Committee To Protect Journalists' Report: Journalists Killed On Dangerous Assignments Reached Record-High In 2011

The number of journalists who died on dangerous assignments reached their highest level on record in 2011, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists' year-end survey of journalist fatalities.

CPJ confirmed that forty-three journalists died as a direct result of their work in 2011. Sixteen journalists, or 37%, died on dangerous assignments. The organization attributed the uptick to growing political unrest, especially in Arab countries. Five journalists were killed in Libya, and two were killed in Egypt.

Meanwhile, the number of targeted killings fell to the lowest level since 2002. Nineteen journalists, or half of those who were killed, were murdered in 2011. Of those 19, six were kidnapped and four were tortured.

Pakistan was the most dangerous country for journalists for the second year in a row. Seven journalists were killed there in 2011. A U.S. military official accused the Pakistani government of sanctioning the death of one journalist earlier this year, which it denied. Iraq had five journalist fatalities, and Mexico had three.

A majority of the journalists who were killed worldwide covered politics (58%), and most were local journalists (84%). CPJ is still investigating an additional 35 deaths to determine whether they were work-related. See here for a full list of the journalists and a breakdown of the statistics.