Europe & Central Asia

AUGUST 11-12, 2005
Posted: August 18, 2005

Igor Rotar. Forum 18
HARASSED, EXPELLED

Russian journalist Igor Rotar, who was detained by Uzbek authorities in Tashkent on August 11 and put on a plane bound for Almaty, Kazakhstan, late the next day, according to local and international press reports.

New York, August 8, 2005—A Polish photojournalist was expelled from Belarus on Saturday and banned from the country for five years. The Committee to Protect Journalists said today it is disturbed by the expulsion of Adam Tuchlinksi, 25, of the weekly news magazine Przekroj.

Belarusian security agents detained Tuchlinksi as he was about to board a Poland-bound train in the western city of Grodno, according to international reports. Agents took him to a local police station where he was held for several hours and told he lacked proper accreditation to work in Belarus. He returned to Poland on a later train on Saturday, The Associated Press reported.

AUGUST 6, 2005
Posted: August 9, 2005

Adam Tuchlinksi, Przekroj.
EXPELLED

Tuchlinksi, photojournalist for the weekly Polish news magazine Przekroj, was expelled from Belarus and banned from the country for five years.

New York, August 5, 2005—A judge in the Uzbek capital, Tashkent, convicted two staffers of Internews Network, a U.S.-based media training and advocacy organization, on Thursday of producing television programming without a license and publishing information illegally. Former Internews director Khalida Anarbayeva and accountant Olga Narmuradova will not have to serve the prescribed six-month jail sentences under terms of a presidential amnesty covering women, but they will have criminal records, according to press reports and CPJ sources.

Dear Minister Lavrov:

The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by the Foreign Ministry's pattern of using accreditation, visa and other regulations to control and intimidate journalists reporting on the war in Chechnya for foreign media. The Foreign Ministry escalated this campaign against foreign news media by moving this week to bar the U.S. television network ABC from reporting in Russia.

The Foreign Ministry said in a statement Tuesday that ABC reporters have been denied access to government officials and that their accreditations will not be renewed when they expire. Authorities took this step after the network broadcast an interview with Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev on its news program, "Nightline," on July 28.

AUGUST 2, 2005
Posted: August 9, 2005

ABC
Andrei Babitsky, ABC
HARASSED, LEGAL ACTION

The Foreign Ministry announced steps to bar the U.S. television network ABC from reporting in Russia. The ministry said in a statement that ABC reporters had been denied access to government officials and that their accreditations will not be renewed when they expire. Russian authorities took the steps after the network broadcast an interview with Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev on its news program, "Nightline," on July 28.

New York, August 2, 2005—The Kremlin escalated its campaign of intimidation against foreign news media covering the war in Chechnya as authorities began moving today to bar the U.S. television network ABC from reporting in Russia. The Committee to Protect Journalists denounced the decision and called for its reversal.

New York, August 2, 2005—The Ukrainian Prosecutor-General's Office announced last night that it has completed the first part of its investigation into the 2000 murder of Georgy Gongadze, editor of the independent news Web site Ukrainska Pravda (Ukrainian Truth).

Yuri Boychenko, a spokesman for the prosecutor, said yesterday that authorities have identified the suspects who carried out Gongadze's murder and the case may soon go to court, according to local press reports. Two of the three suspects in the killing—police officers Nikolai Protasov and Valery Kostenko—are in custody. An arrest warrant has been issued for the other suspect, Gen. Aleksandr Pukach, former head of the criminal investigation department at the Ministry of Interior.

JULY 28, 2005
Posted: August 2, 2005

Jumaboy Tolibov, freelance
IMPRISONED

A judge in northern Tajikistan sentenced independent journalist Jumaboy Tolibov to two years in a prison colony on charges of hooliganism, illegally entering a residence, and abusing his office as a local government administrator, according to local and international reports. The defense said it intended to appeal the verdict.

JULY 18, 2005
Posted: August 2, 2005

Khalida Anarbayeva, Internews Network
Olga Narmuradova, Internews Network
LEGAL ACTION

Former director Anarbayeva and accountant Narmuradova went on trial July 18 at the Yakkasaroy District Court in Tashkent. They faced up to six months in prison if convicted on charges of publishing information and producing videos without a license. The U.S.-based media training and advocacy group disputed the charges.