NOVEMBER 20, 2005 Posted: December 2, 2005 Robert Ramos, Katapat KILLED—UNCONFIRMED Ramos, 39, a reporter for the weekly tabloid, was shot twice in the head outside a market in Cabuyao, Laguna province, 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of the capital, Manila. Ramos was waiting for a ride home from work when two motorcycle-riding assailants shot…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists strongly condemns the October 11 arrest and imprisonment on criminal defamation charges of Mam Sonando, a prominent radio journalist and founder of Sambok Khmum Radio FM 105, one of Cambodia’s few independent news outlets.
Bangkok, November 18, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists expressed grave concern today about the Thai government’s escalating harassment of journalist and television commentator Sondhi Limthongkul. Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra filed a defamation lawsuit against Sondhi on Thursday, the third such suit against the journalist, this one seeking 1 billion baht (US$25 million) in damages.
New York, November 17, 2005—A reporter for the Dhaka-based daily Samakal was found strangled to death in his bureau office today, according to news reports. Journalists in the town of Faridpur, 40 miles (64 kilometers) west of the Bangladeshi capital, have launched protests demanding that authorities find and prosecute the killer of Gautam Das. The…
NOVEMBER 17. 2005 Updated: November 29, 2005 Gautam Das, Samakal KILLED—CONFIRMED Das, a reporter for the Dhaka-based daily Samakal was found strangled to death in his bureau office in the town of Faridpur, 40 miles (64 kilometers) west of the Bangladeshi capital, according to news reports.
NOVEMBER 16, 2005 Posted: December 2, 2005 Kass FM CENSORED The Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK), an official regulatory body, suspended the privately owned radio station Kass FM, which broadcasts in the local Kalenjin language from the capital, Nairobi. Government spokesman Alfred Mutua accused the station of inciting ethnic hatred and violence, but local journalists…
New York, November 15, 2005—The government has threatened to close Uganda’s leading independent daily The Monitor over a story about President Yoweri Museveni’s first choice for army chief. Conrad Nkutu, managing director of The Monitor, told the Committee to Protect Journalists today that the authorities demanded that the paper retract the story and apologize. Nkutu…
Belém, Brazil, November 15, 2005—A leading Brazilian journalist being honored by the Committee to Protect Journalists with a prestigious International Press Freedom Award cannot attend the presentation this month because a series of punitive criminal lawsuits has made him a virtual hostage in his Amazonian hometown. “It’s crucial for me to stay in Belém to…