2008

Last weekend I participated in a conference in Venice, Italy, on climate change and the press. The meeting was hosted by former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev under the auspices on the World Political Forum, an organization Gorbachev founded in 2003 to foster discussion on “crucial problems that affect humankind.”

The attempted poisoning of Russian human rights lawyer Karinna Moskalenko, who is representing the family of Anna Politkovskaya, is the focus of a story in The New York Times this morning. The article cites our alert on the incident and raises concerns about the poisoning, which sickened Moskalenko only days before pretrial hearings in the…

New York, October 14, 2008–Kalima, an independent Tunisian online news site, was hacked into and shut down on October 8, according to the Web site’s staff.

New York, October 14, 2008–Mexican editor and publisher Miguel Angel Villagómez Valle was executed hours after being kidnapped on Thursday in the state of Michoacán. His body was found on Friday in neighboring Guerrero state. The Committee to Protect Journalists is investigating possible links between Villagómez’s death and his work as a journalist.

New York, October 14, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned about the welfare of Russian lawyer Karinna Moskalenko, who represents the family of slain Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Moskalenko was the target of an apparent poisoning in Strasbourg, France, days before she was due to appear in a Moscow court for pretrial…

New York, October 14, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about a criminal lawsuit that has been filed against the editor of The Citizen newspaper in Southern Sudan and calls on authorities to drop the case immediately.

New York, October 10, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the murder of Iraqi reporter Dyar Abas Ahmed, who was shot by unidentified gunmen in Kirkuk today, according to news reports and CPJ interviews.

New York, October 10, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns today’s politicized imprisonment of independent journalist Salidzhon Abdurakhmanov and calls for his immediate and unconditional release.

New York, October 9, 2008–An Uzbek court should reject the politicized prosecution of independent journalist Salidzhon Abdurakhmanov and acquit him on fabricated drug possession charges, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Prosecutors are seeking a 17-year prison term for Abdurakhmanov, defense lawyer Rustam Tulyaganov told CPJ today. Nukus District Court Judge Kadyrbay Dzhamolov, who…

On September 27, the High Court in Zambia’s capital, Lusaka, granted acting President Rupiah Banda an injunction restraining The Post newspaper from publishing libelous words against him. Zambia’s Sunday Times reported that the court had also given a penal notice to Editor-in-Chief Fred M’membe to comply with the order. M’membe refused and appealed to the…