New York, March 13, 2002—CPJ is shocked and saddened by the death of Italian free-lance photographer Raffaele Ciriello, who was killed this morning by Israeli gunfire in the West Bank city of Ramallah, according to press reports and eyewitness testimony. Ciriello, who was on assignment for the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, is the first…
New York, March 13, 2002—Natalya Skryl, a business reporter working for the Nashe Vremya newspaper in the city of Rostov-on-Don in southwestern Russia, died on March 9 from head injuries sustained during an attack the night before, according to local press reports. Skryl, 29, reported on local business issues for a newspaper owned by Rostov…
New York, March 12, 2002—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is gravely concerned that Israeli forces opened fire on a hotel housing numerous journalists near the West Bank city of Ramallah. In the early morning hours of March 12, Israeli forces directed heavy machine gun fire at the City Inn hotel, from which some 30…
Bogotá, March 11, 2002— Seven journalists who have covered high-profile criminal investigations for major Colombian media organizations were threatened with death and given three days to leave the country. A message typed on a card used to request a Catholic prayer for the dead accused the journalists of being “gossipy sons-of-bitches who with their lies…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply concerned about your government’s ongoing efforts to stifle the Nepalese press by using emergency regulations that give authorities broad power to arrest anyone suspected of supporting the rebel Maoist movement.
New York, March 8, 2002—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed at the recent detention of two Al-Jazeera cameramen by Egyptian security forces. Mohamed Ezzedine El-Najjar and Mohamed Eid Galal were filming a pro-Palestinian student protest at the campus of Alexandria University on the morning of March 5, according to sources at Al-Jazeera’s Cairo bureau.…
Bogotá, March 7, 2002—Leftist guerrillas forced a radio station to shut down after accusing it of serving government interests. Onda Zero, based in the southern Colombian town of Acevedo, Huila Department, stopped broadcasting on the evening of February 28, when some 10 fighters from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) threatened to blow up…
Moscow, March 7, 2002—Three representatives of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) today completed a four-day mission to Russia with an urgent call for the release of jailed Russian journalist Grigory Pasko. “We are here to support our Russian colleagues in attempting to free Grigory Pasko, and to halt what seems to be an increasingly…
New York, March 6, 2002—The British-led international peacekeeping force warned reporters today of a credible threat to kidnap foreign journalists. “Information about threats come and go all the time, but this is the first one assessed as credible enough to pass on to journalists,” said Lt. Col. Neal Peckham of the International Security Assistance Force…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is gravely concerned about a government order to ban radio programs produced by the Nation Multimedia Group. This appears to be the latest in a series of moves designed to stifle the country’s free press, one of the cornerstones of Thai democracy.