Is investigative journalism under threat in France?
In April 2007, the French daily Le Monde published an article by the journalist Guillaume Dasquié, in which he revealed the fact that France had been aware of the risk of a terrorist attack in the United States and had informed the latter in January 2001. Accused of having divulged information derived from confidential reports, he was held in police custody for 38 hours last week, before being charged with ‘compromise of the defence secrets principle’. “I am wondering about the right to inform people in a modern democracy”, explains Guillaume Dasquié in the weekly. “The role of investigative journalists is, by cultivating networks, to divulge information covered up by public authorities. But often the press is fed with leaks that are actually organised by those in power. In recent times, all those who, like me, avoid being manipulated and provide striking contradictions to what is publicly communicated by those in power are treated to a terrible backlash.
