Vice President Faisal Naseem has called on journalists to ensure that the information they spread, through print or broadcast, is true.

Vice President Naseem was chief guest at an event held on Friday to commemorate the World Press Freedom Day, where he spoke about the situation for the press in the Maldives.

The vice president said that the ‘past years have been dark’ and that journalists in the Maldives have worked despite ‘several’ obstacles.

Naseem further commended Maldivian journalists for their perseverance and having strived to inform the public in spite of said obstacles.

The Maldives consecutively dropped in rank in the World Press Freedom Index in the past three years; reasons for it have been government crackdown on journalists covering political events, the abduction of journalist Ahmed Rilwan, and targeted sanctions against news organizations.