A documentary produced by French journalist Hugo Clément claims the Queensland police had him and his film crew under surveillance and repeatedly stopped them from filming near Adani’s Abbot Point coal terminal.
The documentary, Sur le Front des Océans, aired on the public television network France2 and detailed how police repeatedly took actions to stop the crew from hiring a boat to obtain footage of Abbot Point from the sea.
Mr Clément and his film crew were arrested by Queensland police in July this year, on charges of ‘trespassing on a railway’.
They were not asked to move on before being arrested and presented their ‘Carte d'identité des journalistes professionnel’ - a French document that identifies them as professional journalists.
The charges were eventually dropped amid public outcry and an intervention from the French ambassador.
Mr Clément and three other members were given restrictive bail conditions, which banned them from going near Adani sites.
In the documentary, Mr Clément outlines his various attempts to hire a boat to film the coal mine from offshore.
He details that upon arriving at two different boat hire locations, they were told they couldn't take the boats as the police had contacted the owners and told them the journalists were involved with the Adani protests.
"It means we were under surveillance, that they were doing everything to prevent us doing our job," Mr Clément said of the ongoing challenges facing the journalists.
Eventually, the police created a new exclusion zone around the port - blocking the journalists from visiting altogether.
The Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, the union for journalists, says it was concerned that the police are preventing journalists from doing their job.
In a statement released earlier this year, Marcus Strom the president of the MEAA Media section said an explanation surrounding why the journalists were arrested and then blocked from filming should be given.
“Journalists should be free to go about their work reporting on matters in the public interest and should not be arrested for simply doing their job," he said.
"The Queensland police should provide a full explanation of why a clearly identifiable French TV crew was arrested.
"When journalists are prevented from carrying out legitimate news reporting in the public interest it raises questions about why the public's right to know is being impeded.
"At a time when Australia’s reputation as a nation that upholds press freedom is already damaged, the actions of Queensland Police have attracted more unwelcome attention.
"The actions of Queensland Police were heavy‐handed and unworthy of a healthy functioning democracy that upholds press freedom.”
