Sri Lanka's government wants to see its journalists behave like team players, and that's leading to -- shall we say? -- tensions. However, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are worse. They've been known to kill critical journalists.
With civil war raging in Sri Lanka, the journalists trying to cover the conflict find themselves increasingly under siege.
They have been hounded by the government, attacked by unknown assailants and accused of aiding the rebels. Many reporters have been arrested or fled the country, while others have resorted to self-censorship, journalists said.
Rights groups blame much of the intimidation on the government, saying that since fighting with the Tamil Tigers flared more than two years ago, pressure has grown on journalists to report the official line.
When media don't comply — reporting higher troop casualties or alleging corruption in arms purchases — "they are branded as traitors," said Sunanda Deshapriya of the Free Media Movement.
"The government does not accept that media can play a watchdog's role," he said.
Media Minister Anura Yapa denied the government was intimidating the media or orchestrating the assaults.
"We have no intention of suppressing media freedom. Why should we attack journalists and get our image tarnished?" he said.
For their part, the rebels allow no independent media at all in their de facto state in the north, which they run as a dictatorship. The rebels also have been accused of killing journalists critical of them in the violence-plagued Jaffna peninsula.
Pressure on the media has grown along with the fighting. Both sides have been accused of exaggerating victories and downplaying defeats, while the government has restricted access to the war zone, making independent reporting difficult.