Press freedom in worst scenario in 25 years, in accordance with Reporters Without Borders | EUROtoday

A transparent decline in the best to data. Press freedom has reached its lowest stage in 1 / 4 of a century, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) warned on Thursday April 30, pointing to a basic deterioration, from the United States the place Donald Trump’s assaults are “systematic” to Saudi Arabia which executed a journalist in 2025.

“For the first time in the history” of this annual rating created in 2002, “more than half of the world’s countries (94) are in a ‘difficult’ or ‘very serious’ situation, whereas they were only a tiny minority (13.7%) in 2002”, writes RSF, which has 5 ranges on its scale, from “very serious” to “good”.

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At the identical time, the speed of individuals dwelling in a rustic with a “good” press freedom scenario has plunged from 20% to “less than 1%.”

Only seven international locations in northern Europe, led by Norway, are on this class. France ranks 25^e (“pretty good situation”). “In 25 years, the average score of all the countries studied has never been so low,” provides the group.

“Economic, political, legal” pressures

The United States, in a “problematic situation”, loses seven locations and ranks 64^e rank, between Botswana and Panama. Beyond the Republican president’s assaults on the press – “a systematic practice” – this additionally resulted within the detention after which expulsion of Salvadoran journalist Mario Guevara, who denounced the arrests of migrants within the United States, or the drastic discount in funding for American overseas broadcasting.

“The attacks against journalists are changing. There are always journalists murdered, always journalists in prison, but the pressures are also economic, political, legal,” Anne Bocandé, editorial director of RSF, advised AFP.

If the decline could be defined by armed conflicts, the group additionally factors to the hardening of political regimes lately.

To (re)learnRSF 2025 report: 67 journalists killed, practically half of them by the Israeli military in Gaza

RSF highlights the spectacular falls in El Salvador (143^e), which has misplaced 105 locations since 2014 and the launch of a conflict towards the legal gangs “maras”, or Georgia (135^e), which has fallen 75 locations since 2020 attributable to an “acceleration of repression”.

The largest decline in 2026 is attributed to Niger (120^e-37 locations), image of “the deterioration of press freedom in the Sahel for several years”, between “attacks by armed groups and (the) juntas in power”, writes RSF.

“Certain international locations had been flagships of press freedom but it surely has deteriorated profoundly with the arrival of army regimes like in Mali (121^e) or in Burkina Faso (110^e)”, adds Anne Bocandé.

A columnist executed by Riyadh

Saudi Arabia (176^e-14 places), where the columnist Turki al-Jasser was executed in June by the State, “a singular occasion on the planet”, rubs shoulders with Russia, Iran and China at the very end of the ranking, closed by Eritrea (180^e).

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On the other hand, Syria (141^e) jumped 36 places after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

Among the five RSF measurement criteria, it is the legal framework indicator that has deteriorated the most in 2025.

“National security laws, against terrorism for example, or to protect defense secrets, increasingly restrict the field of journalism. Russia is champion in this area, but the impact is also felt even in democracies,” underlines Anne Bocandé.

Intimidation

Another weapon, that of “SLAPP procedures”, in other words legal proceedings for defamation, economic denigration or dissemination of false news, which aim to intimidate journalists.

A global phenomenon, illustrated in Guatemala by the case of the founder of El Periodico, José Rubén Zamora, sentenced to several years in prison after his investigations into political corruption. But RSF also denounced this trend in France in a recent study on local media.

“The laws are increasingly criminalizing journalists, when they should be protecting them,” notes the editorial director of the organization.

Nevertheless, “instruments exist”, she adds, citing the European Commission’s regulation on freedom in the media (“European Media Freedom Act”), which got here into pressure in 2025, or the European directive towards SLAPP procedures.

With AFP