Yesterday’s uprising at the Hal Safi barracks, in which six policemen, two AFM soldiers and five immigrants were injured, was also characterised by some moments of tension between the police and journalists.

The Malta Independent photo-journalist Ben Borg Cardona was at one point pushed in the chest by a police officer. Borg Cardona was later treated at St Luke’s Hospital, although he was not found to be suffering from serious injuries. Other cameramen also complained that the police tried to stop them from filming.

Reacting to these incidents, the Journalists Committee (Malta) has expressed serious concern about the “confrontational attitude taken by police officers towards journalists, particularly photographers and cameramen” who were reporting the event.

The statement added that, while the Journalists’ Committee understands that yesterday’s incidents were highly charged, “it is unacceptable that the press is viewed by people in authority and public officials as a hindrance, when it is in the public interest that it covers these issues, even more so when the incidents happened in the public domain.

“Clearly if the police officers were doing their job, so were the journalists, and it is worrying that in a free country the press is still perceived as being in the way when such incidents occur.”

The Journalists Committee concluded with an appeal for greater understanding of the role of the media. “The Committee will be pressing for recognition of journalists’ vital role in our democracy with the police force and other public institutions that are of direct relevance to freedom of the press.”

In a statement the Institute of Maltese Journalists also condemned the incident.

On a more positive note, police officers gave bottles of water to the journalists and cameramen to quench their thirst in the stifling heat.