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Miklos Haraszti: â€œThe United States owes a shield law to journalists around the worldâ€

09 June 2008 10:41 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Tamara Grigorievaâ€“APA. â€œThe United States owes a federal shield law not only to American journalists but to journalists around the world, including Russia, Belarus, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and other countriesâ€, said Miklos Haraszti, OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media in his article published in â€œThe Washington Postâ€, APA reports. Haraszti said the law should finally allow the media to protect the anonymity of confidential sources. â€œThis backpedaling in press freedom in the United States has allowed foreign governments to claim a double standard in the U.S. approach -- and then engage in such behavior themselvesâ€. â€œInterestingly there is almost no prosecution of journalists on allegations of violating official secrets in the former Soviet republics of Belarus, Russia, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan, where prosecutors otherwise don’t shrink from criminalizing journalism as "extremist," "insulting" or "defamatory"â€, Haraszti said. â€œThe U.S. Justice Department, of course, cannot be blamed for the imprisonment of foreign journalists by their governments. But American behavior is a modelâ€.