US EditionPress Freedom Worldwide Is at Lowest Level in 25 Years, Watchdog Group Warns
RSF said more than half of countries now rate as difficult or very serious, with 110 of 180 countries criminalizing media workers.
- In its annual index, RSF warned that press freedom has reached its lowest level in 25 years, with "In 25 years, the average score for all the countries studied has never been so low," the NGO said.
- The proportion of the global population living in countries with a "good" press freedom rating has plummeted from 20% to "less than 1%", with only seven nations in northern Europe, led by Norway, maintaining this high standard.
- Dropping seven places to 64th, the United States received a "problematic" rating between Botswana and Panama, while the NGO described President Donald Trump's attacks on the press as "systematic," citing journalist Mario Guevara's detention.
- RSF highlighted dramatic falls for El Salvador and Georgia due to an "escalation of repression", while Niger dropped 37 places to 120th amid deterioration of press freedom in the Sahel region.
- By contrast, Syria climbed 36 places to 141st following the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime, though Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran, China, and Eritrea remain at the bottom of the ranking, with Eritrea ranked 180th.
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101 Articles
Reporters Without Borders: Press freedom at lowest level in 25 years
Argentina falls 11 places in annual ranking, now in 98th place; Press freedom at lowest level in 25 years, says media watchdog RSF; More than half of countries facing “difficult” or “very serious” situation.
The organisation Reporters Without Borders has published its annual ranking on the global situation of freedom of the press. Only seven countries are still "good", it says.
Reporters Without Borders announced its annual press freedom ranking on Thursday, 30 April, and warns about its overall deterioration.
At the top of the list, another year, is Norway, the only country to get an "excellent" rating (92.72 out of 100), followed by the Netherlands, Estonia, Denmark, Sweden and Finland.
The press freedom in the world has reached its lowest level for 25 years. To launch the alarm is Reporters sans frontières (Rsf), Ong based in Paris, in the World Press Freedom Index 2026, the annual report on the state of health of the media at the global level. The ranking is drawn up according to five indicators: economic, legal, security, political, social. The most declining this year concerns the legal framework, underlines the editorial d…
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