pereira, after being missing for more than a week.
At issue: an investigation by the two men into illegal fishing in the Amazon.
Similarly, Indian reporter Shubham Mani Tripathi was coldly shot six times in June 2020, while investigating cases of illegal expropriations linked to the sand mafia in India.
In Colombia, the two journalists Maria Efigenia Vásquez Astudillo and Abelardo Liz were assassinated, respectively in 2017 and 2020, for having denounced the grabbing of certain indigenous lands by large private groups.
On the poster, British journalist Dom Phillips and Brazilian indigenous expert Bruno Pereira, murdered in June 2022 while investigating in the Amazon.
Three individuals were charged with their murders in July.
Examples of this type, there are many others.
“
When you look closely at what type of investigation journalists are harassed, threatened and arrested for, they are always for very important and extremely dangerous subjects.
And this is increasingly the case for investigations into environmental crimes
,” says Laurent Richard, founder of the Forbidden Stories consortium.
Abuses against climate reporters have become commonplace, and the trend is only likely to increase.
"
As global warming accelerates, the conflict is becoming more and more extreme, between the companies that destroy the environment, the authorities who do not do enough to prevent this destruction, and the journalists who try to attract public opinion. Pay attention to what's going on.
And unfortunately, I think that the difficulties we face will become even more sinister in the years to come
,” warns Peter Schwartzstein, British environmental journalist and affiliated member of the Wilson Center research center.
An upward trend
As
Reporters Without Borders reports
, the journalists killed for having dealt with environmental issues are mainly found in Latin America (Mexico, Colombia, Brazil…) and in Southeast Asia (India, Indonesia, Philippines…).
But with increasing attention to environmental issues in recent years, the degree of freedom of specialized journalists has been reduced everywhere.
Peter Schwartzstein lived in Cairo for six years to investigate water scarcity.
"
When I arrived in 2013, I could talk, call and meet local officials quite easily
," he says.
But around 2018, these officials stopped responding to me, even on the phone.
Access to visas has also become more complicated in several countries.
The victim of two kidnapping attempts, in Iraq and in Syria, Peter thought he died during those days, while he was investigating the water shortages there.
Suffering threats and intimidation has become the daily life of a large number of environmental reporters in the field.
Why ?
Precisely because for this type of report, "
we cannot do it with statistical data from a distance, we have to go and investigate on the spot to dig into a subject and understand all the issues
", argues Renata Neder, representative of the Committee to Protect Journalists in Brazil.
In the Amazon, an area of intense conflict between indigenous populations, industrial multinationals and traffickers, environmental reporters are all the more confronted with danger and threats.
Pressures can also by a legal framework.
Shailendra Yashwant, a climate reporter in India for more than 30 years, was sued by UPL Limited, a multinational industrial company, accused of defamation.
In 1995, he published an article in which he denounced the pollution caused by the pesticides used in certain factories of the group, in Vapi.
"
I had been a freelancer for ten years at the time and I thought I had made a good name for myself, but I became an outcast,
" he recalls.
Because of the lawsuit, no one wanted my articles anymore.
Shailendra was finally acquitted in 2018, after
22 years of litigation
, with the judgment declaring that the article had been published for "
the general interest and the common good
".
Climate reporters, a thorn in the side of authoritarian regimes
On the side of authoritarian states, already singled out for numerous breaches of freedom of information, the situation is also changing on this issue.
"
Many of them are realizing the threat that global warming represents for the stability of their regime
," emphasizes Peter Schwartzstein.
This is particularly the case in Iran.
Environmental issues are forces that transcend traditional ideologies: you can be atheist, religious, conservative or liberal, and still agree that more climate action is needed.
»
This cohesion around the climate is therefore perceived by certain regimes, including that of the mullahs, as a potential rallying point for the opposition.
"
These States therefore tend to shoot the messenger rather than solve the problem, since the problem makes them vulnerable
", affirms the British journalist, author of the report
The Authoritarian War on Environmental Journalism
which goes into detail on the question.
Considerable stakes for States and multinationals
Besides the political argument, targeting environmental activists and journalists is also a way for some businesses to bury revelations that could harm their reputation, and especially their interests.
And to expose, for example, the conditions in which the workers work, or the contaminations for which certain multinationals are responsible, is to risk making them lose too much money.
The trial of Shailendra Yashwant is a case in point.
By wanting to convict the journalist of defamation, UPL Limited finally shot itself in the foot.
“
During the hearings, we discovered many more illegal activities on the part of the multinational, as it had to justify itself and present documents which, in fact, proved what I had denounced.
Everything I had written in the article was recognized as truthful
,” says the Indian reporter.
Result: the factories concerned were closed for a certain time, and the city of Vapi was officially declared as a toxic and polluted zone.
The particularity of "green journalism" is also that "
these investigations often incriminate, not only a company, but also corruption within the state apparatus which was supposed to control and sanction this company
", recalls Laurent Richard .
Revealing an ecological crime is therefore tackling both at the same time.
And sometimes even attack an entire system.
If denouncing an environmental crime is so dangerous in the Amazon, for example, it is also because everything is interconnected.
“
There are a lot of gangs and traffickers there, and these criminal networks are all linked.
There is a direct connection between drug trafficking and illegal mining
,” says Renata Neder.
Worse, President Jair Bolsonaro's climate policy has dismantled the protection mechanisms that had been established to guarantee the rights of indigenous peoples.
“
As no more official organization prevents the illicit practices of companies and traffickers, there has been a sharp increase in illegal activities, and in deforestation.
»
The threat even fiercer in rural areas
The consequences of this type of denunciation can be extremely serious.
Guatemalan journalist Carlos Choc paid the price.
In 2019, this reporter for Prensa Comunitaria, an indigenous information site, risked between 20 and 30 years in prison for having revealed the contamination of Lake Izabal by a mining company, in the small town of El Estor in Guatemala.
In the sights of justice, he has been forced to live in hiding ever since.
If his investigation was taken up and completed by the journalists of Forbidden Stories within the
Mining Secrets
project , published in March 2022, the story of Carlos Choc illustrates a crucial difficulty for environmental journalists.
They are even more vulnerable if they are alone, and if they investigate in remote areas or in small towns, which have much less accountability.
Journalist Carlos Choc investigated the nickel mine run by the Swiss group Solway Investment, next to Lake Izabal, in El Estor, Guatemala.
Indigenous peoples have protested the mining group's plans to expand into indigenous lands in 2021.
Places that are difficult to access, fewer telephone networks, few paved roads, often no nearby police station: the logistical challenge is closely linked to security problems.
“
Rural India is one of the riskiest places to cover
,” says Indian environmental journalist Sibi Arusu, for example.
Local journalists are very easy targets, since they often have fewer resources and even less of a safety net than in the big national media.
»
Above all, at the local level, the pressure and intimidation of the authorities against a journalist goes much more unnoticed.
“
In addition, in these isolated areas, there are much more often corrupt relations between the State and industries, so the police have an even greater interest in avoiding having their activities scrutinized too closely
”, adds Peter Schwartzstein.
Need for commitment to ensure the safety of journalists in the field
To protect themselves, environmental journalists try to adopt several reflexes.
Already, collaboration brings protection, as Shailendra explains: now, neither he nor any of his colleagues working on these subjects go alone to the place of investigation.
You also need to know your terrain and understand the local context.
"
In some places in the Amazon, the threats can be direct, like when someone points a gun in your face
," explains Renata Neder.
Or on the contrary, much less explicit, if you are simply told to pay attention to such and such a place...
"
Faced with impunity, the journalists concerned expect real awareness and a response from the international community.
“
We can't get used to hearing in the media, '
a journalist killed in Mexico, another in the depths of India
'
,
as if it were just a funeral statistic
, warns Laurent Richard .
These murders of environmental journalists, who investigate, for example, drug cartels circulating in more than 50 states, or the trafficking of sand, exported around the world including to France, are not only local crimes.
These are global crimes.
»
For Peter Schwartzstein, international institutions have every interest in promoting and protecting free and independent journalism that investigates climate issues.
“
Obstacles to the coverage of these subjects ultimately contribute to further degrading the environment and preventing solutions from being found.
Especially since a climate scandal is never confined to a single state, it always spills over into neighboring countries.
»
To continue to exercise their profession in acceptable conditions, to expose the truth and to inform, the reporters on the environment plead for reinforced security measures and a real consideration of the risks.
Because according to them, these stories of climate scandals, corruption and the exploitation of natural resources, concern us all.
► To read also: "I am not ashamed to say that I am afraid": young journalists facing violence against the profession
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