IVORY COAST: Students raid newspaper

AUGUST 27, 2007
Posted September 7, 2007

L’Intelligent
HARASSED

About 40 militants of pro-government student group FESCI invaded the offices of private daily L’Intelligent in the capital, Abdijan, sequestering journalists for two hours, seizing newsroom equipment and knocking down the door of editor Laurent Okoué, according to news reports and local journalists.

The students ordered the staff to publish a protest letter they were carrying, but dispersed after the intervention of police. The letter was in response to an August 14 story alleging that 100 student members of FESCI had defected to an opposition party, Okoué told CPJ. The paper had refused to publish the letter three days prior on the grounds that it was not printed on official stationery, according to Okoué.