SoloJourno

As with suicides, the rate of sexual assaults within the US military now exceeds that of the general population. A Pentagon report earlier this year found one in three female service members are sexually assaulted at least once during their enlistment. Sixty-three percent of nearly 3,000 cases reported last year were rapes or aggravated assaults. Rape in the Ranks: The Enemy Within is a documentary that focuses on the cases of three female service members victimized by rape and other forms of sexual assault. We air excerpts of the film and speak to filmmaker Pascale Bourgaux.

Read the full transcript and download audio/video.

Via Reporters Without Borders:

Journalists fleeing persecution are vulnerable, often in a state of shock and utterly unequipped to deal with the steps they need to take. They are often surprised not have easier access to international protection. Lacking reliable information, some take unwise risks and fall into traps or become victims of unfair proceedings. The recent imprisonment of Mexican journalist Emilio Gutiérrez, who sought exile in the United States, should not happen again,” Reporters Without Borders said.

Via Reporters Without Borders: Press Freedom Index 2009

“Press freedom must be defended everywhere in the world with the same energy and the same insistence,” Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Jean-François Julliard said today as his organisation issued its eighth annual world press freedom index.

“It is disturbing to see European democracies such as France, Italy and Slovakia fall steadily in the rankings year after year,” Julliard said. “Europe should be setting an example as regards civil liberties. How can you condemn human rights violations abroad if you do not behave irreproachably at home? The Obama effect, which has enabled the United States to recover 16 places in the index, is not enough to reassure us.”

Reporters Without Borders compiles the index every year on the basis of questionnaires that are completed by hundreds of journalists and media experts around the world. This year’s index reflects press freedom violations that took place between 1 September 2008 and 31 August 2009.

Read the full article and download the report.

Via Time Magazine:: Asylum seekers from as far away as Afghanistan try to get to Britain through France, but face a new crackdown on migrants in Calais

Read also Will France’s Immigration Crackdown Solve Anything?.

Via Reporters Without Borders:

Umukundwa is a Rwandan journalist who worked for various foreign news media including Voice of America, which has many listeners in the Great Lakes region.

She was always very outspoken in her articles and reports, including those about the activities of the ruling Rwanda Patriotic Front (FPR). She was often the target of threats and physical attacks but this did not deter her.

However, after gunmen invaded her home and her brother was the target of a physical attack in August 2006, she felt she had to flee Kigali for the sake of her physical safety and freedom.

Now a refugee in France, she calmly relates these experiences and ordeals in the video.