May 24, 2006 Posted: June 12, 2006 George D. Watkins, Radio Veritas ATTACKED Watkins, a journalist for the Catholic Church-owned Radio Veritas, was assaulted by State Security Services (SSS) agents while reporting on the SSS’s alleged enlistment of a former rebel commander, according to the independent daily The Analyst and the Press Union of Liberia.
New York, May 24, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned by reports that Web sites critical of the government have been inaccessible in Ethiopia since late last week. Several blogs have reported that the authorities are blocking sites, although the information minister denied this. An Ethiopian blogger who goes by the alias Ethio-Zagol reported…
New York, May 23, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed at a spate of attacks on the press in the run-up to the July 30 elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo. On Monday, armed assailants smashed and looted equipment at Kinshasa-based broadcaster Radiotélévision Message de Vie (RTMV), forcing it off the air for…
New York, May 19, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomed the release today of radio journalist Tchanguis Vatankah after three weeks of arbitrary detention. Vatankah, who went on hunger strike in early May, told CPJ by telephone from the capital, N’Djamena, that he was “very happy” to be back home with his wife, and that…
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…