The World Bank (WB) in a clarification to a report on the country's journalists has said that the report did not intend to charactarise the entire press, or even the majority of the press as biased or dishonest.

Earlier in a report titled "Taming Leviathan: Reforming Governance in Bangladesh", the WB said Bangladeshi journalists were gradually getting involved in corruption.

However in a clarification yesterday it said it recognised the report's failure to accurately depict the severity of the pressure faced by journalists in Bangladesh today, suffering threats, assaults, torture, abductions and even murder in their efforts to uphold the truth.

It also recognised that the press was one of the most vibrant groups of the Bangladesh civil society and in many ways it had gone beyond traditional journalism to uphold its social responsibility.

The WB said the report drew attention to the extreme pressure faced by the professional media such as political threats and harassment exacerbated by a weak rule of law, and hoped to suggest means of improving the environment for a more effective and professional press in Bangladesh.