21/10/2021
A number of protesters, camped near the International Zone (IZ), detained a reporter and cameraman for Rudaw TV inside a tent this morning, Thursday, while they were covering sit-ins rejecting the results of the parliamentary elections.
The Rudaw TV correspondent Mustafa Goran told the Press Freedom Advocacy Association in Iraq (PFAA) that for the third consecutive day, he was with his colleague, the cameraman Muntadher Jaafar, in a special coverage of the demonstrations rejecting the election results. He and his colleague, were taken into one of the tents, and interrogated, on the pretext that they were in violation of the protesters’ demands, and then released after a detention that lasted more than two hours.
After their release, other elements participating in the sit-in event took the crew again to one of the tents, interrogated them for four continuous hours, and withdrew their press equipment, after they demanded that the crew shall not film or cover events unless one of the demonstrators escorted the crew and monitored their coverage of the demonstrations in Baghdad.
The PFAA in Iraq strongly rejects what the journalists were subjected to during the performance of their journalistic duties, considering it a violation of the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of press and media work in the country.
It further calls on the demonstrators to comply with the constitution, to allow journalists to report demonstrations, and to take into consideration the role and mission of the media in reporting events. The association stresses that the media’s mission is to convey the facts to public opinion, without bias.
