New York, November 20, 2009—Authorities in Odessa, Ukraine, should immediately cease harassment of independent and pro-opposition broadcasters, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Officials from the Odessa Public Utility Service and mayor’s office have been physically obstructing the work of several local television and radio stations on the grounds of alleged building renovation, according to local news reports. 

New York, November 19, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the Singapore government’s refusal to renew British freelance journalist Benjamin Bland’s work visa and its rejection of his application to cover the recently concluded Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit meeting. Bland had planned to report on the summit for the U.K.’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.

CPJ introduces 2009 International Press Freedom Awardees

Washington, November 19, 2009—Naziha Réjiba, editor of the Tunisian online news journal Kalima, said she knows what to expect when she returns home—surveillance, harassment, and threats conducted by one the world’s most repressive governments.

Free press advocates in Britain are looking to a bill stuck in the U.S. Congress for moral support in the fight to reform England’s draconian defamation laws. The U.S. bill, the Free Speech Protection Act 2009, is itself the product of those laws, which have made London the capital of “libel tourism.” 

We issued this statement on the first anniversary of the brutal attack on Mikhail Beketov, editor-in-chief of the Khimki-based independent newspaper Khimkinskaya Pravda, who was beaten nearly to death and left in his backyard. Beketov had criticized the Khimki administration’s decision to cut down a vast area of the region’s forest in order to build a highway. As a result of the attack, Beketov underwent a series of surgeries, had a leg and several fingers amputated, and is still hospitalized...

New York, November 12, 2009—A Norwegian freelance journalist and an Afghan colleague were released Thursday after nearly a week in captivity in eastern Afghanistan, according to international news reports.

New York, November 11, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns today’s prison sentences given to two video bloggers detained in July on fabricated charges of “hooliganism” and “inflicting minor bodily harm.” 

Jointly authored by CPJ's Kati Marton and Nina Ognianova, an op-ed piece is running on The New York Times' Web site today and will be published in the November 10 edition of The International Herald Tribune. The article is a follow-up to Marton and Ognianova's mission to Russia to launch our special report Anatomy of Injustice: The Unsolved Killings of Journalists in Russia. The op-ed argues that Russia must put an end impunity in the cases of murdered journalists as it positions itself as a legitimate democracy and requests equal treatment with what it calls other "great nations." 

Our news alert on Wednesday detailing a vicious attack on Albanian editor Mero Baze elicited e-mail comments from both victim and a businessman accused in the attack. Baze said he is recovering but is experiencing head pain. He also echoed reported witness statements that identified Rezart Taci, a principal in local oil companies, as being involved in the attack. Taci, who responded to us through one of his companies, denied involvement in the assault.

We issued this statement following today’s announcement by Russia’s Investigative Committee at the Prosecutor General’s Office that two individuals have been arrested and charged with the January 19 murder in Moscow of human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasiya Baburova. The two suspects are 29-year-old Nikita Tikhonov and 24-year-old Yevgeniya Khasis, identified in the press as members of a neo-fascist group. Reports identify Tikhonov as the shooter and Khasis as the woman who followed Markelov and Baburova, and informed Tikhonov of their whereabouts...