Report flags abuse of economic charges to silence media

WAN-IFRA report exposes governments using false financial charges to silence independent media, threatening press freedom globally.

A new report from the World Association of News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) flags the growing trend of governments resorting to false charges of financial crimes to silence the press. The report, titled ‘Misuse of economic charges to silence, threaten and attack the press: Review of case studies’ documents eight different cases of media under attack for their independent journalism, including that of NewsClick from India.

The economic charges most frequently misused by regimes seeking to silence independent media and journalists were money laundering, tax evasion, blackmail, terrorism financing, fraud, and illegally receiving foreign funds.

Highlighting the impact of trumped up economic charges, the report identifies five main trends. Firstly, it notes that the “threat of imprisonment that those economic charges pose has a strong chilling effect in the media community”. Second, since “financial charges correspond to criminal law, many prosecutions result in lengthy pre-trial detention, prison terms and hefty fines” and the consequences include “financial loss/ruin and closure of the media outlet’s operations.”

Another trend, the report notes, is that during the investigation and trial, journalists and media outlets are often “denied access to bank accounts and have their assets frozen, hampering their finances.” Further, legal defence against such charges are costly and require “access to tax and criminal lawyers, accounting experts, and other legal expertise to which journalists and media outlets do not have easy access.” In cases where they do manage to access such expertise, “lawyers defending such cases are increasingly attacked.” Lastly, the report observes that the narratives put out around such charges aim to “label journalists as criminals, erode public support, and attack the journalist’s or media outlet’s reputation.”

These dynamics were evident in the case of the online news outlet NewsClick, whose offices and staff were raided in 2021 and 2023. Its founder Prabir Puryakastha and head of human resources Amit Chakravarty were arrested as part of an investigation into suspected foreign funding of the news portal. Observing that “the charges are linked to the outlet’s critical coverage of India’s ruling political party,” the report calls it a “worrying example of where broad anti-terrorism laws are applied to silence critical media outlets” and states that “it illustrates efforts to cut the few revenue streams for independent media in a country where all major outlets are aligned with the ruling party, the BJP.”

The report details how “the almost endless investigation process under the PMLA [Prevention of Money Laundering Act] allowed authorities to search and seize NewsClick’s property and accounts” and “staff at NewsClick were detained under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), also known as India’s ‘anti-terror’ law.” Both PMLA and the amendments to the UAPA in 2009 were “brought in under the auspices of the global terror financing and money laundering watchdog, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). But the “misuse of these laws against NewsClick is indicative of the abuse of anti-terror laws for political purposes,” notes the report.

Significantly, the report notes that governments find financial crimes rather effective “in silencing media and journalists as they do not require the need for a link to content produced and are not subject to the same international scrutiny as laws explicitly targeting media.”