CAMBODIA Government suppression of a hard-hitting investigative report that implicated senior government officials in illegal logging represented a significant reversal of the modest press freedom gains of the previous two years. Britain-based environmental watchdog Global Witness released the 95-page report, “Family Trees,” on June 1 and several local media groups detailed its findings, which included…
In a year of internal political wrangling and further emergence on the global stage, Chinese leadership under President Hu Jintao showed a keen awareness of public opinion at home and abroad. But the result was not greater freedom for the press. The administration undertook a clumsy effort to woo the foreign press corps while simultaneously…
INDIA The famously freewheeling press in the world’s biggest democracy operated largely without interference from the central government but nevertheless faced significant challenges, from the threat of violent assault to legal harassment. The dangers confronting journalists varied tremendously across regions, with those working in conflict areas or outside the major urban centers at greatest risk.…
The December 27 assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto plunged the nation into further turmoil after months of violent unrest and a bitterly contested state of emergency. An aggressive domestic press corps was in the middle of the momentous events, questioning government assertions and being targeted by government censorship.
PHILIPPINES Supreme Court Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno told a visiting CPJ delegation in July that he would personally seek justice for the unsolved killings of journalists and use his judicial authority to better protect press freedom. “The fact that the killings remain unsolved heightens public distrust in our system of justice,” Puno told CPJ.…
SRI LANKA In May, senior journalist Iqbal Athas wrote to CPJ warning that press freedom conditions had deteriorated under President Mahinda Rajapaksa. By September, Athas, a well-known defense correspondent for The Sunday Times of Sri Lanka and a 1994 CPJ International Press Freedom Award winner, had to leave the country temporarily in fear for his…
THAILAND Fallout from the September 2006 military coup cast a chill over Thailand’s media throughout 2007, as the junta maintained martial law over nearly half the country’s provinces and used its discretionary powers to censor broadcast news, seize control of the country’s only privately run television station, and pass new legislation that severely curtailed free…
New York, February 4, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the recent release from prison of Tran Khai Thanh Thuy, an award-winning writer and journalist. Thuy, 47, had an unexpected trial before the Hanoi’s People’s Court on Thursday. She was sentenced to nine months and 10 days on charges of “causing public disorder” under Article…
See also: Journalists killed | Journalists abducted | Background reports The war in Iraq illustrated the dangers faced by people who work with journalists in supporting roles–as drivers, interpreters, fixers and guards. Here is a statistical look at media support workers killed in Iraq 2003-09. Capsule reports detailing each death are…
JANUARY 26, 2008 Posted February 1, 2008 Syed Jaymal Zahiid, Malaysiakini DETAINED, BEATEN Police arrested Syed Jaymal, a correspondent for the online news provider Malaysiakini, while he was covering demonstrators protesting high food costs in Kuala Lumpur. He was charged with obstructing a police officer, a criminal offense punishable by two years in prison and…