NEW YORK, March 30. /TASS/. Killing journalists or taking them hostage should be classified as a war crime, The Associated Press President and CEO Gary Pruitt said in a speech on Monday in Hong Kong.
A new framework is needed to protect journalists "as they cover conflicts in which they are increasingly seen as targets by extremist groups," Pruitt said.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a total of 61 journalists were killed in the line of duty in 2014. Five journalists were killed in Ukraine. The most dangerous country for journalists in 2014 was Syria, where 17 journalists were killed in the line of duty.
Violence against journalists in Ukraine
Ukraine is an absolute leader in the number of illegal actions against journalists, Russian Foreign Ministry Commissioner for Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law Konstantin Dolgov said on March 27.
"The most notorious cases of attacks on journalists happened precisely on the Ukrainian territory," Dolgov told Rossiya-24 TV channel.
"There was no investigation of the deaths of four journalists [in Ukraine]. No one was punished for that," the commissioner added.
"The Ukrainian authorities are not doing it [investigating], just like they are not investigating other crimes committed, first of all, in the framework of the punitive operation in the south-east of the country," he stressed.
More than 6,000 people, including journalists, have died in Ukraine since the conflict broke out last year, Dolgov reminded.