The Luxembourg association of professional journalists (ALJP) has appealed to the authorities to protect journalists who have received death threats, as threats have spiralled as a result of the pandemic.
This week alone, a photographer for the Tageblatt newspaper was verbally attacked at a Covid protest in Esch-sur-Alzette, disturbing her work, while a journalist for RTL received death threats via Telegram following a report on mandatory vaccination.
The number of threats received by journalists in Luxembourg is on the rise, exacerbated by discourse surrounding the pandemic. On Thursday evening, the ALJP association issued a statement calling for political support in combating these threats, and said they would fight them with all legal means available to them. Freedom of the press must be maintained, the statement continued.
Journalists who have received such threats should report them to the association. The AJLP said: "Journalists get in the way of fellow human beings when they reveal their anti-democratic goings-on. It's part of the job. The consequences are often threats, insults, agitation, and sometimes physical violence against the reporters." It went on to add that in recent months, such threats had come from anti-vax or Covid-sceptic people in particular.
The Democratic Party has issued a demand for a Chamber discussion on freedom of the press in relation to the pandemic, after reports that journalists and press associations had been targeted by such attacks, both in private and at work.
