By Amy Starlight Lawrence and Jon Sotsky

The Committee to Protect Journalists released its annual Impunity Index today, which details the 13 most dangerous countries for journalists.

The report highlights countries where journalists are murdered and their governments are unable or unwilling to bring the killers to justice.  The impunity rate calculated by CPJ is a metric based on the number of unsolved journalist murders as a percentage of the population.

Iraq tops the list for the fourth year running, and Mexico’s rating has worsened for the third consecutive year.  CPJ believes that there have been improvements in Russia, where a number of unsolved murder cases were reopened by officials.

CPJ battles impunity using several approaches including research, advocacy, field-building and financial assistance to journalists and their families.

The report provides insights about global impunity trends and in particular that “prior threats against a journalist are powerful indicators of violence to come. More than 40 percent of the victims in this index had received threats prior to being killed.”

Knight Foundation has supported CPJ’s impunity campaign, with an emphasis on its work in Russia and the Philippines.