DELETED: Rights of War Correspondents

[Vibrant Coconuts]

Rights of War Correspondents

A resolution to improve worldwide human and civil rights.

 

Category: Human Rights | Strength: Significant | Proposed by: <a class="" href="http://www.nationstates.net/nation=abacathea">Abacathea</a>

 

Description: <i>The General Assembly;</i>

 

<i>Accepting</i> that despite the work undertaken by the World Assembly in bettering respective nations and international affairs that wars sadly still occur,

 

<i>Considering</i> it to be in the best interests of both the national and the international community to be kept informed of war time events as they develop,

 

<i>Resolved</i> to affording protections to the correspondents who travel to these war zones in an attempt to fulfill the provision of necessitated information to the international community,

 

Hereby;

 

<i>Defines</i> for the purpose of this act:

 

"War Correspondent" as any civilian individual employed for the purposes of, in part or in totality, relaying information to the media for dissemination to the public.

 

"Self Defence" as the use of force for self preservation so long as it is justified, necessitated, non-discriminatory and proportionate.

 

"War Zone" as an area wherein military combat is taking place and/or is marked by constant and extreme violent conflict.

 

Mandates;

 

1. The welfare of war correspondents be given equal importance and afforded the same protections as would be placed on any other civilian or non-partisan actor in a war zone.
   
   
2. War Correspondents attached to a military body submit to any given orders required to ensure the protection of both the military body and the correspondent unless those orders would be in direct contravention of the non-partisan role of the correspondent and not required for self defence purposes.
   
   
3. War Correspondents are not permitted to engage in any military action outside of the role of an observer barring instances of self defence.
   
   
4. War correspondents who choose to become a willing participant in war zone conflict in any instance other than for the purposes of self defence nullify their correspondent status at that point in time and cannot be considered a non partisan actor under the terms of this resolution.
   
   
5. A War Correspondent who, due to disaster of natural or war based origin, becomes the only available immediate medical responder shall not be deemed to have taken partisan action with the provision of medical aid, even if the patient is or was a combatant.

 

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Forum thread: http://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic....9&t=278984

[Vibrant Coconuts]

I filed a legality challenge on this but have predictably heard nothing. Nonetheless I'm opposed, even if it is ruled legal.

[Auralia]

As I stated in the NS drafting thread, I don't really understand why we should have a special resolution for war correspondents instead of a general resolution governing the treatment of civilians during warfare.

 

AGAINST
.

[Vibrant Coconuts]

As I stated in the NS drafting thread, I don't really understand why we should have a special resolution for war correspondents instead of a general resolution governing the treatment of civilians during warfare.

 

AGAINST
.

Yep, exactly. That's my problem with the proposal on substantive grounds.

[Velvet]

As I stated in the NS drafting thread, I don't really understand why we should have a special resolution for war correspondents instead of a general resolution governing the treatment of civilians during warfare.

 

AGAINST.

May I suggest:  the correspondents protection bill helps with the free information flowing to the citizens, letting them know how civilians are being treated during a war, and encourages additional participation in that occupation therefore supplying the free flow of the necessary news about civilian treatment. a law protecting civilians during war cannot work if it's broken while no one is around to report it to the people: war reporters will make it possible to know who is breaking the law allowing the enforcement and discouraging future lawbreakers.

 

FOR

[Vibrant Coconuts]

 

<blockquote class="ipsBlockquote" data-author="Auralia" data-cid="116436" data-time="1392140297">
<div>
As I stated in the NS drafting thread, I don't really understand why we should have a special resolution for war correspondents instead of a general resolution governing the treatment of civilians during warfare.

 

AGAINST.

May I suggest:  the correspondents protection bill helps with the free information flowing to the citizens, letting them know how civilians are being treated during a war, and encourages additional participation in that occupation therefore supplying the free flow of the necessary news about civilian treatment. a law protecting civilians during war cannot work if it's broken while no one is around to report it to the people: war reporters will make it possible to know who is breaking the law allowing the enforcement and discouraging future lawbreakers.

 

FOR

 

</div>
</blockquote>
Except that this resolution doesn't "help with the free information flowing". Censorship is still perfectly legal under this resolution. A nation can be in compliance and ban war correspondents from entering their nation, entering specific areas, reporting certain facts, or accessing information.

 

So your argument is academic, because this resolution doesn't do anything to facilitate the information flow you're talking about.

[Vibrant Coconuts]

And so it proved - deleted.