Critical thinking

There is a paradox in Turkey's leader talking about how unfair the global order is, while presiding over the worst inequality in his country's history.

The coronavirus crisis highlighted, particularly on World Press Freedom Day, a more humane, and perhaps more useful, perspective regarding the importance of reliable news reporting. At times like this, when societies are dominated by fear, the risk from ignorance and misinformation intensifies while the need for accurate documentation of events and thorough analysis of data grows.

The freedom of press is the guarantee of any functional democracy wherein citizens must be properly and timely informed, reads a message by the Foreign Affairs Ministry (MAE) on the World Press Freedom Day, sent on Sunday to AGERPRES.

During the social crisis caused by the pandemic, misinformation works at full capacity, as people are being more sensitive to panic, which causes their critical thinking level to significantly drop, shows an analysis signed by Felix Staicu, co-founder of the educative agency Intel4Patriam.

Media freedom in Turkey, Bulgaria and Montenegro is the worst in the region, according to the 2020 World Press Freedom Index, published on Tuesday by Reporters Without Borders - but other Balkan countries have largely failed to improve.

"In southern Europe, a crusade by the authorities against the media is very active," the report warns.

Brnabic said Serbia had done everything to keep Serbian citizens informed in a timely manner and that no information would be hidden from the public, but that it would withdraw a recently adopted decision "to avoid casting a shadow on everything that has been done so far".

Twenty-one academics have joined forces against pseudoscience disseminated by some news outlets and on social media - a phenomenon that has been skyrocketing since the outbreak of the new coronavirus - by setting up a monitoring agency to debunk unfounded claims.

Greek army and police patrols have used tear gas and stun grenades in an attempt to stop thousands of refugees pouring into the country.

Authorities in Iran have arrested 24 people accused of online rumor-mongering about the spread of the coronavirus, according to BGNES.

The country is struggling to gain control of the outbreak, which has claimed 19 lives in the last week.

US government officials have suspected Russia of spreading fake news about the coronavirus, thus undermining international efforts to combat the epidemic, AFP reported.