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On September 27, 2007, a Japanese journalist who was covering a demonstration against the government in the Southeast Asian country, Myanmar, was found dead. Nagai Kenji was a video journalist who had experience working in dangerous places. Two days before his death, he had arrived in Myanmar in order to cover the government trying to control people by military force. Myanmar’s officials said he was killed accidentally, not intentionally. However, many people said that Nagai was probably killed because he had a camera.
The military government of Myanmar had been closing private newspapers that did not follow the rules on what to print or did not publish what they told them to. Furthermore, the government did not like foreign journalists covering news about them. As the government was trying to keep their domestic news from reaching the outside world, foreign journalists such as Nagai would have been a real pain in the neck for them.
Many people might wonder what makes journalists willing to risk their lives to report from such dangerous places. Nagai’s colleagues and family remember him saying, “These are places no one wants to go, but someone has to go.” He was ready to risk his life to report such hidden facts. One person in Myanmar said, “He served our country. Not much is known by the outside world, so he was trying to fill that gap … His effort will stay in our minds forever.”