One key change in the update noted that “where possible, efforts should be made to distinguish between the activities of journalists and the activities of enemy forces so that journalists’ activities…do not result in a mistaken conclusion that a journalist is part of enemy forces”.
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“The manual was restructured to make it more clear and up front that journalists are civilians and are to be protected as such”, Charles A. Allen, the Pentagon’s deputy general counsel, said in a conference call with reporters Thursday.
The updated manual released today contains a substantial revision to the section on journalists as well as minor updates to other sections.
The revised text recognizes the civilian rights of journalists, the role they play in a free society, and the objective they serve in a war zone. Advocates said the new manual acknowledged journalists’ right to interview enemy combatants and placed the onus on commanders to discern between the actions of reporters and combatants.
“These are major changes”, Frank Smyth of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) told Reuters. “This affirmation of journalists’ right to report armed conflicts freely and from all sides is especially welcome at a time when governments, militias, and insurgent forces around the world are routinely flouting the laws of war”.
The manual’s earlier version, published in 2015, said that while journalists “in general” are civilians, they “may be members of the armed forces, persons authorized to accompany the armed forces, or unprivileged belligerents”. The revised manual also explicitly says that practicing journalism should not be equated to assisting enemy forces.
The modified Law of War manual also removed wording that compared journalists to spies.
That passage drew criticism for setting an unrealistic standard for war reporting, in which frontlines can shift quickly.
Speaking of the First Amendment, the Pentagon last week took the sensible step of revising its policies to ensure that journalists covering conflicts won’t be subject to military discipline if they upset the Defense Department.
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“The department’s mission is to defend the very freedoms that journalists exercise”, the Pentagon’s top lawyer, Jennifer O’Connor, said in a statement.
