Veteran journalist Robinson to speak at ARIJ conference

AMMAN (JT) — Journalist Walter Robinson, who led The Boston Globe’s Pulitzer Prize winning investigation into sex abuse in the Catholic Church, will speak at a forum for investigative journalism at the Dead Sea in December.

Robinson says he will encourage his colleagues in the Arab world to “never take no as an answer” at the ninth annual forum for Arab investigative journalism, organised by Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ). 

“I will tell them to keep chipping away because it is a block of granite we are up against and we are the chisel… Eventually, chip by chip, we will get all the answers that the public needs,” he said, according to a statement from ARIJ.  

“I firmly believe that in virtually every country in the Middle East, democracy will come closer because of good journalism, reporters who probe and pry and force public officials to explain themselves, reporters who dig out information that the public desperately needs to know to assess the quality of their leadership; these reporters are the point of the lens in the move towards democracy in any country,” the veteran reporter added.

Robinson expressed admiration for “the courage and resourcefulness of reporters who have to work under such difficult repressive conditions and yet they continue to do that work because they care so much about their countries”.

The investigation into the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal was made into an Academy Award-winning film, “Spotlight”, in which Robinson’s character was portrayed by Michael Keaton. 

Robinson’s keynote address will be one of 25 sessions at the upcoming forum held under the theme: “A decade of investigating the Arab world: I hear evil, I see evil and I report on evil.”