New York, May 12, 2005 – Zimbabwe’s High Court yesterday dismissed a request to accredit journalists of the banned Daily News, according to news reports and CPJ sources. The ruling came more than a year after the newspaper’s owners, Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe (ANZ), filed the application. The judge said the newspaper’s journalists could not…
JULY 5, 2005 Posted: July 7, 2005 Hamidou Diarra, Radio Kledu ATTACKED Unidentified assailants kidnapped and brutally beat a commentator for the independent Radio Kledu in the Malian capital, Bamako. Hamidou Diarra was found several hours later about 10 miles (15 kilometers) outside of Bamako, Radio Kledu director Abel Koné told CPJ. No suspects were…
New York, May 11, 2005—A U.S. photographer was released from custody yesterday after being detained by Sudanese authorities in Darfur two weeks ago, the U.S. daily The Hartford Courant reported today. Sudanese security forces detained Brad Clift on April 26 while he was taking photographs at an internally displaced persons camp outside Nyala, capital of…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the recent jail sentence given in absentia to two journalists who reported on alleged corruption in the gendarmerie. On April 20, a court in Maroua, the capital of Cameroon’s Far North Province, sentenced Guibaï Gatama, publication director of the independent weekly L’Oeil du Sahel, and Abdoulaye Oumaté, a journalist for the paper, to five months in prison and fined them 5 million CFA francs (approximately U.S. $9,782) in a criminal defamation case.
MAY 9, 2005 Posted: May 10, 2005 Honoré Sepe, Le Front HARASSED Three armed gendarmes came to Honoré Sepe’s house at 4 a.m. and demanded to be let in, although they admitted they had no warrant, according to the journalist. Sepe refused to let them in and instead called his lawyer. As he was on…
MAY 8, 2005 Posted: June 10, 2005 Zéphirin Kaya, Radio Ndeke Luka Patrick Akibata, Radio Ndeke Luka Maka Gbossokotto, Le Citoyen THREATENED Kaya, Akibata and Gbossokotto received death threats following critical coverage of the second round of presidential and parliamentary elections on May 8. Reinhard Moser, head of independent station Radio Ndeke Luka, and Le…
New York, May 6, 2005—Puntland authorities have ordered the immediate closing of the weekly newspaper Shacab for allegedly inciting violence, according to CPJ sources. The decree, issued after a cabinet meeting on Thursday, cited the government’s constitutional responsibility to uphold the unity of Puntland. The decree was signed by Vice President Hassan Dahir Afqurac on…
New York, May 6, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned about official harassment and threats against Sudanese editor Mohamed Taha Mohamed Ahmed. Ahmed is being tried this month on criminal charges of insulting the Prophet Mohammed after publishing an April 21 article in the daily Al-Wifaq. The article, by the well-known Muslim historian Al-Maqrizi,…