Free media essential for Bangladesh to meet full potential: UK minister

UK Minister of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Asia and Pacific Affairs) Mark Field said that free media was essential for Bangladesh to meet its full potential.

The minister, exchanging views with senior journalists of Prothom Alo on Saturday, placed emphasis on the importance of media freedom. He visited the Prothom Alo office on the second day of his visit to Bangladesh. The minister was received by editor Matiur Rahman.

Mark Field said that media freedom featured high on the agenda of talks this time, his third visit to Bangladesh. The UK, along with Canada, is organising an international media conference in London on 10 and 11 July this year.

While exchanging views, British High Commissioner Robert Dickson said that media freedom was an important focus of Mark Field’s visit.

Mark Field said that they were very committed to media freedom and particularly to the protection of journalists. He said, last year some 80 journalists were killed which was the worst year on record and many other hundreds were either in prison or kidnapped and found themselves in great danger just doing their day to day job. “We don’t preach to other countries because we have our own controversies to deal with,” he added.

“We do recognise that here in Bangladesh there has been a restriction on press freedom with the digital security act,” the minister said, also referring to some detrimental impacts of social media.

The state minister went on to say, “We are a very close friend of Bangladesh and we are not preaching. This is genuinely a matter of concern. If this country wants to fulfill its full potential, it needs to have a free media.”

The UK minister pointed out that alongside media freedom, it was also essential to ensure the rule of law. These elements are the foundation stone for any functioning democracy, he said, adding that only a functioning democracy can see economic growth and create opportunity for prosperity.

Dwelling on the issue of forced disappearances and extrajudicial killings, Mark Field said, “We are vocal about this,” adding that they discussed these matters in “conversations that take place privately as well as in a public way.”

Across the board, the notion of extrajudicial killing needs to be discussed in order to resolve the issue, he said. “We are concerned about human rights abuses and these by no means are phenomenon of one country alone. But it is important to stand up and be counted every opportunity.”

On the Brexit issue, the state minister said, “It is a very fluid situation as I tell my constituents.” He said his government was having to devote a lot of time to Brexit.”

Concerning bilateral relations, Mark Field said, “We have a great relationship between our two countries since the country was formed in 1971.” He said his country’s relations with the Asian region went back over decades if not centuries. However, there was a bit of uncertainty over Brexit and the way out. “But we are very committed from the foreign office perspective to be on the front foot to put global Britain first and not turn back from rest of the world,” the minister said, adding, “But obviously in the last 46 years we are more integrated with Europe and we are not turning our back to Europe either, because we are important partners in trade and security matters. We feel that this is an important opportunity to put our voice beyond that. That is why we are opening a lot of new missions around the world.”