Two U.S. journalists are among four foreign correspondents captured by the Libyan military earlier this week, reported USA Today. A Spanish photographer and South African photographer also are being held.
The two U.S. journalists have been identified as Clare Morgana Gillis, a freelancer who has written for USA Today, The Atlantic, and the Christian Science Monitor; and James Foley, a reporter for GlobalPost.
The GlobalPost reported Friday that Libyan officials said the journalists would be taken to Tripoli and released.
The capture of these four journalists is just the latest threat against foreign correspondents covering the unrest in the Arab world.
Four New York Times journalists and a Brazilian reporter were freed earlier. On Thursday in Oklahoma City, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times Beirut Bureau Chief Anthony Shadid described the ordeal of how he and his fellow NYT colleagues were beaten, threatened and arrested by forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi.
The threats against journalists in Libya comes on the heels of foreign correspondents being beaten and arrested while covering the Egyptian revolution. The attacks on journalists, such as the sexual assault against CBS correspondent Lara Logan, highlight the dangers of foreign reporting.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, there have been more than 70 attacks against the press since the Libyan revolt began in February.
Note from the editor: This story was originally published by the Knight Center’s blog Journalism in the Americas, the predecessor of LatAm Journalism Review.
