New York, January 31, 2008—As part of its ongoing campaign to urge China to adopt reforms promised when the International Olympic Committee awarded the country the 2008 Olympics, CPJ today delivered more than 500 advocacy cards to the Chinese Consulate in New York urging the government to release 29 jailed journalists. The IOC granted China…
New York, January 30, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by the criminal defamation lawsuit filed by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani on Tuesday against the editor-in-chief of the independent Kurdish weekly Hawlati for translating and publishing a report written by a U.S. scholar. Tariq Fatih, publisher of Hawlati, told CPJ the newspaper was served…
Dear President Karzai: The Committee to Protect Journalists has been closely monitoring the case of Parwez Kambakhsh, the journalism student who was sentenced to death on blasphemy charges by the provincial court in Balkh province. We are disturbed that the upper house of Afghanistan’s parliament gave their public support to this verdict today, according to The Associated Press and the BBC.
Dear Prime Minister, We are writing to express our great concern about the government’s denial of publishing licenses to five independent Ethiopian journalists freed last year from prison. We are calling on you to use all your influence to remove such administrative restraints, which contradict the government’s public assurances last year that former prisoners would be allowed to resume their work.
Your Excellency, On the eve of the African Union summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the Committee to Protect Journalists urges the AU to actively defend and uphold press freedom across the continent. CPJ calls on your office to strengthen AU institutions dedicated to supporting press freedom, including the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the African Peer Review Mechanism, and remind states of their obligation to uphold press freedom as part of their membership in the union.
New York, January 29, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Mexican authorities to fully investigate the alleged involvement of Alfredo Araujo Avila, a top hit man for the Arellano Félix drug cartel, in the shooting of editor J. Jesús Blancornelas a decade ago. Araujo was arrested Saturday in Tijuana by the Mexican military, according to…
New York, January 29, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns Monday’s six-month prison sentence given by the Bangui Magistrates’ Court to the editorial director of a private weekly in the Central African Republic. The editor of Les Collines de l’Oubangui, Faustin Bambou, was found guilty of inciting revolt, abuse, and defamation.
New York, January 29, 2008—Authorities in Nigeria’s southern Akwa Ibom State sent a journalist to prison on Monday on sedition charges, according to local journalists and news reports. The move was part of a crackdown launched by the state government in response to a story alleging corruption by the state governor. The newspaper’s distributor was…
New York, January 29, 2008–Police in the southern Russian Republic of Ingushetia detained, beat, and deported journalists and human rights activists who tried to cover an opposition rally in the regional capital on Saturday, according to CPJ sources and local news reports. Authorities mounted a massive crackdown against the roughly 200 protesters in Nazran. Riot…
New York, March 11, 2008—Six people affiliated with the Sri Lankan news Web site OutreachSL have been detained by the Terrorist Investigation Division of the Sri Lankan police force in Colombo since last week, according to Agence France-Presse and local news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists urges the government of Sri Lanka to charge…