May 12, 2006 Original Case: July 13, 2005 Radio France Internationale (RFI) CENSORED On May 12, Ivory Coast’s National Council on Audiovisual Communication (CNCA), a media regulatory agency, lifted a 10-month ban on RFI’s FM broadcasts in Abidjan following negotiations between the two sides. The CNCA had banned RFI on July 13, 2005, accusing the…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the deterioration of press freedom in the Gambia. Authorities in your country have held a journalist without any official explanation since April 10 and have prevented his newspaper, The Independent, from operating for more than seven weeks.
UPDATED: May 16, 2006 Original Alert: December 12, 2005 Leykun Engeda, Dagim Wonchif IMPRISONED, LEGAL ACTION CPJ confirmed that Leykun Engeda, who was sentenced on December 9 to 15 months in prison, was released pending a decision in his appeal. The former editor-in-chief and publisher of the Amharic-language weekly Dagim Wonchif was convicted of publishing…
MAY 3, 2006 Posted: May 16, 2006 Sebastiao Canjera, Mabarwe Joao Mascarenhas, Mabarwe Patreque Francisco, Mabarwe IMPRISONED A prosecutor in the western district of Manica ordered three journalists from the community newspaper Mabarwe detained without charge, according to the local chapter of the Media Institute for Southern Africa (MISA) and local news reports. According to…
May 15, 2006 Posted: June 2, 2006 All Media THREATENED National Security Minister John Michuki warned local journalists that he would use force against local media outlets that criticized the government, according to local and international news reports. Referring to March raids on a prominent newspaper, The Standard, and a television station owned by the…
May 14, 2006 Posted: June 9, 2006 Dupont Ntererwa, Centre Lokole ATTACKED Ntererwa, a journalist with the Centre Lokole radio production studio in Bukavu, eastern DRC, was attacked by four youths in civilian clothes, who threatened him over his reporting on insecurity in the town, the studio said in a press release. The journalist told…
MAY 14, 2006 Posted May 30, 2006 Africa Independent Television (AIT) CENSORED Plainclothes security agents told managers at the Abuja bureau of Africa Independent Television (AIT) to stop broadcasting a privately produced 30-minute documentary about past failed efforts by Nigerian leaders to prolong their time in office. The agents also confiscated the master copy of…
Update: May 12, 2006 Original Alert: February 28, 2006 Chaacha Mwita, The Standard Dennis Onyango, The Standard Ayub Savula, The Standard IMPRIONED, LEGAL ACTION Mwita, Onyango, and Savula of Kenya’s independent daily The Standard appeared in court on March 2, 2006, after 48 hours in police detention. They were charged with publishing “alarming statements” and…
New York, May 12, 2006—Another Ethiopian journalist has been sentenced to jail under the country’s draconian press law, in a case that dates back at least seven years, the Committee to Protect Journalists has confirmed. Tesehalene Mengesha, a former editor at the defunct Amharic-language weekly Mebruk, was convicted of criminal defamation over a week ago…
New York, May 11, 2006—A local prosecutor in Mozambique has taken a preliminary step toward indicting a son of former President Joaquim Chissano in the 2000 murder of investigative journalist Carlos Cardoso, Mozambique’s official news agency, AIM, reported today. The prosecutor filed what is known as a charge sheet with the Maputo City Court about…