Summary
The authorities, the public, and the militants are all hostile to us. We are like fish in poisonous waters, we can be attacked or killed at any time. -Journalist working in Galkayo, February 2015.
On October 12, 2014, Abdirisak Jama Elmi, known as “Black,” a veteran journalist working for the private Somali Channel TV, was outside his home in Mogadishu when a man in a car started shooting. “As I was trying to escape the man started shooting automatic rounds and I felt as though he hit me about 10 times in my back,” Abdirisak said. “I could hear several voices telling the shooter to aim better. I could hear them saying, ‘He is still alive!’”
Bullets struck Abdirisak in the hand and several times in the back. He spent four months in the hospital and continues to receive weekly medical treatment. As a result of his injuries, he can no longer carry out his reporting activities.
Following the attack, government officials including the head of the National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) promised accountability. Yet, Abdirisak says he was never interviewed or asked to give a witness statement about his attack. He continues to live in fear: “The attackers are still alive, they know me and I don’t know them.”
In 2015, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) ranked Somalia at the top of its list of countries where journalists’ killings go uninvestigated. Since 2014, 10 journalists have been killed in Somalia, four in apparent targeted attacks. In addition, six journalists survived assassination attempts, and three have been injured while reporting.
Scores have received threatening phone calls and text messages urging them to change their reporting or face the consequences. While Somali authorities have often committed to holding those responsible for attacks against journalists to account, accountability has been both extremely limited and uneven. For incidents of killings of journalists which occurred since 2014, there has been only one prosecution.
Somali journalists throughout south-central Somalia and Puntland told Human Rights Watch that over the last two years, freedom of the media has come under threat from all “LIKE FISH IN POISONOUS WATERS”
sides in ongoing fighting between governmental forces and various non-state armed groups. As Somalia prepares for an electoral process (without a popular vote) in late 2016, threats and attacks against journalists are undermining Somalis’ rights to basic and accurate information as media organizations censor themselves to survive.
This report focuses on abuses by state and non-state actors against journalists and other media workers since 2014. It is based on over 50 interviews with journalists working throughout south-central Somalia and Puntland, the semi-autonomous state in northeastern Somalia. Beyond killings, attempted killings, and a range of threats, the report also documents how journalists in the new interim regional states and in Puntland face unique obstacles that undermine their reporting.
Read the full report: HRW_Like Fish in Poisonous Waters
Source: HRW
