If the media won't report on terrorism, who will?

Taken from the HSN Blog

The international media gives short shrift to terrorism outside the West as it spends vast amounts of time, ink and money to cover royal weddings. Journalists who report on terror

came together in Bonn to discuss why.

Sixteen people were killed in a series of terrorist attacks on the offices of the French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo and other locations in Paris on January 7-9, 2015. It was headline news around the world for days, if not weeks. Across the globe, presidents and prime ministers took time out of their busy schedules to express their outrage and condolences. The slogan "Je suis Charlie" was born to signify support for press freedom.

As many as 2,000 people were killed in a series of terrorist attacks in the northeastern Nigerian town of Baga and the surrounding area between January 3 and 7, 2015. Even today the number of dead remains unclear. The city of 300,000 on the banks of Lake Chad became a ghost town. The news hardly made a dent in the international media, which was avidly reporting about Charlie Hebdo. The president of Nigeria played down the death toll.

This, said Malam Umar Sa'id Tudun Wada, is an example of how inequality permeates media coverage. The managing director of Nigeria's Kano State Radio Corporation was one of four journalists called upon to discuss reporting on terror at the Global Media Forum, an international media conference hosted by Deutsche Welle, in Bonn on Monday.