Burkina Faso police question Zongo protesters
This morning, police in Burkina Faso summoned four leaders of a march over the weekend that called for a renewed investigation into the unsolved 1998 assassination of investigative journalist Norbert Zongo. Among those questioned was Jean-Claude Meda, the president of the Association of Journalists of Burkina Faso, who told me that he received a call…
Reporter alleges beating by presidential guards
New York, December 10, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists is outraged by reports that a journalist who was summoned to the Gabonese presidential office ended up in intensive care from a severe beating on December 5. The office called in journalist Habib Papy Boubendji for questioning over a November 27 column that raised pointed questions…
Cardoso’s killer escapes again
New York, December 8, 2008–The convicted murderer of Mozambique’s foremost investigative journalist, Carlos Cardoso, escaped from his high-security cell in on Sunday morning, local journalists told CPJ. This is the third time the assassin Anibal dos Santos Jr., commonly referred to as Anibalzinho, has escaped prison in Mozambique’s capital, Maputo.
What’s become of the people in this photo?
This week, as CPJ finalized its annual list of journalists imprisoned for their work, my thoughts turned to Eritrea and this photo. Taken in 2000, near the end of a two-year border war with neighboring Ethiopia and during the heyday of a burgeoning private press movement in Africa’s youngest nation, the photo shows the staff…
CPJ’s 2008 prison census: Online and in jail
Also: See capsule reports on journalists in jail as of December 1, 2008 New York, December 4, 2008–Reflecting the rising influence of online reporting and commentary, more Internet journalists are jailed worldwide today than journalists working in any other medium. In its annual census of imprisoned journalists, released today, the Committee to Protect Journalists found…