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Seven journalists re-arrested in the Gambia

2009-07-03T22:17:32Z

We issued the following statement in response to reports that the Gambia's High Court jailed six journalists today who were charged with sedition and criminal defamation. One of the seven journalists, a mother of a young child, was re-arrested but then freed on bail...

]]> "We strongly condemn this unprecedented harassment of these seven independent journalists in The Gambia," said CPJ's Africa Program Coordinator Tom Rhodes. "The charges against these journalists represent a government ploy to wipe out the last vestiges of the private press in the country and the courts should reverse this decision and release the journalists immediately."

Young journalist held in Iran, 'a country I love so much'

2009-07-02T21:16:51Z

Iason Athanasiadis is still a young man at 30, but he's an old school, shoe leather journalist. "Journalism's deepest, most honest contributions inevitably spring from on-the-ground reporting, unencumbered by policy agendas in Washington, London, or other foreign capitals," writes Sandy Tolan, author and University of Southern California journalism professor, today in Salon. "That's what epitomizes the work of my friend and colleague Iason Athanasiadis, and it's why his detention by Iranian authorities, on June 17 when trying to board a flight out of Iran, is so troubling."

]]> Athanasiadis is the kind of photographer whose images illuminate people in unforgettable ways. One image, taken in Iran and posted in a slideshow of his work on Salon, shows a young girl in baby blue sweater and ski cap amid a sea of black-clad women during a celebration of the martyrdom of Shiite Islam's first Imam. Another captures two young men sitting in the stands at a soccer match, each wearing a headband with the green, white, and red colors of Iran, and one wearing a black Metallica T-shirt.

Iason, as he is known to his colleagues and friends, learns about a place and its culture before going to work. "A year spent living in Damascus, then another year in Cairo, gave me a taste of two of the Arab world's great cultural and political capitals," he writes on his Web site. "In addition, I lived for four-months in Qatar, a rapidly developing emirate on the Persian Gulf." Athanasiadis spent plenty of time in Iran, too. He's one of few non-Iranians to study Persian and Contemporary Iranian Studies, notes his Web site, at Tehran's School of International Studies.

Like many freelancers, the young journalist writes as well as photographs. And he isn't afraid to put context and perspective into his copy. "Britain's imperial past and expert meddling in Iran's internal affairs" are part of the story, Athanasiadis wrote two years ago in TheFirstPost, an independent online news magazine. He goes on: "In the hard-line lingo of the Islamic Republic, England is the 'old fox of imperialism' and Washington merely its brawny, slightly ignorant servant."

Born in Athens, Athanasiadis has a Greek mother and a British father. Iranian authorities have held him for more than two weeks now. He was detained on June 17 at Tehran airport as he was about to board a plane for Dubai. So far no charges against him have been made public. Greek authorities have been working through diplomatic channels to secure his release.

On Monday, the head of the Greek Orthodox church, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, spoke on behalf of Athanasiadis, calling him "a member of the Orthodox church." The patriarch sent the metropolitan emmanuel of France to Iran's General Counsel in Instanbul to "communicate his personal interest in the release of the journalist," according to the Athens News Agency.

Athanasiadis sent an e-mail to his girlfriend hours before he left for the airport, which she shared with CPJ shortly after he was detained.

"It's my last day," he wrote on June 17. "When will I be back? Who knows? I love this country so much."

CPJ continues to work for the release of Iason Athanasiadis along with other journalists--both Iranian and foreign correspondents--detained since June 12 in Iran.

Editor's note: The original version of this entry was modified to correct Sandy Tolan's affiliation.

Press, politics at center of Eritrean mock trial

2009-07-02T21:01:13Z

Articles published in Eritrea's now-banned private newspapers are at the center of a mock political trial being filmed as an educational documentary this week at Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University. Inside a courtroom on the sprawling Tempe, Ariz., campus, a judge of the High Court of Eritrea presides dispassionately, international observers lean into translation headphones, and defense lawyers challenge prosecutors to detail the vague antistate charges against 11 political dissidents. It's a trial that the real defendants were never afforded when they jailed nearly eight years ago.]]> Clues to the "crimes" on trial here can be found in a stack of Tigrigna-language clippings from newspapers that were eventually shut by the government in fall 2001. With titles including Setit, Meqaleh ("Mirror"), Keste Debena ("Rainbow"), and Admas ("Horizon"), they are relics of the once-vibrant private press in Africa's youngest nation. The May 24, 2001, edition of Meqaleh evoked in just five words the now-shattered hopes of the period: "Free press for national progress."

Beginning in 2000, private newspapers that had not previously questioned the policies of President Isaias Afewerki became more assertive following a split in the ruling elite, explained Simon Weldehaimanot, one of two Eritrean human rights lawyers behind the documentary project. The split pitted loyal supporters of Afewerki, the former guerilla leader, against reformers, including the 11 on trial here.

"The fact that a significant portion of the once-unified ruling party publicly dissented with the government emboldened the private press," Weldehaimanot said. In fact, many of the dissidents gave interviews and wrote newspaper columns critical of the government. For instance, in its August 10, 2001 edition, Setit reports the dismissal of the president of the High Court of Asmara after he accused the government of interfering with the judiciary.

"It was an unprecedented battle of ideas being communicated via the newspapers, and that's why we use these newspapers to reflect on that time," Weldehaimanot said. The published statements are referenced throughout the proceedings to document a timeline of political developments and as articles of evidence.

The private press coverage of this national debate earned the papers popularity with Eritrean readers, according to Weldehaimanot, a university student at the time. "Wherever you used to go, you used to see people reading. By 10 a.m., all the papers were gone. But people were so kind, they would either hand you their copy or photocopy it for you."

But editorials questioning the government's policies or airing dissenting opinions, such as one in the July 26, 2001, edition of Meqaleh, which called on the government to review its policy on conscription of journalists into national service, drew increasingly harsh government responses. Meqaleh Editor Mattewos Habteab was detained just a few days after the publication of the editorial and was held incommunicado for four weeks. He was re-arrested in September 2001 and is, to this day, one of at least 13 journalists thought to remain in secret prisons without charge or trial in Eritrea, Africa's leading jailer of journalists.

Semere Kesete, a close friend of Habteab and a lawyer co-directing the film, was once a contributor to Meqaleh and Setit. He published several critical analyses of executive excesses in the Eritrean legal system--until he became the story, as evidenced by an article in an August 10, 2001, edition of Setit. The story, headlined "Asmara University Student Union president not yet charged," refers to Kesete's arrest after he criticized government interference in academic affairs during a graduation speech. Worse, when a judge ordered his release after the state prosecutor failed to formulate charges, police threw him into prison and summarily arrested some 3,000 students on the courthouse grounds. Kesete later escaped from prison after a year of solitary confinement.

The Eritrean government's disregard for due process is illustrated in presidential rhetoric. Commenting on the case of imprisoned journalist Dawit Isaac, the president declared: "We don't take [him] to trial. We know how to deal with him and others like him and we have our own ways of dealing with that."

This film, to be called "Hear the Other Side," is a perfect response. The producers hope to release the documentary by September, the anniversary of the government's roundup of dissidents and journalists. Plans for the release are still in the works, although the producers hope to arrange screenings and distribute online. The law school, which Kesete now attends, is providing courtroom space and editing facilities.

(Reporting from Tempe, Ariz.)

Fighting back against Nicaragua's war on the media

2009-07-02T20:22:05Z

What is happening in Nicaragua when it comes to press freedom? A CPJ report found that President Daniel Ortega is waging a war against the media. It consists of smear campaigns, legal and economic pressures, verbal and physical attacks, and a rigorous information embargo against the critical and independent media.

]]> In fact, I have been one of the victims of this war that is being led by a president who I supported during the revolution of the 1980s. But there is no longer a revolution or a counterrevolution in Nicaragua, just pure authoritarianism. In 2007, the government accused me for months of being a "drug trafficker and a delinquent" after I uncovered a corruption scandal. A year later, a prosecutor and the police forcefully raided my offices as part of an investigation into "money laundering."

However, Roberto Larios, president of the group Unión de Periodistas de Nicaragua (UPN), maintains that a government-led war does not exist. Instead, he says, "big media" are waging a war against Ortega's government. But my former colleague at the daily Barricada is trying to ignore the fact that outlets owned by the governing family are also part of this "big media."

These opposing viewpoints were debated on Wednesday in Managua at a forum in which Carlos Lauría, CPJ's Americas' program coordinator, and Mauro Ampié, a lawyer for the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights, also participated.

It was the start of a discussion that promises to be intense, complex, and difficult, as the main actors--the government and media owners--were not present at the forum. Nonetheless, we proved that among journalists we are able to debate and find some common ground. My participation in this forum can be summarized into four points:

First, we need a policy of no tolerance for aggression against journalists, whether they are verbal, institutional, or physical. The president must take the lead in this process by putting an end to his constant attacks. Second, we must put an end to the information embargo against the independent media, which violates an elemental democratic principle: Citizens have the right to participate in public decision-making. What's more, in Nicaragua, where we have an excellent law for access to public information, we do not use it for mere lack of political will.

Third, we need an ample and well-documented debate on the new telecommunications law, which will set the rules of the game for assigning and administrating radio and television frequencies. A debate will help us avoid state abuses that could affect press freedom in broadcast media.

Lastly, and I must highlight this point, the best weapons media have in the war against the government are good journalism, investigative rigor, and the promotion of a self-critical attitude and the knowledge that we owe the truth to our audiences. It is much more effective to self-regulate by means of professional and ethical guidelines than by allowing politicians to be tempted into imposing laws that control the press. In order to do so, at the Center for Media Investigations (CINCO), we promote a media observatory that monitors and criticizes the press.

CPJ's report was not hailed by everyone, and perhaps its main virtue is precisely that it created controversy among Nicaraguan journalists. This is a debate that I insist is still in its embryonic phase, but during which, as the daily El Nuevo Diario put it the following day, "the president of the UPN put up a fight in favor of the government," at the least this one time, while discussing the war that is being fought against the media. Hopefully, this will only be a first step.

Carlos Fernando Chamorro heads the Center for Media Investigations (CINCO), a nonprofit group that promotes media research, democracy, and investigative journalism in Nicaragua.

Lively debate on the state of press freedom in Managua

2009-07-02T18:53:46Z

Minutes after I woke up to get ready for the presentation of a CPJ report on press freedom conditions in Nicaragua, I turned on the TV. Nicaragua was shaken by the sudden death of Managua's mayor, Alexis Arguello, who was found at home with a gunshot wound to his chest. Arguello, who had won three world boxing titles for Nicaragua and was considered the greatest athlete in the country's history, committed suicide, according to several local press reports. While an autopsy is pending and authorities are investigating his death, on Wednesday the government declared three days of mourning.

]]> The impact of this major news event in the local media challenged our efforts to capture the attention of the Nicaraguan press. But the support of prominent journalist Carlos Fernando Chamorro, who heads the Center for Media Investigations (CINCO), a nonprofit group that promotes media research, democracy, and investigative journalism, and from CENIDH, the leading Nicaraguan human rights organization, brought together a good number of reporters representing the main news organizations and press groups. Among them was leading women's rights activist and journalist Sofía Montenegro, who has also suffered legal persecution during Daniel Ortega's tenure.

Chamorro, CENIDH's lawyer Mauro Ampie Vilchez, and Roberto Larios, president of the pro-Ortega press group Unión de Periodistas de Nicaragua, were invited by CPJ to offer their comments on the report.

Before presenting the CPJ report, I took the opportunity to once again express our concern about the situation for the press in Honduras. According to CPJ research, since the coup that ousted President Manuel Zelaya, reporters have been detained and military personnel have temporarily closed several broadcasters and blocked signals of international networks. I reiterated our call to Honduran authorities to allow the press to report freely without fear of reprisal.

During his opening comments, Chamorro thanked CPJ for putting a spotlight on the situation of the press in Nicaragua. The host of "Esta Noche" and "Esta Semana" on privately owned Channel 8 said that the flow of information cannot depend on Ortega's government discretion. "It is a right of all Nicaraguan citizens," added Chamorro, criticizing Ortega's strategy to ignore and disparage the private media. "When the information doesn't flow with transparency, democracy is hurt," Chamorro said.

Chamorro said that Ortega prides himself on making Nicaragua a participatory democracy. It is an obvious contradiction to his strategy of isolation and secrecy towards public scrutiny, added Chamorro. He said that despite Ortega's attempts to intimidate and harass independent critics in the media, there have been great efforts by a new generation of Nicaraguan journalists to promote public transparency and responsibility.

Chamorro expressed concern over the lack of commitment by Nicaraguan officials to comply with the law on access to public information, and argued that those officials who don't comply should be sanctioned, as established by this provision. He praised CPJ's recommendations in the report but expressed skepticism that Ortega will comply with any of them.

CENIDH's Ampie Vilchez said that there is a pattern of systematic attacks on freedom of expression by the Nicaraguan government that is damaging the health of democracy. He pointed out that in the cases of attacks and threats against journalists and human rights defenders there is total impunity in judicial investigations. Ampie Vilchez said that by engaging on attacks on the press and launching systematic campaigns to discredit independent journalists, Nicaragua is violating international standards on freedom of expression.

Pro-government Roberto Larios harshly criticized our report, offering comments that looked like they had been written by Ortega or his wife, Rosario Murillo. Without specifically addressing the substance of the report, Larios compared it with a U.S. State Department document. He argued that it didn't represent the position of numerous Nicaraguan journalists but the view of the "media owners that represent the oligarchy." Most of his assertions resembled the arguments of the Nicaraguan government. Although Larios was not capable of providing an elaborate response to CPJ's conclusions, his comments did spark a lively debate with journalists and activists in the audience that lasted more than 90 minutes.

Newsweek calls Bahari 'even-handed, widely respected'

2009-07-01T21:12:10Z

Newsweek has issued a statement on the detention of correspondent Maziar Bahari, who is detained in Iran. Newsweek points out that Bahari's work over many years has been "accurate, even-handed, and widely respected." The statement follows...

]]> Maziar Bahari has been detained in Iran since June 21 without access to a lawyer. An Iranian state news agency reports that Bahari has said he participated in a Western media effort to promote irresponsible reporting in Iran. Newsweek strongly disputes that charge, and defends Bahari's work. Maziar Bahari is a veteran journalist whose long career, both in print and in documentary filmmaking, has been accurate, even-handed, and widely respected. Newsweek again calls for his immediate release.

China postpones installation of filtering software...for now

2009-06-30T21:12:22Z

China's Internet censors have blinked. In the face of opposition ranging from PC makers abroad to bloggers at home, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has backed away, at least for now, from a hastily conceived directive that all new PCs sold from July 1 should carry filtering software.

]]> The ministry said the requirement to pre-install Internet-filtering programs called "Green Dam" and "Youth Escort" had been postponed indefinitely. It cited concerns by overseas manufacturers that they could not comply with the directive in time as the reason for the delay. But Internet activists and bloggers who had opposed the software as intrusive and unsafe also took credit for the rollback.

Green Dam, which has already been installed on many school computers in China, was ostensibly conceived to shield children from harmful content such as pornography. But Internet experts around the world quickly unpacked it, showing that the software could be used to filter politics as much as porn. They also claimed it opened up PCs to viruses. In what could become a useful future avenue for countries championing free expression, the U.S. Commerce Department voiced concern that the directive violated international trade rules.

China-watchers, both corporate and academic, are already sifting through the rubble of the Green Dam directive for clues. Is this a de-escalation in the face of international and domestic criticism? If so, does it bode well for future collaborative pushback by foreign companies against government decrees that infringe on basic rights and freedoms? Or was Green Dam an ill-conceived project that was never endorsed by the highest echelons of government and party who have now crushed it to avoid embarrassment?

Whatever the answers to these questions, concerted opposition means that the 40 million PCs sold each year in China won't come with a spy inside.

CPJ alarmed by supression of media in Honduras

2009-06-30T16:18:45Z

We issued the following statement today in response to international press reports that military personnel briefly detained seven journalists on Monday, closed down at least one television station and one radio station in Tegucigalpa, and is interfering with international broadcast of protests in support of ousted President Manuel Zelaya...

]]> "We are alarmed by reports that Honduran soldiers detained seven journalists reporting for The Associated Press and the regional television network Telesur in their Tegucigalpa hotel on Monday," said CPJ deputy director Robert Mahoney. "Although the journalists were released a short time later, we are concerned by further reports that local and international broadcasters have been taken off the air in Honduras, and urge those in power to allow all journalists and media outlets to report freely and without fear of reprisal on the current political situation."

Concern at reports of media black-out in Honduras

2009-06-29T19:08:03Z

We issued the following statement today in response to press reports that several broadcast media outlets have been closed in Honduras following the ousting of President Manuel Zelaya on Sunday...

]]> "We are deeply concerned by reports that several broadcasters have been taken off the air," said CPJ Americas senior program coordinator Carlos Lauría. "We call on those in power to allow the resumption of all broadcasts and ensure that all journalists can work freely and safely at this critical time for Honduras."

Stoking, not suppressing, dissent in China

2009-06-29T16:26:23Z

A self-styled army of Internet users, Anonymous Netizens, has announced its intention to wage war on government censors, starting July 1. Global Voices Online has the text in English; it's also here in Chinese. Whether their scheduled attack (its nature is not specified) will be felt or not, the irritation of the document's drafters is palpable: "NOBODY wants to topple your regime." ]]> The reason is this month's massive censorship drive in China, ostensibly mounted to protect citizens from online obscenities. Substitute the phrase "antigovernment" for "vulgar" or "pornographic," and it becomes clear why the new measures are a concern to journalists and internet users.

Google's English language search engine has spread large amounts of vulgar content that is lewd and pornographic, seriously violating China's laws and regulations," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters after Google.com appeared inaccessible in parts of China last week, according to China Daily. The accusation lent credence to Internet users' assumptions that the site and related services, including Gmail, had been officially censored. Google acknowledged only that it had experienced some interruption. "We are investigating the matter, and hope that (we) can restore all the services as soon as possible," the company said in a statement on Thursday, according to Agence France-Presse.

But whether the apparent block was instigated to suppress porn or dissent, the logic behind it was hard to fathom. China's Information Ministry already has sophisticated filters in place to limit banned content. What's more, pages that could not be reached through Google's English searches were still widely available on the Chinese version, Google.cn, or on Google's main Chinese competitor, Baidu, according to analyst Rebecca MacKinnon.

Even if you overlook the fallacy that search engines actively "spread" content, rather than merely facilitating access to it, the action still makes no sense. Pornography (and information that challenges China's government) can still be viewed; but a lot of irate people can't check e-mail. Patience with official interference in Web use was already wearing thin, both domestically and internationally, following the furor over soon-to-be-mandated censorship "Green Dam" software. Now, for many, it has snapped altogether.

China's electronic surveillance capabilities have long posed grave threats to citizens' freedoms. Liu Xiaobo, the democracy activist and writer, was charged this month with attempting to subvert state power, according to international news reports. He was arrested in December 2008, the day before Charter '08, a political manifesto he is accused of co-authoring, was circulated online. A Tibetan guide was recently sentenced to three years in prison for sending e-mails and text messages that "distorted the facts and true situation regarding social stability in the Tibetan area" following riots in the region in March 2008, according to the Dui Hua Foundation, a San Francisco-based advocacy group for political detainees in China.

Chinese dissidents oppose rights violations of this kind, but media control generally prevents a public outcry. Yet if the Anonymous Netizens ("innumerable ... omnipresent ... omnipotent ... unstoppable") are anything to go by, the latest censorship measures have tapped into a vein of opposition that is much more mainstream. When they tell the Internet censors of China, "YOU are waging this war on yourself," it's hard not to feel they have a point.

A year later, impunity in attacks on Senegalese media

2009-06-29T15:23:56Z

A year ago last week in Senegal, two reporters covering a soccer match were assaulted with tasers, handcuffed, and abused by police officers after the reporters refused to halt a post-game interview at Léopold Sédar Senghor Stadium in the capital, Dakar. A year on, Senegalese law enforcement has fallen short in bringing to account those responsible for this and other abuses against the media.

]]> The beating of sports editor Babacar Kambel Dieng of Radio Futurs Médias and reporter Kara Thioune of bilingual station West Africa Democracy Radio triggered public outcry in both Senegal and Chicago, particularly after an audio recording of the beating was aired in the media. In Chicago, protesters greeted President Abdoulaye Wade as he arrived for the annual convention of the U.S.-based National Association of Black Journalists. In Senegal, a national debate on the state of press freedom erupted. Press leaders formed a Committee for the Protection and Defense of Journalists (CPDJ), which organized major street protests (above) and news blackout to press the government for justice. Authorities eventually appointed a senior judge to lead an investigation. Then-Interior Minister Cheikh Tidiane Sy announced the transfer of the officers involved--while, in the same breath, accusing the journalists of provoking the officers.

A year on, neither Dieng nor Thioune have been given an opportunity to confront or identify their attackers. Thioune told me he was questioned twice, once by the investigating magistrate and once by the police. Dieng, who was hospitalized for 21 days, was questioned on three occasions, one of which included a re-enactement of the incident, he told me.

The senior magistrate overseeing the case, Mahawa Sémou Diouf, said in an interview on Monday that he had renewed investigations by placing them under the authority of the paramilitary police, or gendarmes, according to private daily Le Quotidien.

But El Hadji Diouf, one of several lawyers defending the two journalists, told me the case has not moved forward in months. Prior to involving paramilitary police, the magistrate had tasked the police's Criminal Investigations Department (notorious for detaining journalists and raiding newsrooms) to carry out investigations, but the agency did not produce any results, the lawyer said.

"The government is delaying the process," Diouf said, adding that authorities have information about which officers were on duty the day of the assault, June 21, 2008.

Diouf, who doubles as a member of Senegal's National Assembly, is also representing the daily L'As, one of two critical newspapers whose offices were ransacked last year by assailants with links to former Air Transport Minister Farba Senghor. Senghor, who reacted to the attacks by declaring, "When one saws the wind, one should expect to reap the whirlwind," was under investigation after his driver and two bodyguards were convicted in the attacks.

But Wade ordered the case brought before a special parliamentary court, the High Court of Justice. The four lawmakers selected in January to sit on the court and try Senghor, propaganda chief of the ruling Senegalese Democratic Party, are fellow party members.

The Assembly has yet to vote on formally charging Senghor, according to Diouf. Meanwhile, Wade pardoned those convicted in the raids and set them free in April this year.

"These shelved, unresolved cases create a climate of impunity and insecurity, and the public is the victim of this injustice, which spares no one," said Ibrahima Khaliloullah Ndiaye, a journalist with the state-run national daily Le Soleil. Ndiaye, who is also the spokesman of the CPDJ, said the committee organized a panel with various human rights organizations to mark the one-year anniversary of the stadium incident. Discussions centered on devising strategic partnerships in defense of human rights in Senegal, he said.

A year ago, in a letter to President Wade, CPJ expressed concern that thorough, transparent investigations into abuses against the media have seldom taken place in his country. The events of the past year, sadly, have shown a continuation of those practices.

In Ethiopia, prime minister's words, actions not in step

2009-06-26T21:15:40Z

This week, in an exclusive interview with the Financial Times, Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi suggested that the press in his country freely expresses dissent. In fact, that is hardly the case. The Horn of Africa nation remains one of the world's worst backsliders of press freedom.

]]> Asked whether a series of recent arrests of political dissidents and legislation on civil society organizations and terrorism had "contributed to an atmosphere where people do not feel free to speak," the prime minister responded: "Have you read the local newspapers? Do they mince their words about government?"

A multitude of private, political newspapers filled the newsstands in the capital, Addis Ababa--until November 2005. Then, in the midst of deadly unrest following disputed elections, authorities imprisoned the editors of these publications on antistate charges, blaming the violence on their headlines. The government either banned the titles or induced enough fear that printers were dissuaded from printing the newspapers.

When I put the prime minister's response to Dawit Kebede, who launched the weekly Awramba Times after spending nine months in prison for his critical coverage in 2005, he chuckled softly. "The facts and his argument are totally opposite," he said, citing self-censorship among the handful of authorized private newspapers venturing into current affairs coverage these days. "Before the 2005 elections, there were a lot of newspapers. Today, we can say there are may be two or three genuinely independent (political) newspapers for a population of 80 million." Independent in this sense means media outlets not owned by the government or its supporters.

The comments of the prime minister (who, by the way, also told the Financial Times he wants to step down if his supporters will let him) are often out of step with his government's actions. "I don't think people have any qualms about criticizing the government or rejecting its policies, or expressing dissenting views in any way," the business weekly Addis Fortune quoted him as saying in 2007. Yet, since then, the government has threatened, harassed, and imprisoned journalists, blocked the distribution of newspapers and access to Web sites. Speaking to Newsweek in April 2008, Zenawi said the government was enacting "a new press law that we very much hope will put our legislation on par with the best in the world." Instead, the law was hastily passed with repressive statutes that fall well short of international standards.

In 2007, Zenawi declared that pardons issued to imprisoned journalists and dissidents showed the government had "no sense of revenge." Its tolerance, though, is limited: The government has denied licenses to three publishers who were among those once imprisoned.

Other independent journalists in Addis Ababa spoke to me on condition of anonymity for fear of government reprisals--a practice that has apparently become the norm for many of their sources. "If you want to interview a university lecturer (on a sensitive issue), one of the first things you hear is, 'Don't mention my name. I don't want to say these things in public,'" according to one veteran reporter. "Always we say 'person doesn't want his name to be mentioned.' It's a challenge." Another reporter told me that this practice has led some readers to doubt the credibility of stories in the newspapers. "The government always says they're trying to be transparent and make a comfortable environment for media. Practically it's not the case," the veteran reporter said.

With press council, Sri Lanka revives a repressive tool

2009-06-26T20:44:13Z

There should be no doubt that the government is continuing its offensive against the media following its military victory over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). On Wednesday, Media Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena confirmed what had been rumored for more than a week: The defunct Press Council, which was put to rest in 2002, will be revived.

]]> A "press council" might sound innocuous enough, but it is the sort of tool we've seen in many countries where the government is intent on silencing critics. Search our site for "press council" and you'll see that it's a widespread tactic. In Sri Lanka, as the war with the LTTE was ramping up in 2006 and the government was starting its crackdown on domestic critics in the media, it had threatened to re-establish the council but never followed through.

The threat of a revived council wasn't lost on eight Sri Lankan media rights groups when they wrote a letter this week to the government. Here's an excerpt sent to me by a colleague in Colombo:

It is with a sense of deep concern and disappointment that the media organizations herein under-mentioned have learned of the re-activation of the Sri Lanka Press Council Law No. 5 of 1973, which has the powers to fine and/or sentence journalists and publishers to terms of imprisonment.

A media culture cannot be based on slapping charges against journalists, fining them or sending them to jail. Instead the modern world has accepted a self-regulatory mechanism by media persons as the way forward.

The groups were the Editors Guild of Sri Lanka, the Working Journalists Association of Sri Lanka, the Tamil Media Alliance, the Muslim Media Forum, the Federation of Media Employees Trade Unions, the South Asia Free Media Association (Sri Lanka Chapter) and the Free Media Movement.

A press council? Not to worry, says Media Minister Abeywardena. The Associated Press reached Lakshman, who said the government didn't reactivate the law that organizes the press council with the intention to silence the media. He told the AP that a parliamentary committee investigating waste found that salaries were still being paid to council officials and that office space was still being rented--so it forced the government to reactivate the body.

Don't buy that for a second. Journalists in Sri Lanka tell CPJ that the pressure remains as intense on them as it was during the height of the war with the LTTE. Many of them have stopped writing and, as we said in our Special Report: Journalists in Exile 2009, others have fled the country.

Lee, Ling supporters hold vigil to keep case in spotlight

2009-06-25T21:46:18Z

Last night, about 300 people gathered at San Francisco's Academy of Art University for a vigil for U.S. television journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling. Today marks the 100th day of captivity in North Korea for the women, who were arrested in March by North Korean guards while filming a story about refugees for the California-based broadcaster Current TV. Earlier this month, the two reporters were sentenced by North Korea's highest court to 12 years hard labor after a closed-door trial. ]]> The vigil was filled with emotion, song, and prayers. There were also personal anecdotes about Ling and Lee from friends and coworkers, people just barely getting their minds wrapped around the idea of what has happened to these young women. Local politicians ensured that they would keep pressure on Washington to secure the reporters' release.

Human rights and press freedom groups also pledged their support. I reiterated CPJ's call that the reporters be allowed regular contact with the outside world and be guaranteed transparent legal proceedings. As a journalist who has reported abroad in dangerous places, there is no way to downplay the risks these women assumed when they left San Francisco and headed to the porous China-North Korea border. But like other reporters who head to repressive parts of the world, Lee and Ling were driven by an intrepid spirit and the desire to give people a voice.

Speaking to the San Francisco audience, Michael Saldate, Lee's husband, held their 4-year-old daughter and talked about a brief phone call with Lee last Sunday. During the call, Saldate said that Lee, 36, sounded worried, but she gathered herself to record a message for her young daughter: Mom would be home soon. Saldate said that hearing Lee's anxiety was "one of the hardest things I've ever heard in my life."

Iain Clayton, Ling's husband, said that his 32-year-old wife sounded scared, but added that he could tell that she was "trying her hardest to be strong for us." Friday will mark the couple's fifth wedding anniversary.

Clayton also pleaded with the North Korean government to "show compassion" and release the women, who are charged with hostile acts and illegally crossing the border between China and North Korea.

During the brief phone calls earlier this week, Lee and Ling told their husbands that they are currently being held separately in a medical facility. Lee, petite and slender, has reportedly lost some 15 pounds since her arrest, while Ling suffers from an ulcer.

Last night's vigil was just one slice of the grassroots campaign to keep the case of these two journalists alive. U.S. Senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer have joined other senators to call on the White House to send envoys to North Korea to negotiate freedom for the reporters. Organizing efforts on behalf of Lee and Ling can also be found on a Facebook page, "Detained In North Korea: Journalist Laura Ling and Euna Lee, please help."

Monica Campbell is a freelance journalist and CPJ consultant.

CPJ testimony focuses on Russian impunity

2009-06-25T21:27:21Z

Nina Ognianova, CPJ's Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, provided testimony to the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe on the pressing issue of impunity in journalist murders in Russia. The commission held a hearing this week on Russia's human rights record. A transcript of the testimony follows:

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Thank you for the opportunity to submit this written testimony on press freedom in Russia ahead of President Barack Obama's July 6-8 trip to Moscow for a summit with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. My name is Nina Ognianova. I coordinate the Europe and Central Asia program at the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, an international, independently funded organization that defends the rights of journalist to report the news without fear of reprisal.

I will focus my testimony on the issue of impunity in journalist killings under the present Russian leadership. Seventeen journalists have been killed in Russia in relation to their work since 2000, CPJ research shows. In only one case have the killers been convicted. In every case, the masterminds have gone unpunished.

This record has contributed to the spread of self-censorship in the press corps, restricting coverage of sensitive topics such as government corruption, organized crime, human rights violations, and unrest in the North Caucasus region of Russia. The public has suffered as a result, having been kept in the dark about important issues of community, national, and international interest.

The following capsules describe the 17 journalists killed in relation to their work:

Vladimir Yatsina, 51, took a leave from his job with the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS in the summer of 1999, to travel to the North Caucasus on a freelance assignment to photograph Chechen rebel fighters. In July of that year, while in the southern republic of Ingushetia, Magomed Uspayev, an ethnic Chechen who had been hired as Yatsina's fixer, reportedly handed the photographer to a criminal gang notorious for kidnapping people for ransom. Yatsina was shot in the mountains of Chechnya the following February, according to fellow captives who later gave public statements. Law enforcement officials did not detain or charge Uspayev, who lived freely in Russia for two years after the killing before going to Sweden in 2002. It was not until 2005 that Russian authorities placed Uspayev on Interpol's international wanted list. The Swedish government has refused to extradite him to Russia, citing human rights concerns. Yatsina's killers were never prosecuted.

Igor Domnikov, 42, a reporter and special-projects editor with Novaya Gazeta, was bludgeoned with a hammer in the entrance to his Moscow home in May 2000. He slipped into a coma and died on July 16 of that year. Before his death, Domnikov had written several articles criticizing the economic policies of the Lipetsk regional government. Seven years later, five members of a criminal gang were convicted of the murder and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Authorities have yet to file charges against those accused of ordering the killing.

Eduard Markevich, 29, founder and editor of the independent weekly Novy Reft, was shot in the courtyard of his apartment building in the Ural Mountains town of Reftinsky on September 19, 2001. Markevich, who had been investigating a public employee's use of government property for private gain, had received threats and had been previously attacked for his work. Authorities made initial progress in the case when they detained a suspect in a vehicle matching the description of the gunman's car. But the case was transferred without explanation to another prosecutor's office, the investigation came to a halt, and the suspect was released. No developments have been reported in the case.

Natalya Skryl, 29, a business reporter for the Rostov-on-Don newspaper Nashe Vremya, was walking home from a bus stop in her hometown of Taganrog, an industrial city on the Azov Sea, when at least one assailant struck her a dozen times with a pipe or similar object on March 8, 2002. She died in a hospital the next day. The assailant did not take money or gold jewelry from the journalist; in fact, nothing appeared to have been stolen. Nonetheless, Taganrog investigators classified the case as a robbery and did not explore journalism as a motive. Skryl had written several articles on the struggle for control of a large steel-pipe manufacturer. In the six years since Skryl's killing, the case has been suspended and reopened several times without evident progress.

Valery Ivanov, 32, and Aleksei Sidorov, 31, consecutive editors of the independent newspaper Tolyattinskoye Obozreniye in the car-manufacturing city of Togliatti, had exposed organized crime activities and corruption in the local government. They were slain 18 months apart: Ivanov was gunned down on April 29, 2002, and Sidorov was fatally stabbed on October 9, 2003. Both attacks occurred outside their homes. Investigators asserted that a man who later died of a drug overdose had killed Ivanov, but no evidence has been disclosed to support the accusation. In the Sidorov case, a local welder was falsely accused of killing the editor; that man was acquitted at trial. No further progress has been reported in either case.

Yuri Shchekochikhin, 53, deputy editor of Novaya Gazeta, had meticulously investigated a high-level corruption scheme when he was felled by a mysterious illness in June 2003. The sickness caused Shchekochikhin's organs to fail, one after another, and he died within weeks. Questionable steps followed. Hospital authorities declared Shchekochikhin's records a "medical secret" and sealed them from the public, including the journalist's family. A Moscow prosecutor then lost the records, Novaya Gazeta reported. It was not until five years later that a team of investigators with the Prosecutor General's Office opened a criminal probe into the circumstances of Shchekochikhin's death. That case was suspended on April 6, 2009, after investigators concluded that no foul play was involved. The medical records have yet to resurface.

Maksim Maksimov, 41, a reporter with the St. Petersburg weekly Gorod, who was investigating alleged corruption in the local Interior Ministry branch, disappeared after going to meet a source on June 29, 2004. He was declared dead two years later. Witness accounts implicated ministry officers in the disappearance, but St. Petersburg prosecutors have taken no evident action against them. The investigation was suspended in 2008; the family and its lawyer have not been allowed to review the case file.

Paul Klebnikov, 41, the founding editor of Forbes Russia magazine, had carried out journalistic investigations on risky topics such as the synergy of Russian business, politics, and organized crime; the "gangster capitalism" of the 1990s; and the 1995 murder of television journalist Vladislav Listyev. At least one gunman shot and killed Klebnikov, a U.S. journalist of Russian descent, as he left his Moscow office on July 9, 2004. Two defendants were acquitted of the murder in May 2006, in a closed trial marred by procedural violations. The Russian Supreme Court overturned the verdict and ordered a re-trial, but the case was indefinitely postponed in March 2007 when one of the defendants vanished. No developments have been reported since. Authorities have yet to report any progress in apprehending the crime's mastermind.

Pavel Makeev, 21, a cameraman for the television station Puls in the town of Azov, was struck and killed by a car while filming illegal drag racing on May 21, 2005. Evidence showed that the car dragged Makeev's body 50 feet, and the driver did not apply the brakes. Authorities classified the case as a traffic accident without questioning witnesses. Makeev's video camera--with footage of the illegal racing--was taken.

Magomedzagid Varisov, 54, and Telman Alishayev, 39, worked in the volatile southern republic of Dagestan. Varisov, a political analyst for Dagestan's largest weekly, Novoye Delo, was shot and killed near his home in the regional capital, Makhachkala, on June 28, 2005. He had criticized people across the political spectrum--from government officials, to federal troops, to radical organizations. Alishayev, a reporter and host of a religious television program on the Makhachkala-based Islamic television station TV-Chirkei, covered social issues such as education, drug addiction, and the spread of HIV. He was gunned down near his home, on September 2, 2008. In each case, authorities said they identified suspects who were then killed in armed confrontations with police. No evidence has been disclosed to support those assertions, however, and the victims' families have told CPJ they are deeply skeptical of the findings.

Vagif Kochetkov, 31, a political reporter for the Tula-based Molodoi Kommunar newspaper, had written critically of business practices and organized crime in his hometown. An attacker struck him on the head with a heavy object near his home on December 27, 2005. He died 12 days later. Authorities classified the case as a robbery, although Kochetkov's valuables--including a diamond ring--were left intact. A suspect was acquitted at trial. Investigators did not explore Kochetkov's journalism as a possible murder motive and failed to question his colleagues in any depth.

Anna Politkovskaya, 48, a special correspondent for Novaya Gazeta, was gunned down in her Moscow apartment building on October 7, 2006. The internationally known journalist had reported extensively on human rights abuses in Chechnya and throughout the conflict-ridden North Caucasus. She had been threatened, poisoned, and forced into exile during her career. Three men accused of being accomplices to the murder were acquitted in February, although a retrial has been ordered. Neither the gunman nor the masterminds have been apprehended. The gunman fled Russia on a fraudulent passport, according to news reports; the masterminds have not been identified.

Ivan Safronov, 51, a prominent military correspondent for the business daily Kommersant and a reserve colonel in the Russian Space Force, fell to his death from a staircase window in his Moscow apartment building on March 2, 2007. He had just returned from a business trip to the Middle East, where he had learned of purported sales of Russian defense technology to Iran and Syria. Three days before his death, Safronov told colleagues that he had been warned not to publish portions of the information, Kommersant reported. The journalist had also embarrassed defense officials two months earlier by reporting on the third consecutive test failure of the Bulava ballistic missile. Authorities classified the death as a suicide, yet Safronov left no note and, in the hours before his death, had made plans with family and friends and had shopped for groceries.

Magomed Yevloyev, 37, publisher of the independent news Web site Ingushetiya, who uncovered official corruption and human rights abuses in Ingushetia, was shot and killed in state custody on August 31, 2008. In an interview with CPJ two months before his killing, Yevloyev said Ingushetia authorities had filed more than a dozen lawsuits seeking to shut down his site. The day of the killing, Yevloyev was detained by an Interior Ministry unit at the airport in Magas, Ingushetia (without a valid arrest warrant, as a court later ruled). He did not resist and was placed in an Interior Ministry vehicle with three officers, witnesses told CPJ. Along the way, Yevloyev was shot in the head. Authorities claimed an officer's gun went off accidentally. A negligent homicide charge has been filed against the officer--nephew of former Ingushetia Interior Minister Musa Medov--but the officer has left the region and has not returned for court proceedings. The Yevloyev family has called the trial a sham.

Anastasiya Baburova, 25, a freelance reporter for Novaya Gazeta, had covered the rise of race-motivated crimes and the activities of neo-Nazi groups in Russia. On January 19, 2009, a gunman shot her and prominent human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov in downtown Moscow, minutes after they emerged from a press conference in which the lawyer criticized the early release of a Russian army colonel convicted of killing a teenage Chechen girl. Five months later, investigators have yet to report progress in the case.

With 50 journalists killed on the job since 1992, Russia is the third-deadliest country in the world for journalists, CPJ research shows. Only the conflict-ridden countries of Iraq and Algeria surpass this number of work-related fatalities during this period. Russia also has one of the highest levels of impunity in journalist murders in the world (ninth worst), according to CPJ's annually updated Impunity Index, which calculates the number of such unsolved journalist murders as a percentage of each country's population.

This record contrasts with stated commitments by President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to strengthen the rule of law and protect the safety of all Russian citizens. It also undermines Russia's standing as an international leader. Russia is a member of a number of international institutions, such as the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Council of Europe, and it has an influential voice in a number of others. Yet membership and influence come with the obligation to adhere to international standards, including the rights to life and free expression. When Russia fails to adhere to these norms, it undermines them for all.

The leaders of the democratic world, including President Obama, must engage their Russian counterparts in a dialogue on the record of impunity, offer assistance in combating the problem, and call for concrete results.