european-union

North Korea tops CPJ's list of "10 Most Censored Countries"

By Julia Crawford

In Ethiopia's toxic political climate, Zenawi's government sweeps up journalists and shuts down newspapers.

April 19, 2006

The Honorable Silvio Berlusconi
President of the Council of Ministers
Presidenza del Consiglio dei ministri
Palazzo Chigi
Piazza Colonna 370
00186 Roma
Italia

Via Facsimile: 011 39 066 7793169

Your Excellency:

The Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent, nonpartisan organization dedicated to defending the rights of journalists worldwide, is deeply concerned about the fate of Mario Spezi, a veteran crime journalist imprisoned in the central Italian city of Perugia.

New York, April 11, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes a Turkish court ruling today to drop charges against four prominent newspaper columnists but deplores the decision to continue with the trial of a fifth. All five writers were charged over comments they made about an Istanbul conference last September on the killing of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire during World War I.

A court in the Istanbul suburb of Bagcilar dismissed charges on a legal technicality against Haluk Sahin, Erol Katircioglu, and Ismet Berkan of the daily Radikal, and Hasan Cemal of the daily Milliyet, local and international news agencies reported. But it ruled that the trial of Murat Belge of Radikal would go ahead. The judge said the cases against the four journalists had been filed after the time limit allowed by the law but that in the case of Belge the deadline had been met.

New York, April 6, 2006—An early morning explosion today rocked the Sofia apartment of Vasil Ivanov, a Nova Television investigative reporter who recently uncovered abuse of inmates in Sofia Central Prison, local and international press reports said. No injuries were reported, but the bomb caused extensive damage.

New York, March 28, 2006—More than two dozen domestic and foreign journalists are now jailed in Belarus in connection with a tumultuous presidential campaign that included a deeply flawed March 19 vote and ensuing antigovernment protests, according to records compiled by the Belarusian Association of Journalists and other local press groups.

On Monday, Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay called on Belarusian authorities to immediately release Frederick Lavoie, a reporter for the Montreal-based newspaper La Presse, who was arrested while covering a protest in October Square on Friday and sentenced to 15 days in jail. “Effective immediately, the government of Canada will limit its official relations with Belarusian authorities,” MacKay said during a meeting with the Belarusian ambassador to Canada, Nina Mazai.

New York, March 24, 2006—Riot police in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, detained at least nine journalists as they stormed an encampment of 200 or more opposition protesters in October Square early today, according to local and international press reports. Police barred other journalists from filming or taking pictures of the assault, which led to the arrests of the activists and ended an around-the-clock rally that began Sunday evening in protest of the flawed presidential election that returned Aleksandr Lukashenko to a third term.

New York, March 20, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the release from prison of prominent Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji, freed on Friday after six years behind bars, but the organization calls on authorities to release all Iranian journalists jailed for their work. At least nine journalists are now jailed in Iran, CPJ research shows.

CPJ Update Committee to Protect Journalists March 17, 2006

In meeting with CPJ, Colombian president vows support for beleaguered provincial press