Yemen

New York, February 5, 2010—Muhammad al-Maqaleh, editor of the opposition Yemeni Socialist Party’s news Web site Aleshteraki, who was detained in September has finally appeared in government custody. He is being held without charges, local news outlets reported, and alleges that he has been tortured.

Ministers and officials representing some 20 Western and Arab governments and international financial institutions declared themselves “friends of Yemen” during last week’s closed-door meeting in London to address threats posed by Al-Qaeda in Yemen, according to news reports. Participants, including U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, offered assurances that the international community, in addition to providing military cooperation, would work with the Yemeni government to promote human rights and build democratic institutions. But skeptics fear this publicized “friendship” will also provide an opportunity for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to intensify his attacks on political dissent and independent journalism.

New York, January 19, 2010—A journalist at a Yemeni weekly was sentenced on Saturday, in absentia, to three months in jail and was banned from writing for a year. The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the Sana’a court’s decision and calls on the Yemeni judiciary to reverse the sentence on appeal.

New York, January 6, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the arrest today of the editor-in-chief and managing editor of the independent daily Al-Ayyam on the third day of a government siege of the compound that houses the paper’s offices in Aden.

New York, January 4, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists today called on Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to instruct authorities to peacefully end a siege of an independent daily that is now in its second day in Aden.