Africa
2025
Guinean regulator bans news site Dépêche Guinée
Dakar, January 30, 2025—Guinea’s High Authority of Communication should reverse its decision to indefinitely suspend the privately owned news site Dépêche Guinée and ensure the public has unrestrained access to diverse media sources, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday. “The banning of Dépêche Guinée represents an escalation of the Guinean communications regulator’s censorship efforts and…
South Sudan blocks social media access amid unrest
Nairobi, January 24, 2025– The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on South Sudanese authorities to reverse its social media ban and to ensure that the public has open and reliable internet access, which is essential for news gathering amid unrest in the country. “Blocking social media access is a blanket act of censorship and a disproportionate response…
Benin’s regulator suspends 6 media outlets until further notice
Dakar, January 23, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Beninese authorities to reverse their January 21 orders suspending six privately owned media outlets — news sites Reporter Médias Monde, Les Pharaons, and Crystal News, the Mme Actu Tiktok account, and Le Patriote and Audace Info newspapers — and to return the press card of Audace Info’s publication director…
CPJ finds flaws, inconsistencies in murder conviction of Senegalese journalist René Capain Bassène
In spite of the Senegalese gendarmerie officer holding a gun held to his head, Ibou Sané held firm. He refused the officer’s order to admit that he knew René Capain Bassène – but in the end it didn’t matter. Testimony he insisted he never gave was used in court to help convict Bassène, a well-known…
Tanzanian journalist Maria Sarungi Tsehai briefly abducted in Kenya
Nairobi, January 14, 2025– CPJ calls on the Kenyan government to conduct a comprehensive investigation after four unknown men assaulted and abducted prominent Tanzanian journalist and human rights activist Maria Sarungi Tsehai for about four hours on Sunday in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi. “With attacks on dissidents living in exile in Nairobi and a…
VPNs, training, and mental health workshops: How CPJ helped journalist safety in 2024
Haitian journalist Jean Marc Jean was covering an anti-government protest in Port-au-Prince in February 2024 when he was struck in the face by a gas canister fired by police into the crowd. One of at least five journalists injured while covering civil unrest in the country that month, Jean arrived at the hospital with a…
CPJ, partners call on Angola to commit to press freedom during UN human rights review
The Committee to Protect Journalists and two Angola-based media rights organizations have made a joint submission to the United Nations Human Rights Council, calling on authorities in the southern African nation to improve its record on ensuring journalists’ safety and press freedom. The submission, dated July 16, 2024, was made ahead of Angola’s January 2025…