Freedom House ranks Taiwanese press freedom at 47th in the world

Freedom House is an independent research nongovernmental organization which conducts research on democracy and advocates freedom. Rankings are provided for 196 nations based on their legal, political, and economic levels. The organization's report operates on a scale of 0-100, the lower the score, the more media freedom the nation possesses, according to Freedom House. A score of 0-30 is “Free,” 31-60 represents “Partly Free,” and 61 and above indicates “Not Free.”

The 2011 press freedom report that was release yesterday was titled “Freedom of the Press 2011: A Global Survey of Media Independence.” Finland achieved the highest press freedom of all nations with a score of 10, closely followed by Norway and Sweden, each with a score of 11.

Taiwan scored around 20 to 24, in the press freedom reports from 2002-2009. In 2009, Taiwan's rank dropped to 43th with a score of 23. In 2010, it scored 24, with a world standing of 47.

The nations with the lowest ranking included the People's Republic of China (85), Iran (91), Cuba (92), Lybia (94), and North Korea (97).

Freedom House said that certain countries were newly categorized as “Not Free” this past year, including Mexico where drug traffickers attacked news reporters and Egypt where press coverage of the parliament election in November 2011 was oppressed.

Freedom House concluded that from 2010, governments licensing and controlling the media; totalitarian governments strictly monitoring new media, including satellite TV, the internet, and cell phones; and the increasing violence against the media which is often left unpunished by the governments, are the biggest concerns for worldwide press freedom.

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