Press freedom in death throes as autocrats shutter media outlets of Nobel laureates

It’s taken just eight months for autocrats to get their revenge for the embarrassment of having the power of independent journalism recognised with the Nobel Peace Prize last October.

Yesterday, the 2021 laureate, Maria Ressa, revealed that the legal incorporation of Rappler, the news website she co-founded in 2012, was being shut down by the Philippine Securities and Exchange Commission due to claims it had received overseas funding. This would end its ability to operate within the country.

It follows the closure of Russia’s Novaya Gazeta in March, the post-Soviet paper edited by Ressa’s fellow laureate Dmitry Muratov, after repeat warnings from the country’s media regulator, Roskomnadzor. It occurred under new legislation restricting reporting on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which, among other things, made it a crime to describe the invasion as a “war”. (Rozkomnadzor is a Russian-language acronym for the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media.)

In April, the attacks on Muratov escalated when he was assaulted on a train from Moscow to Samara and doused with red paint due to the paper’s reporting on the invasion.

This week we had a further reminder of the distinction between what autocratic leaders say and what they do.

In Germany, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi signed the G7’s 2022 Resilient Democracies statement, committing Australia’s democratic Quad ally to “protecting the freedom of expression and opinion online and offline and ensuring a free and independent media landscape through our work with relevant international initiatives”.

The signatories to the statement promised to protect and foster “open and pluralistic civic spaces” by, among other things, “guarding the freedom, independence and diversity of civil society actors, speaking out against threats to civic space, and respecting freedom of association and peaceful assembly”.

Also this week, Indian journalist Mohammed Zubair, founder of fact-checking site Alt News, was arrested and held in custody for allegedly hurting religious sentiments and promoting enmity in a 2018 tweet: “Before 2014: Honeymoon Hotel. After 2014: Hanuman Hotel.” (Modi was first elected as prime minister of his Hindu fundamentalist party in 2014.)

The recognition of independent journalism in last year’s Nobel Peace Prize demonstrates the enduring power of message politics. The prize put up in the global lights both the probing journalism of Rappler and Novaya Gazeta and the oppression of the authoritarian governments in the Philippines and Russia.

It’s been a powerful demonstration that the annual prize is as much about the message as it is about recognition. Last year, Ressa and Muratov were recognised for “their courageous fight for freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace”. The message, according to the prize committee announcement, was that Ressa and Muratov “are representatives of all journalists who stand up for this ideal in a world in which democracy and freedom of the press face increasingly adverse conditions”.

The actions of the Philippine SEC this week — like those of Russia’s Roskomnadzor in March — confirm that the message has certainly been received. More, these institutions have grasped the threat that lies in the power of the prize committee’s decision. Ressa’s award in the Philippines (like the arrest of Mohammed Zubair in India) demonstrates that the default response of authoritarian governments is to twist into a shape some law lying around unused for oppressive goals. And if they can’t find one, authoritarian rulers can always find willing legislators ready to make new laws to fill the gap.

The attacks on Ressa and Muratov remind us both of the power of the peace prize and the danger it brings when it recognises journalists and writers.

Carl von Ossietzky was recognised in 1935 for his work in exposing German rearmament. The Nazi government demanded he refuse the award, barred reporting of it and denied him an exit visa to attend the prize ceremony in Oslo. He died in custody in 1938.

When Liu Xiaobo was awarded the prize in 2010, he was already in detention in China. Reporting of the award was also prohibited in the country. He died in 2017, his prize still unrecognised in official media and ruthlessly scrubbed from the country’s social platforms.