![reuters:
DEVELOPING: The Red Cross says it has recovered the bodies of two journalists killed in Homs, Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik.
Photo: A Turkish journalist holds portraits of American correspondent Marie Colvin (R) and French photographer Remi Ochlik during a demonstration against the killings of journalists in Syria, in front of the Syrian Embassy in Ankara, February 24, 2012. [REUTERS/Umit Bektas]
Read more: ICRC says journalists bodies to be taken to Damascus
Let’s hope their bodies eventually find their way home safely.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m09op1fUOy1qmaoalo1_500.jpg)
DEVELOPING: The Red Cross says it has recovered the bodies of two journalists killed in Homs, Marie Colvin and Remi Ochlik.
Photo: A Turkish journalist holds portraits of American correspondent Marie Colvin (R) and French photographer Remi Ochlik during a demonstration against the killings of journalists in Syria, in front of the Syrian Embassy in Ankara, February 24, 2012. [REUTERS/Umit Bektas]
Read more: ICRC says journalists bodies to be taken to Damascus
Let’s hope their bodies eventually find their way home safely.
But Ms. Colvin’s frustrations were also more particular than that: she worried that her accounts of indiscriminate bombing by forces loyal to the Syrian government were not able to reach the widest possible audience.
Days before her death, she asked a fellow journalist to sidestep the online subscription requirement for her newspaper, The Sunday Times of London, and share her latest article from Syria with nonsubscribers. “Getting the story out from here is what we got into journalism for,” she wrote in a message that was republished on Wednesday by Bill Neely, the international editor for ITV News in Britain.
“You have my permission to post it, as in I will take the firing squad in the morning,” Ms. Colvin said, indicating that her bosses might object to the reposting of her articles elsewhere. “I’m just not able to technically do it, as I am still in Baba Amr.”
This puts a seriously human face on a problem widely plaguing the newspaper industry — how do you get your stories read and paid for? The Times’ paywall, implemented by News Corp. in 2010, is the worst of the worst, as you can’t even read excerpts from the stories without a subscription. Newspapers need to make money, yes, but when does the public interest, which Marie Colvin was deeply interested in, take precedent?
“We go to remote war zones to report what is happening. The public have a right to know what our government, and our armed forces, are doing in our name. Our mission is to speak the truth to power. We send home that first rough draft of history. We can and do make a difference in exposing the horrors of war and especially the atrocities that befall civilians.” - Marie Colvin
You get the real impression that Colvin’s influence in death could go far beyond her influence in life. There’s probably a 18-year-old journalism student who’s reading this quote somewhere, saying to themselves, “I can do this.”
![inothernews:
Two journalists are among the latest casualties of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s murderous bombing of Homs: Marie Colvin, left, an American reporter working for The Sunday Times of London, and Rémi Ochlik, a French photographer. Three other journalists were wounded when an explosion tore through a building being used as a makeshift media center in the central Syrian city. (Photos via the Sunday Times [Colvin] and EPA; caption via the New York Times)
Between this and Anthony Shadid, it’s been a tough week for foreign journalists. In case you’re wondering about the eye patch, Colvin was kind of a die-hard as foreign correspondents go: “According to his Web site, Mr. Ochlik, in his late twenties, had covered wars and upheaval in Haiti, Congo and the Middle East. Ms. Colvin, 55, was a veteran of many conflicts from the Middle East to Chechnya and from the Balkans to Iraq and Sri Lanka, where she lost an eye covering a civil war. She wore a distinctive black eyepatch. Both had won awards for their work.”](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lzsq1cNaRf1qz82gvo1_500.jpg)
Two journalists are among the latest casualties of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s murderous bombing of Homs: Marie Colvin, left, an American reporter working for The Sunday Times of London, and Rémi Ochlik, a French photographer. Three other journalists were wounded when an explosion tore through a building being used as a makeshift media center in the central Syrian city. (Photos via the Sunday Times [Colvin] and EPA; caption via the New York Times)
Between this and Anthony Shadid, it’s been a tough week for foreign journalists. In case you’re wondering about the eye patch, Colvin was kind of a die-hard as foreign correspondents go: “According to his Web site, Mr. Ochlik, in his late twenties, had covered wars and upheaval in Haiti, Congo and the Middle East. Ms. Colvin, 55, was a veteran of many conflicts from the Middle East to Chechnya and from the Balkans to Iraq and Sri Lanka, where she lost an eye covering a civil war. She wore a distinctive black eyepatch. Both had won awards for their work.”
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