October 2009 - Committee to Protect Journalists

Media rules could bring back the bad old days in Pakistan

October 30, 2009 4:24 PM EDT

On a day when Western media focused on the ramifications of the official visit of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Islamabad, I got a heads-up email message from Mazhar Abbas in Islamabad this morning.

Chinese authorities detain Uighur Web site managers

October 30, 2009 3:47 PM EDT

New York, October 30, 2009—Chinese police have reportedly arrested two Uighur journalists who published online about Uighur issues in Xinjiang, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Chinese authorities blamed local and international Uighur Web sites for fueling July’s ethnic violence, according to international news reports.

CPJ to Clinton: Morocco censors, jails journalists

October 30, 2009 11:20 AM EDT

Dear Secretary Clinton: As you prepare for the Forum for the Future in Marrakesh next week, we’d like to bring to your attention a sharp spike in government repression in the host country, Morocco. The Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent, nonprofit organization that defends press freedom worldwide, has documented an aggressive crackdown on independent news outlets and journalists that has occurred over the last five months and has included judicial harassment, politicized prosecutions, obstruction, and censorship.

Burmese authorities detain freelance journalist

October 29, 2009 3:33 PM EDT

New York, October 29, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists strongly condemns and calls for the immediate release of freelance journalist and blogger Pai Soe Oo, who was detained by government authorities on Wednesday for questioning.

Video: CPJ announces funding from Thiel Foundation

October 29, 2009 11:50 AM EDT

On October 28 the SiliconValleyWatcher blog posted a short video featuring speeches from CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon and Board Chairman Paul Steiger announcing funding from the Thiel Foundation to aid freedom of the press online.Please click here to read the post and watch video of the speeches.

Natalya Estemirova case must be solved, say CPJ, PEN

October 29, 2009 9:36 AM EDT

President Medvedev: On the day PEN American Center and the Committee to Protect Journalists join together for a public tribute to slain independent journalist and human rights defender Natalya Estemirova, we call on you to ensure that both her assassins and those who sent them to her doorstep are brought to justice.

Death threats sent to paper of slain editor in Sri Lanka

October 28, 2009 3:46 PM EDT

New York, October 28, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists is greatly concerned by ongoing threats to Sri Lanka’s journalists and media organizations. Anonymous letters with death threats, at left, recently sent to Sunday Leader Editor-in-Chief Frederica Jansz and News Editor Munza Mushtaq echo those that ended in the death of the paper’s founder, Lasantha Wickramatunga,…

Mexican Congressional body to be disbanded

October 28, 2009 12:27 PM EDT

We issued the following statement today in response to reports that the new Mexican Chamber of Deputies has not renewed the mandate of a special congressional committee on violence against the press appointed in 2006…

Tawakul Karman, chairwoman of Women Journalists Without Chains. (Oliver Holmes)

Just off Freedom Square in Yemen

October 27, 2009 4:10 PM EDT

Swathed in the traditional black face veil, or niqab, Yemeni women brandish banners with images of disappeared and imprisoned journalists. Every Tuesday, in Yemen’s capital city of Sana’a, Tawakul Karman, chairwoman of Women Journalists Without Chains (WJWC), leads these women into Freedom Square to demonstrate.

Eight charged in Croatia murders

October 27, 2009 1:19 PM EDT

We issued the following statement after Croatian and Serbian prosecutors announced that they have charged eight men in an October 2008 car bombing that killed Ivo Pukanic, owner and editorial director of the Zagreb-based political weekly Nacional, and Niko Franjic, the paper’s marketing director…