Your Excellency, The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) deplores the government-controlled Media and Information Commission’s (MIC) June 10 decision to suspend the private weekly The Tribune for one year. The Tribune is the second newspaper to be shuttered under Zimbabwe’s repressive Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA).
Kinshasa, June 14, 2004—Concluding a two-week mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) today called on the transitional government not to use national security as a justification for restricting the work of the press. Journalists working in the DRC face frequent harassment, legal action, and even imprisonment, according to…
Kinshasa, June 10, 2004—Three community radio stations that had been threatened by rebel forces in the eastern town of Bukavu resumed broadcasting yesterday, after government forces retook the town, according to journalists at the stations. One station reported further threats. Radio Maria, Radio Sauti ya Rehema (Voice of Mercy), and Radio Maendeleo have been able…
New York, June 10, 2004—The private weekly newspaper The Tribune was ordered closed today by the government-controlled Media and Information Commission (MIC) for violating sections of Zimbabwe’s draconian Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA). Tafataona Mahoso, the MIC chairman, announced today that the newspaper’s license would be suspended for one year. He…
Kinshasa, June 7, 2004—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has learned that Albert Kassa Khamy Mouya, former publication director of the weekly newspaper Le Lauréat, and Rakys Bokela, editor of newspaper Le Collecteur, have been imprisoned in Kinshasa, the capital of Democratic Republic of Congo, since May 27 and May 21, respectively, on criminal defamation…
Kinshasa, June 3, 2004—Rebel forces that took control of the town of Bukavu, in eastern DRC, on Wednesday have threatened and attacked the town’s three main community radio stations, forcing them off the air, according to the local press freedom group Journaliste en Danger (JED) and other local sources. Joseph Nkinzo, director of the radio…
For background, read CPJ’s special report, “The Case of Carlos Cardoso” New York, June 3, 2004—Anibal Antonio dos Santos Junior, the convicted murderer of Mozambican journalist Carlos Cardoso was arrested with the help of Interpol officials at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport on May 25, according to international press reports.
New York, June 2, 2004—A brother-in-law of Ivory Coast’s first lady has been formally charged as an accessory in the kidnapping, confinement, and murder of Guy-André Kieffer, a missing freelance journalist with both French and Canadian citizenship, according to international news reports. Michel Legré, the accused, has been in detention since May 25 in the…
New York, May 27, 2004 – Lucien-Claude Ngongo, deputy editor of the weekly newspaper Fair Play, has been detained in the DRC capital Kinshasa for a week without charge, according to local press freedom group Journaliste en Danger (JED). Local journalists say Ngongo has been questioned about an article he wrote denouncing corrupt practices by…