German journalists increasingly the target of right-wing violence
According to a study, journalists in Germany are increasingly becoming the target of right-wing violence. Last year, 49 attacks on reporters and cameramen were registered.
Martin Hoffmann from the European Center for Press and Media Freedom said this on Wednesday before the Culture Committee of the German Bundestag. The massive increase in attacks has been recorded since the emergence of right-wing populist movements such as Pegida. With 30 of the 49 cases, Saxony is clearly particularly affected. The editor-in-chief of Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk, Stefan Raue, said that the Pegida movement was invoking a kind of intellectual civil war with accusations such as "lying press". "We media must not accept this declaration of war," he said. Britta Hilpert, head of the ZDF regional studio in Brandenburg, also warned against fear and intimidation. "Thank God we live in a country with media freedom. But we are at the beginning of a development that I would like to see come to an end now." The German Journalists' Association (DJV) launched the blog on Wednesday Eyewitnesses.infoin which reports of right-wing extremist attacks on reporters are to be collected and documented. However, many colleagues are now afraid to report on incidents, said DJV national head Frank Überall in the committee. "The inhibition threshold for violence against journalists has objectively fallen dramatically." (SDA)
