THE Philippines remains one of the most dangerous countries for journalists. This is being stressed by the Special Rapporteur of the United Nations Human Rights.Based on the database on the killing of journalists in the country from the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility , no less than 165 members of the press have been killed since the ouster of the Marcos Sr. administration and the restoration of democracy in the country since 1986.
Nymia Pimentel Simbulan, chairperson of the Philippine Alliance of Human Rights Advocates and executive director of the Philippine Human Rights Information Center, said that journalists in the country continue to experience hazards such as physical attacks, red-tagging, harassment , state surveillance and monitoring of social media accounts, defamation and smear campaigns, state censorship of journalistic work, pressure on self-censorship and watering down, and trauma and anxiety.