Journalists In Afghanistan Face Increasing Danger

>> The dangers of reporting from a war zone came home to public broadcasting this week week. With the death of a journalist in Afghanistan. David Gilkey and the Afghan soldier were killed Sunday by a rocket propelled grenade. >>Reporter: Was on assignment traveling around the country with Afghan security forces. The deaths bring into focus the fact that the war in Afghanistan is not over and the reporters covering that war risked their lives. Joining me is Bob Dietz, program coordinator for the committee to protect journalists. Right now, how dangerous is Afghanistan for reporters? >> It's dangerous. It's something that can't be denied. Afghanistan turns out not to be the most dangerous assignment in the world, right now. When you're looking at Syria and Iraq, those are the places that really get all the attention. That's where we are seeing the most casualties. Afghanistan is fallen on the back burner. Over the years, let's count since 9/11, we've had 17 foreign journalists and nine local journalists who've been killed covering the conflict. Two of those people were Americans. It's a bad and nasty place. It's one of the places in the world, where it's not getting as much attention as it should. >> The world has been galvanized by the atrocities they've seen committed by ISIS against reporters and aid workers. Our reporters throughout the region, also risking execution? >> When you start moving from Central Asia and South Asia, which Afghanistan as part of South Asia. If you start to move west, into the Arab countries, pastor ran, you see a tremendous increase in the number of casualties. That's the place that's captured the headlines and the news coverage. This ugly war has continued for more than 15 years. It's just not going to go way. There's been a steady toll over the years, of people that were lost. For us, -- counterintuitive for us, most of the casualties have been foreign journalists in Afghanistan. And the rest of the world, when you look at the number of people killed in any country, runs about 90% of the total our local journalists, not the foreign journalists. There has been a steady from of local journalists that have been killed in Afghanistan, it's counter to that. The number is pretty much, 221 in terms of ratio, foreign journalists killed two local journalists. >> Do you think news agencies and networks are being asked responsible as they should be to ensure safety of their journalists. >> This is a high-risk occupation. The people who take these assignments are aware of the risks. People like David Gilkey, they knew what they were doing. They went into it knowingly and willingly. The same with the local people who accompanied him. There's not a heck of a lot you can do, frankly to protect people. You can protect them with training, you can give them the gear, these are high-risk assignments. People who take on these assignments are aware of that. It's a risk they know they're taking. >> David Gilkey was riding with security forces, shouldn't that add a level of safety? >> You would think. Most, have died or been killed while they been embedded with forces. There is no guarantee of safety in any of these. You can be taken out by an IED or an RPG, that's just the nature of the business that you are in. >> People often ask, why would anyone want to report from a war zone. Can you remind us about the value of having reporters and photographers witnessing these events? >> They are witnessing the events, Maureen. That's their job. That's what they do. That's the task they take on to themselves, for whatever reasons. Some are adventurous, some are morally driven, some people see that this is the best way they can perform as a journalist. Unless there are witnesses to this, outside witnesses, neutral witnesses, journalists really, who are watching and reporting what's going on, you don't have a sense of the reality on the ground. You can listen to the releases from headquarters, from any source, they will tell you one thing. Until you have people who were on the ground reporting, you really do not understand what's going on in this situation like Afghanistan or Syria or Yemen. Look at the Middle East, justice which focus, see how much relies upon the look reporting of local journalists and people who are not even journalists, people who just have iPhones that they can report and post video. That's one way to get the news, the best way to understand a situation is when you have training journalists such as David Gilkey. In Paris come under criticism for this, frankly, you have to send reporters out on assignments like this. There were four of them and they were working the best they could. We lost a couple of great reporters. >> I thank you for your time. I've been speaking with Bob -- Bob Dietz.