Reporting on Violence and Emergencies: Regional Media Conference for East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific

14 Oct 2011 Philippe Stoll, Public Relations Officer for East Asia, South-East Asia and the Pacific ICRC (headquarters) Panel 1: Reporting on violence and emergencies: opportunities and challenges

Challenges for humanitarian organizations in a global environment: ethical reporting, citizen journalists, cyber propaganda
I strongly believe that the relationship between the media and humanitarians is extremely important as both play a key role in terms of shaping public perceptions of armed conflict, situations of violence, internal tensions, natural disaster... Thus they influence in their own way the actions taken by governments and the international community to put an end to or alleviate the suffering caused by these calamities. The humanitarian sector is as diverse as the media therefore it is always difficult and risky to generalise. For now, we should just bear in mind we may often sit on the same boat, but journalists and aid workers do not necessarily pursue the same aims. Aid organizations are supposed to help people in need on the ground while the media aim to inform about the reality of war while also succeeding in an increasingly difficult and competitive economic environment. Historically, there have always been connections between the media and humanitarian organizations. One simple example, the founder of the Red Cross, Henry Dunant, launched his idea by publishing a book in 1862 about what he had witnessed at the Battle of Solferino where thousands of soldiers died and suffered without any care. As a result of the book which incidentally is a brilliant piece of war reporting support quickly increased for Dunant's idea to provide more help for the sick and wounded on the battlefield. As I said earlier, public awareness is therefore an important aspect. Napoleon said: I fear three newspapers more than a hundred thousand bayonets. This quote dates some two hundred years ago is still very vivid today: public awareness is crucial as it can result in political activism and thereby pressure governments to act. The public feeling that "something has to be done to stop this" can be a powerful factor to stimulate action. There are also limits to how the media cover wars and disasters. Just how many crises are the media and their audience willing to focus on at the same time? Do journalists experience compassion-fatigue, which leads them to pay less attention to new crises if they are already dealing with similar scenarios elsewhere? And which crises make the headlines anyway?

2011 was in a way an shocking year in terms of number of crisis and situations of violence and emergencies: Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Japan, Ivory Coast, Indonesia, the Delta of the Mekong and recently the Philippines. These were critical situations. We should of course not forget long lasting crisis Afghanistan, Pakistan, Isral and the Occupied Territories, Congo DRC I could guess that you editors face every day hard choices: what will be my headline tomorrow? These limits go also without forgetting the cruel impact of the current economic crisis that has hit hardly media organizations. We could see in the field that they generally have a lot less money available for foreign coverage in general and reporting from far-flung places that are difficult to reach in particular. And you know better than me that a stolen picture of Lady Gaga eating a salad in a restaurant worth 1000 times more money than any pictures of a wounded civilian in Mindanao. This said, shared public awareness also does not automatically make a difference. Governments for example don't always like this kind of publicity. The ICRC presence and communication, for example, is sometimes seen as bringing a negative image on a country. (In other words: if the ICRC is in your country, this means that you have big problems!) Some also don't like the publicity around their activities. The increasing number of journalists killed while covering wars is a key issue at this conference. Unfortunately, the situation for humanitarians is equally dramatic. And, as is the case for journalists, local aid workers are just as much if not more at risk as international staff. As I explained earlier, for the ICRC it is essential to be accepted by conflict parties. Therefore we think a lot about what we say publicly and what we don't say bearing in mind that we don't want to compromise our possibilities to have access to those people affected by conflict who need our help. To this end we invest a lot of time and effort into building up reliable contacts on all sides, not just with conflict parties themselves but also those who have a potential influence on them including local and at times even international media. In today's world, journalists and humanitarian workers face more and more pressure because of or maybe thanks to new technologies. No need to develop on how people are today connected. The ICRC could see more and more displaced people having a mobile phone. You can easily guess what it means in terms of connectivity to the world. The refugees or IDPs communicate with humanitarians, with journalists, with citizens, with governments. They can express their needs to the world, put pressure on people, criticize or praise aid workers, politicians, media and so on. This brings me to what we call citizen journalists Some of you have already a strong opinion on that Journalists have been trained, they carry

values, they have a code of conduct, they should know what is ethics And on top of that journalists know what it means to verify information. They know the complexity to crosscheck sources of information How many of these "citizen" journalists carry news without the basic verification? How many stories have you in mind of fake information circulating on the web? For an organisation like the ICRC, the risk is definitely important, in terms of security and in terms of access, especially when we have to deal with rumours or wrong information. People also have their own agenda, they don't get the whole picture and it is very easy to criticise. I have an example in mind: Haiti. There were quickly many critics saying that humanitarian organisations being slow at the reconstruction of Port-au-Prince, especially houses. I could definitely imagine the frustration of an average Haitian being forced to live in a tent six months or one year after the earthquake. The problem was in fact not so much the building capacities, but a problem of land ownership. Due to the destructions of administrative archives, it was very difficult to solve this problem. No one wanted to take the risk to build houses on places where there was a dispute between two owners or when the owner was not known. This issue of quick and close communication becomes even more complicated and complex when politics enters the game. Recently the ICRC Facebook page became kind of battlefield between pro and anti Syrian government. The ICRC was caught between two propaganda. This reached an unprecedented level when the ICRC's President, Jakob Kellenberger, visited Syria early September and meet with President Bashar al-Assad. The main risk today for the ICRC is that "someone's truth" becomes "everyone's truth". So our challenge today for aid organizations is to learn new way of communicating, of interacting with our audiences. This means actually opening up and giving people more of an input in how aid organizations do their business. Before I conclude, I just want to take the opportunity to remind what Cynthia said this morning about the importance of correct reporting, especially in situations of armed violence: The correct use of terminology is crucial in this respect. Not every mass killing is a genocide and civilians are protected against direct attack irrespective of whether they are 'innocent' or not. Finally it is important to note that international humanitarian law is also worth knowing for two reasons: because it allow you to strengthen the legal side of your pieces and remind the protection entitled by people caught in situations of violence and

conflict with principles like proportionality, distinction, limitation, collateral damages, etc. and last but not least, because it offers specific protection to journalists, defining them essentially as civilians who must not be directly targeted. I have only been able to offer a very partial snapshot of some of the challenges currently faced by aid organizations in a global environment when we simply intend to provide assistance or to try to prevent lack of respect of the law. I remain optimistic that we will have many more opportunities such as this conference to talk about our shared concerns.