Why Journalism Matters
Europe and the race for critical raw materials plus the secrets of the EU Council. Defending journalists, especially women, against injustice and impunity.
5 minute read
Mine games—the cost of digging for the precious metals that will create our future
“Your mobile has them. Your laptop as well. They are likely in the toothbrush you used this morning. E-scooters are full of them. So are electric cars.
“Rare earths and other minerals are essential for wind and solar power installations, defence, and for the gadgets that we now rely upon in our daily lives. The demand for critical raw materials is going to skyrocket in the years ahead, far beyond current supply.”
“There is no ‘climate neutrality’ ahead without them. This implies more mining than ever before.
—Investigate Europe Mine Games investigation
One thing that everyone knows (although many might not like not to think about it most of the time) is that the human race has to stop burning fossil fuels in the way we have been burning them—and we have to do it now.
That means making a rapid and accelerating transition to green technologies that don’t produce CO2 emissions. And to do that rare metals like cobalt, nickel and lithium, and many others need to replace fossil fuels in our economies.
The dynamic and still young investigative journalism team at Investigative Europe (IE) has launched a major investigation into Europe’s dependence on the exotic precious metals and rare earths that will power the future.
(IE is a cross-border team of multilingual reporters, editors and producers who deliver investigative journalism content from across Europe. The co-operative began in 2016 and now has 23 staff baed in 12 European countries.)
WJM has been following their progress.
IE’s analysis shows that although The European Union is a major consumer of rare earth elements and other critical raw minerals, it is highly dependent on other countries to supply them. Prominent among those countries are China, Russia, Chile and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
‘Critical raw materials’
While the EU banned Russian oil and coal in the wake of the Ukraine invasion in 2022, it has continued importing ‘critical raw materials’ from Russia to the tune of €13.7 billion.
But in their overview report on the situation IE says it is the dependency on China that ‘burns brightest’.
“ Europe relies on this single supplier for more than 90 per cent of rare earth elements, gallium and magnesium, and China controls more than half the global capacity for the processing of lithium, cobalt and manganese.”
“Neodymium is a rare earth metal that is not only highly magnetic, but remains so at higher temperatures. Three other rare earths (terbium, dysprosium and holmium) are even better at this. These materials have two things in common: they are needed for modern weapons as well as electric cars, and China controls the market.”
Fight back
Europe’s fight back against this is The Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA), which was presented by the EU Commission in March and could pass by the end of the year, one of the fastest legislative journeys in the history of the EU. This legislation aims to reverse Europe’s dependency on external suppliers.
Environmental group Friends of the Earth has made a detailed study of this legislation and reveals how heavily it has been influenced by the priorities of industry rather than environmental or social concerns. According to FOE “Mining companies, associated metals and minerals companies and their lobby groups have spent more than €21 million a year lobbying and racked up nearly 1,000 meetings with EU decision-makers since 2014.“
The CRMA proposal currently being considered includes industry’s major demands: “faster processing of permits, self-regulation, and “strategic” projects harmful to the environment to be allowed if they are of “overriding public interest”.
Friends of the earth declares that the current version of the CRMA is a “clear example of corporate capure."
IE gives details of projects currently either operating or on the agenda in Sweden, Portugal and Greece. The planned scale implies a devastating environmental impact and a wholesale transformation of beautiful landscapes into areas devastated by mining operations.
Essential components
“However, without such mined materials - essential components for electronics - the modern comforts of daily life would not be possible.”
“The people are hypocrites,” shouts Peter Tzeferis, a senior mining official in Greece’s ministry of environment and energy, as he waves a colleague’s phone in the air. "They want a phone - and a cheap one at that! - but refuse to even consider what minerals are needed and where they come from. I’ve been repeating this for decades, now I've given up. I think people don't want to know.”
Trying to reduce the demand for minerals and avoiding new mining altogether are not high on the EU agenda.
IE comments: “In the EU Commission's 200-page impact assessment published alongside the CRMA proposal, this basic question is directed to a box in the last annex.”
Instead, industrial assessments prevail. And the scale of this hunger is staggering: in the next 30 years, mankind will have to mine more than it has in the last 70,000 years.
A mind-boggling prediction if ever there was one.
“We, eight billion of us, will use more metal than the 108 billion people who lived before us,” French journalist Guillaume Pitrón wrote in his book Rare Metal Wars.
Reference
Friends of the Earth report on the CRMA
4 minute read
Investigate Europe keeps an eye on the EU Council secrets
One of Investigate Europe’s latest projects is to probe the operations of the most powerful body within the European Union—the so called European Council— Council of the European Union, once known as the Council of Ministers.
This body is meant to be the bulwark of Europe’s democracy, but remains persistently secretive and opaque in discussing its principal deliberations and decisions.
(This EU council is not to be confused with the Council of Europe which is a pan-European body that monitors human rights and legal protections within its 46 state members across Europe, including maintaining abolition of the death penalty. It is not formally connected to the EU.)
The Council of the European Union consists of all the elected heads of state within the 27 member states and the President of the European Council, Charles Michel and the President of the European Commission, currently Ursula Von der Leyen.
Proposals by European Commission
European laws are based on proposals put forward by the European Commission and passed by the European Parliament which, of course, is elected by the citizens of Europe across the 27 countries.
One of the major issues and perceived flaws of the current system is that these laws are often watered down or changed by the European Council without any record of who is making those changes or why they are being made.
In its preamble to the ongoing investigation into the Council called The Secrets of the Council Investigate Europe summarises the current situation and why it’s important to address it:
“The Council of the European Union: 27 Governments. 150 committees. Unnamed diplomats. Secret negotiations. Thousands of paragraphs written into the laws that govern our lives. That is why we follow the Council’s proceedings closely, reporting on which governments are blocking or watering down legislative proposals, and with whom they are in league.
“When newspapers and television stations report on EU legislation, it is usually about debates in the European Parliament or the summits of Heads of State and Government. Sometimes the media also mention that the responsible ministers from the EU Member States must somehow reach an agreement before a draft law can become EU-wide law.
“But mostly citizens never find out exactly who are the people negotiating the paragraphs of hundreds of laws that govern all our lives every year, and who has taken which position. This ignorance is by no means accidental. The fact is that the bulk of the European Union’s legislation takes place behind closed doors. The Secrets of The Council project take[s] you inside.”
“Although the Council of Ministers now holds public sessions, the elected governments of the member states are not keen to grant access to debates in the Council, which are held behind closed doors – and where most important decisions are made. These meetings can’t be watched online and minutes are not made public. Not even representatives of the European Parliament can attend.”
One area which is the subject of upcoming European legislation is preserving press pluralism in the EU against both threats to journalists and interference by national governments in the way national media organisations operate.
Media Freedom Act
The Media Freedom Act has been approved by the European Parliament in the light of increasing encroachments by some European governments into controlling major national media. IE provides two startling examples.
In Greece, reporter Sofia Mandilara who works for Greek news agency Amna, confesses that aspects of Greek political life are not written about. Amna belongs to the state and is subject to the office of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (who of course sits on the European Council).
Mandilara says that reports that are critical of the current conservative government are censored and recently her editors cut quotes from the two Supreme Court judges who spoke against a government bill.
She adds that reporters “quite often engage in self-censorship” to avoid trouble with management.
The situation is similar at the Italian state broadcaster Rai.
AS IE reports: “With more than 12,000 employees, Rai plays a major role in shaping public opinion. But it is increasingly under the influence of Italy’s right-wing populist government.
“Immediately after taking office in October 2022, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni filled all management positions with her followers. The two previous governments did the same, but none as radically as Meloni.
“Prominent reporters left and even high-profile journalist and anti-Mafia author Roberto Saviano’s show was cancelled after he tangled with Meloni.”
Grave threats
A newly published study by the Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom at the European University Institute concludes that every country in Europe ‘without exception’ is facing grave threats to media pluralism.
It records ‘persistent risks’ encountered by journalists including threats to their safety, diminishing resources, and ‘alarming rises’ in online harassment and attacks, especially to women journalists. Not to mention the digital transformation which is driving concentrated media ownership across Europe.
“Our Media Pluralism Monitor clearly demonstrates the current fragility of media pluralism in Europe”, said Professor Pier Luigi Parcu, Director of the CMPF. “There is ample room for improvement when it comes to media independence from commercial and political influence, and to the underrepresentation of women and minority groups in the media” he noted.
The Media Freedom Act in its proposal form was passed by the European Parliament with a large majority. Negotiations with the EU Council now begin on the final shape of the law, but it is likely that some EU member states—Poland, Hungary, Austria and Germany—will strenuously object to some measures which may dilute the good intentions of the legislation. Watch this space.
Reference
PS: Worth watching IE’s short and succinct video intros to their reporting
4 minute read
Protecting women journalists from threats and harassment—online and offline
Every year on November 2 the United Nations marks International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against journalists. WJM has brought attention to this day before and it remains a cogent case for action this year as well.
As the UN reports only 14 per cent of cases of crimes against journalists are currently considered judicially resolved. In the years 2020-2021 117 journalists were killed around the world. More than 80 per cent of those remain unpunished.
And in 2021 the number of women journalists killed rose to 11% from 6% the previous year.
Freedom House
The Washington-based think tank Freedom House has recently highlighted the abuse that women journalists face online in a special report by Margaux Ewen, Director of the Political Prisoners Initiative and Sierra Reeves, Program Assistant, International Programs Division.
They write: “Every day, journalists around the world encounter online harassment and abuse, often intended to suppress critical voices by attacking their credibility. However, while all journalists are at risk of such attacks, it is women journalists who have found themselves on the front line of the battle against online harassment and intimidation.
“Misogyny and the suppression of free expression frequently intersect online, where women journalists face attacks that are often graphic, intimate, and highly sexualised in nature.”
Those threats include death threats and threats of sexual assault, doxing and misinformation campaigns. In a 2022 report by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) and the International Centre for Journalists (ICF) found that 73% of female journalists reported online attacks connected to their work, including threats to family members and colleagues.
The case of Indian journalist Rana Ayyub was cited by the report as she is a member of a minority group of women who are disproportionately targeted. She is a prominent critic of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“Ayyub, who is Muslim, is often the target of extreme misogynistic and Islamophobic harassment; she has been referred to by epithets such as ‘ISIS sex slave’ and ‘presstitute,’ and some of her online abusers have called for her to be gang-raped in retaliation for her work.
“ She has also been the target of at least one pornographic deepfake video, intended to discredit her journalistic work. According to a 2023 report by the ICFJ, many of Ayyub’s online attackers appear to be aligned with the Modi government.”
Demonstrating Impunity
Since 2011, Lebanese journalist Ghada Oueiss has been subject to extreme mysogynistic harassment online, as well as repeated threats of physical violence. According to a 2023 report by the ICFJ, some of those who made these threats did not even attempt ‘to conceal their identities, demonstrating the impunity with which they operate.’ ”
But there is new cause for hope in the ongoing battle to protect both women and men journalists. Surprisingly perhaps, this hope arises from the world of celebrity A listers. But not so surprisingly those A-listers are Hollywood actor George Clooney and his wife Amal, a prominent human rights lawyer, both well known for their support of just causes.. In 2016 they set up the Clooney Justice Foundation which advocates and intervenes in the defence of justice around the world.
One of their latest initiatives is TrialWatch which monitors and, where possible, intervenes in unfair trials around the world. These include those trials which are targeting female journalists. CJF summarises the mission for TrialWatch on their website.
“All over the world, courts have been weaponised against those who speak truth to power and stand up for the rights of the most vulnerable.
“To reverse this trend, Co-Founders George and Amal Clooney launched TrialWatch in 2019. TrialWatch is the first global initiative that monitors criminal trials against the most vulnerable worldwide, provides free legal support to get innocent people out of prison, and advocates for the reform of unfair laws.
“ TrialWatch has monitored trials in over 40 countries, focusing on journalists, women and girls, democracy defenders, LGBTQ+ people and activists, and religious and ethnic minorities.”
One case from Tunisia: In 2022 blogger and activist Myriam Bribri was convicted of ‘offending security officals’ for reposting and and commenting on a video depicting police brutality and given a 4 month prison sentence and fined 500 dinars.
At the 2023 appeal hearing, where Trialwatch’s report on the trial was quoted, her conviction was requalified by the court, meaning that she no longer had to serve time in prison.
“TrialWatch helped in taking my case beyond the local Tunisian context and making it more of a regional and international case, Bribri explained. “This exerted…adverse pressure on the authorities.”
And in Bangladesh, soon after TrialWatch issued a press statement in December 2020 calling for the release of Shafiqul Kajol, a 52 year old Bangladeshi photojournalist, he was freed.
He is charged under Bangladesh’s draconian cybercrime law the Digital Security Act in three separate cases relating to a story he shared on his Facebook page alleging a sex scandal involving several high-ranking officials from the ruling party.
Other NGOs like Amnesty International and the Committee to Protect Journalists were also involved in this campaign but TrialWatch supplied some of the legal background that bolstered his case.
Upon his release Kajol said: “I feel extremely good [that my trial is being monitored} it gives me a sense of hope, and it gives me some courage.”
Taking into account there are more than 500 journalists around the world currently in prison, including more than 70 women, there is much more justice to be done.
Reference
Freedom House report on online abuse against women journalists
Clooney Justice Foundation: Trialwatch
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