Jennifer Griffin and Lara Logan
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"It is always a risk, but it's a risk for men and for women. There's an element of unpredictability anytime you enter war zone or crowd," Griffin, 41, tells PEOPLE, commenting on last week's "brutal and sustained" sexual assault of CBS reporter Lara Logan in Egypt.
"I've heard a lot of people blaming the victim. 'She should have known better. She already had a brush with the military there.' That's so incredibly unfair," says Griffin. "As a journalist, you take a calculated risk. No one goes into a crowd thinking, 'I could be lynched or sexually assaulted.' If we thought that as journalists we'd never take those steps into the crowd. You don't think about the danger. You think about, 'How am I going to get this story.' "
Griffin adds that often there is no security detail for journalists reporting in conflict zones.
"I have been in wild mobs before," says Griffin, who has reported extensively on Israel and Afghanistan. "It can happen very suddenly and you think you are on the edge of a crowd, but you can get pulled in and separated from your team."
And while Griffin's own colleagues, Greg Palkot and Olaf Wiig, were also savagely attacked while reporting in Egypt and remain hospitalized in the U.S. after being airlifted to safety last week, she says she hopes this spate of violence won't deter journalists from doing their jobs.
"There's a significant reason we take these chances," she says. "With most people I know in this business, it would take a lot to stop them from covering another story. We all feel it's too important."
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