Rebecca Vincent Reporters Without Borders

What is your own impression of the delegation’s visit to Malta?

It was positive that senior Maltese government officials were willing to engage in an open discussion with us and that the Prime Minister, together with the Minister for Justice and the Attorney General, gave us the chance to raise our very serious concerns with them directly. As we expected, however, we found really serious shortcomings in the way the Maltese government is implementing its obligation to safeguard freedom of expression, particularly over the murder of Daphne. It has now been a full year and there has been no justice. We can see no tangible progress in the investigation, beyond the three arrests that were made a full 10 months ago. There seems to be no effort to track down anyone else involved in the attack and who actually planned it. That is not justice.

We are also concerned with the PM’s reluctance to open a public inquiry to see whether Daphne’s life could have been saved. That is really important. Until we understand how this happened, why this happened and whether the state could have prevented it, then journalists will remain at risk here in Malta.

Based on your meeting with Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, do you think that any of the delegation’s recommendations will be taken up?

Well, we hope so, because they are in line with Maltese law and Malta’s international obligations. We have raised these concerns with the UN Human Rights Council ahead of Malta’s periodical review and at the Council of Europe. These recommendations merely solidify what the international community has been saying to Malta: journalists must be able to pursue their work without fear and without interference from the government; that is essential to democracy.

Critics argue that international delegations who visit Malta can paint a superficial, one-sided picture of the current situation here. Can you comment?

I think we have seen this reaction when we have visited some other countries too, but I have to stress that we do this all over the world. We band together as a freedom of expression and freedom of the press organisation to go on missions where there are particular concerns and, as I said to the Prime Minister on Monday, we would have never imagined coming to Malta to undertake a mission such as this. And yet here we are, and this has been brought about by the heinous assassination of a journalist and the continued impunity a full year later. There is still a movement of people who want justice, who want answers, who want to encourage reporting. The turnout at the vigil was good, and it was a beautiful outpouring of support. We also have to encourage the people concerned to leave the memorial alone: interfering with it is counter-productive and just damages Malta’s international image.