New York, July 8, 2005—Ethiopia’s Supreme Court yesterday ordered three newspaper executives to reveal the name of a lawyer their newspapers cited anonymously as criticizing a recent court decision. One of the three, Tamrat Serbesa, editor-in-chief of the private Amharic-language weekly Satanaw, was jailed overnight and released after posting bail. He and the other newspaper…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the criminal prosecution of three Chadian journalists in connection with their work. One of these journalists, Michaël Didama of the private weekly Le Temps, remains in jail in the capital, N’Djamena, more than two weeks after his initial arrest.
New York, July 6, 2005—Unidentified assailants kidnapped and brutally beat a commentator for the independent Radio Kledu yesterday 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 immediately identified. Local journalists said they believe…
New York, July 5, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the imprisonment of two radio journalists in Bossasso, a city in the self-declared autonomous region of Puntland. Sheekh Aduun, director of the Bossasso radio affiliate of the private STN network, and Awale Jama, an editor at the station, have been in police…
Restrictive regimes around the world came out ahead. Many were already taking a cue from a U.S. case involving the leak of a CIA officer’s name when the Supreme Court announced this week that it would not hear an appeal by two journalists. The reporters, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine and Judith Miller of The New York Times, face 18-month jail terms for not revealing their confidential sources.
JUNE 30 and JULY 1, 2005 Posted: July 18, 2005 Luc Mikomo, RAGA TV HARASSED RAGA FM, RAGA TV, and RAGA Plus CENSORED As opposition groups protested a delay in national elections originally due to take place by June 30, security forces detained Mikomo, news director at RAGA TV, for several hours in the capital,…
JUNE 30, 2005 Posted: July 12, 2005 Tadesse Kabede, Lisane Hezeb Fassil Yenalem, Addis ZenaDaniel Gezahegne, Moged LEGAL ACTION The editors of three private weeklies were arrested and charged in connection with their work, according to CPJ sources and the Addis Ababa-based Ethiopian Free Press Journalists’ Association (EFJA). Kabede, Yenalem, and Gezahegne were released after…
JUNE 30, 2005 Posted: July 7, 2005 Haruna Acheneje, The Punch HARASSED State Security Service (SSS) agents arrested Acheneje, a correspondent in Nigeria’s southern Akwa Ibom State for the independent daily The Punch, at his office. The agents detained and questioned Acheneje for about eight hours before releasing him without charge.