Journalists Killed Statistics

Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)

To provide an overview of journalists who have been murdered because of their work.

CPJ is funded by contributions from individuals, corporations, and foundations. CPJ does not accept government funding.

To highlight the dangers faced by journalists around the world and to advocate greater press freedom.

Mostly stories from news agencies and local press.

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CPJ
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New York, NY 10001 USA
info@cpj.org

The Journalists Killed Statistics list the total “confirmed” number of journalists murdered in a given year. Cases are considered “confirmed” when CPJ’s research confirms or strongly suggests that a journalist was killed in direct reprisal for his or her work or in crossfire while carrying out a dangerous assignment. The list does not include journalists who are killed in accidents unless the crash was caused by bellicose human action, for example, if a plane were shot down. If the motives are unclear, but it is possible that a journalist was killed because of his or her work, CPJ classifies the case as “unconfirmed”.

Total number of journalists killed in a given year, arranged by country.

The Journalists Killed Statistics can be used to assess what countries pose a security risk to media personnel in a given year.

It is not an indicator of press freedom or freedom of expression. As CPJ points out there are several countries associated with low press freedom but which have low rates of murdered journalists as well, e.g. Cuba and China.

It is assumed that the number of murdered journalists can be correlated to the state of global press freedom. Although the data takes measures to assure that deaths are murders it does not say anything about why the journalists were murdered or by whom.

The figure below provides results for the number of journalists killed in the line of duty in selected countries from 1992 – 2006.