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In the year 2000, Kurt Schork, a freelance journalist working for Reuters, was killed while on assignment in Sierra Leone. His death, along with that of Associated Press cameraman Miguel Gil Moreno de Mora, sent shockwaves through the news industry. But since the turn of the century, the death of journalists has become an all too familiar occurrence and while the targeting of high-profile international correspondents such as Marie Colvin has rightly caused international outrage, the overwhelming majority of those killed have been local journalists and fixers whose work often goes unheralded. Since the deaths in 2000, a number of trusts and foundations have been set up to support local journalists and fixers, while academic scholarship has started to focus on their work. But this commentary argues that much more needs to be done to recognise the invaluable role they play in today's newsgathering environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]