EU/IRAQ: European leaders were urged yesterday to redouble their efforts to secure the safe release of two hostages in Iraq.
The two, reporter Florence Aubenas of Libération newspaper in France, and her Iraqi guide, Hussein Hanoun, were kidnapped in Iraq on January 5th last.
Aubenas has since appeared on a video pleading for her freedom but no demands have been heard from her kidnappers, whose motives remain unknown. There has been no word from Mr Hanoun.
Around 75 editors and senior journalists from newspapers and broadcasting organisations from France, Belgium, Germany, Spain, Italy, Ireland and Estonia met yesterday in Brussels, where EU heads of government are gathered for a summit meeting today.
The president of the European Parliament, Josep Borrell, told the journalists that members of the European Parliament supported calls for the release of Aubenas and Mr Hanoun. He paid tribute to journalists in Iraq and elsewhere, whose work was essential for freedom and democracy to flourish.
Editors from Libération, the German newspaper Die Welt, El Pais of Spain and Il Manifesto of Italy, which recently secured the release of a correspondent kidnapped in Iraq, all spoke of the importance of reporters bearing witness to the conflict in Iraq.
Peter Murtagh, foreign editor of The Irish Times, praised Aubenas's vivid reporting from Iraq, Algeria and Rwanda. He noted also that foreign correspondents frequently could not act without the assistance and bravery of locally retained assistants, such as Mr Hanoun.
The meeting ended with all present signing a declaration, drawn up by the World Editors Forum and Reporters Without Borders, expressing solidarity with Aubenas and Mr Hanoun.
The declaration calls on EU leaders to help secure their release and also "make themselves active defenders of press freedom" and thus democracy.