It is interesting to note the growing importance
given in world news by the media in the democratic
countries, which generally recognize the freedom of
thought and expression enshrined in their constitution as
something needing to be realized.
We have particularly noted in many countries the wide
publicity given in print an on the air to exceptionally
serious transgressions, such as the shooting down of the
Korean jet, which put the spotlight of world opinion on
the responsibility of the great powers in regard to
deliberate violations of international convention and of
natural law.
It is, however, worth remarking in this context that
the right of the public to be objectively informed,
although formally acknowledged in the democracies, is
:
a) widely ignored by many organs of the press because
of political alignment and an inclination in partisan
polemics and
b) only partially served by the policy of balanced
reporting adopted by the ostensibly unbiased sections of
the press.
Convinced of the possibility and the necessity, in the
present state of ideological division and acute tension
threatening world peace, of freeing information as far as
possible from the abuses and the double-talk which are
diverting it from its true function (with the danger that
public opinion will become resigned to willful
disinformation) we ask :
- that UNESCO, within the framework of plans for a
"new information order" to accord with ideal of
Human Rights, should set up a permanent international
Pact-finding Commissions, to be entirely independent
and ready to go into operation at the very start of
any very serious international case, so as to monitor
its evolution, and
- that UNESCO should also endorse a World Press
Agency, aiming at the free and immediate
acceptance of its communiqués by all the media,
without any prior limitation of attenuation of the
message through the acceptance of a special motion
from an interested government.
