The World Press Freedom Day is celebrated today , promoted by UNESCO every year.
Dunja Mijatović, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, in a message sent to Ossigeno per l'Informazione, greeted the initiative that celebrates the Day by launching a new site dedicated to all 30 Italian journalists killed from 1960 to today in the exercise of their work. The journalistsuccisi.it website on the net today celebrates the world day. "A unique opportunity to see human beings behind the professionals - said the Commissioner -. For each of those who were killed because they were looking for the truth, the Ossigeno website tells the story of that person, what he or she was investigating - and what was done to punish those responsible for their killing. "
"The World Press Freedom Day which is celebrated today is much more than a celebratory moment dedicated to information operators. It is an opportunity to reaffirm an institutional and civil commitment to defend an independent and pluralist press: because the freedom of information is the cornerstone upon which any democracy " . This was stated by the Undersecretary to the Presidency of the Council of Ministers with responsibility for Information and Publishing, Andrea Martella, on the occasion of the appointment established 27 years ago by the United Nations General Assembly.
Martella first of all remembers "journalists who have lost their lives doing their jobs and those who, in some countries, are threatened or imprisoned for having revealed unwanted truths with their work . This is a phenomenon that does not stop even in times of health emergency, an unprecedented phase in which it is even more essential, for the assumption of responsible behavior by citizens, for those who inform impartially and reliably ".
According to the Undersecretary " the free and authoritative press is and will be a decisive weapon to hope to win the challenge of the virus . The Government is aware of this. Both the choice to guarantee full activity to the entire editorial chain should be read in this direction, both that of reactivating the Coordination Center for the analysis and exchange of information on the phenomenon of intimidating acts against journalists.
"Celebrating this day in the best way - concludes Martella - means carrying out a concrete action following essential principles: freedom of journalists to inform, freedom of citizens to be informed, freedom for those who have chosen a job that is a mission to carry it out without the weight of threats or precariousness, freedom to put their professionalism at the service of the news and the community ".