Protected status of non-combatants in times of war/conflict

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This topic may have been best suited for the Military Affairs forum that no longer exists, but since that forum doesn’t exist, I thought I would post it here.

News channels are reporting the death of a journalist, Tim Hetherington in Libya. He was a famed journalist reporting on the conflict who had reported on other armed conflicts, including Afghanistan in the past.

From my limited knowledge, I believe that it is quite common for journalists to be embedded with combatants during armed conflicts so that they can report on the war. While casualties amongst journalists are not unheard of, it is still relatively infrequent as the participants of the war do want the war to be reported on and journalists have a pseudo-protected status.

An excerpt from the article describes the scale of number of attacks against journalists as unprecedented:
Mohamed Abdel Dayem, program coordinator for the Committee to Protect Journalists in the Middle East and North Africa, told Reuters this week that the number of attacks on the media in the Middle East and North Africa since the start of the year was “unprecedented.”

“This hasn’t happened before, not with this intensity and not with this frequency,” he said of the attacks.

Dayem said 14 journalists were killed worldwide so far this year, with 10 of those deaths in the Middle East and North Africa. The hundreds of other attacks on the media in the region included detentions, destruction of equipment and death threats.

While the Committee to Protect Journalists said press freedom has improved in Egypt and Tunisia since protesters ousted the presidents of both countries this year, it described the situation as only graduating from “horrendous to bad.”
War is no longer “civil” and as a society we seem to have reconnected with our inner barbarianism. War has again become about an all-out attack with the spoils of war going to the victor. So can non-combatants such as journalists or people who engage in humanitarian efforts (Les Medicin Frontieres, etc.) reasonably expect to be safe during a war? Or maybe a better question is: Can war be civil?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42682853/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/

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Re: Protected status of non-combatants in times of war/conflict

If you are 'embedded' you should expect to face the dangers that come with such. You tag along with an small party and the enemy doesn't really want to know what's what.

The US started the whole 'embedded' thing at Desert Storm to bring the North American public footage they deemed appropriate. Now you reckon the enemy is going to see you wearing a flak-jacket and go hold on, lets check their credentials? Nah, you see a jacket, you shoot. You see a helmet, you shoot. End of, this is how it works.

The thing with humanitarian efforts is, they were much more differentiated but with the blurring of intelligence and task force operatives and humanitarian operation personnel and their roles, both sides are bound to damage the reputation and sure enough, kill a few here and there. It sucks but yeah.

You can't avoid stinking when you're in the ****ter. As crude as that sounds, it fits this circumstance.

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Re: Protected status of non-combatants in times of war/conflict

^ I think you've got the right assesment here.

Journalists from independant bodies or Media groups have always been smart enough to keep thier distance in War Zones but sadly there have always been casualties.

When I first read the title I was thinking of Civilians in general and of thier status. Journalists have a choice they dont neccasarily have to be there at that time... most non combatants dont get that choice.