Bangladesh

2018

  
Reuters journalist Kyaw Soe Oo is led handcuffed from a court in Yangon in September. He and colleague Wa Lone are serving seven-year prison sentences in Myanmar. (Reuters/Ann Wang)

Hundreds of journalists jailed globally becomes the new normal

For the third year in a row, 251 or more journalists are jailed around the world, suggesting the authoritarian approach to critical news coverage is more than a temporary spike. China, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia imprisoned more journalists than last year, and Turkey remained the world’s worst jailer. A CPJ special report by Elana Beiser

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A tribute to victims of an April 2018 suicide attack in Afghanistan’s capital Kabul, that killed at least nine journalists. (AP/Rahmat Gul)

Getting Away with Murder

CPJ’s 2018 Global Impunity Index spotlights countries where journalists are slain and their killers go free By Elisabeth Witchel, CPJ Impunity Campaign Consultant Impunity is entrenched in 14 nations, according to CPJ’s 2018 Global Impunity Index, which ranks states with the worst records of prosecuting the killers of journalists.

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CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon talks about global press freedom violations during a Press Behind Bars panel at the U.N. (Reuters)

CPJ’s Joel Simon speaks at Press Behind Bars panel

Committee to Protect Journalists Executive Director Joel Simon addressed a panel event at the 73rd session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York on September 28, 2018. The event highlighted global press freedom violations and the jailing of journalists in countries around the world, with a specific focus on cases in Egypt, Kyrgyzstan, Bangladesh,…

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Live Stream – Press Behind Bars: Undermining Justice and Democracy

Event scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. EDT on Friday, September 28, 2018. Committee to Protect Journalists Executive Director Joel Simon, Reuters President and CPJ board member Stephen J. Adler, and human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, who represents the imprisoned Reuters journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, speak on a panel at the 73rd…

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CPJ urges Bangladesh’s president to return Digital Security Act to Parliament for revision

The CPJ expresses concern about the Digital Security Act that was passed on September 18 by the Parliament of Bangladesh, and urges President Abdul Hamid to return it to Parliament for review. CPJ is concerned that the legislation, if allowed to become law, would violate constitutional guarantees of freedom of the press, and would create extensive legal dangers for journalists in the normal course of carrying out their professional activities.

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Bangladeshi students attempt to break a police barricade during a protest in Dhaka on August 1. More than a dozen journalists have been attacked covering the nationwide protests. (AP/A. M. Ahad)

CPJ Safety Advisory: Covering protests in Bangladesh

On July 29, two students were killed, and 12 others injured when a bus plowed into a passengers waiting at a stop in Dhaka. Since then, daily demonstrations that started in Dhaka have spread throughout Bangladesh. Thousands of students have demonstrated on the streets of Dhaka at major traffic intersections, causing congestion that has nearly…

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Students take an injured fellow to the hospital during clashes with unidentified assailants while they are protesting over recent fatal traffic accidents in Dhaka, Bangladesh, August 4, 2018. (Reuters/Mohammad Ponir Hossain)

Bangladesh orders Shahidul Alam held 7 days; more than a dozen journalists attacked

New York, August 6, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Bangladeshi authorities to immediately halt widespread attacks on journalists covering ongoing student protests in Dhaka and to release photographer Shahidul Alam from jail.

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Bangladeshi photographer Shahidul Alam, pictured in December 2006, is detained in Dhaka after posting a video to Facebook about student protests. (AFP/ Prakash Singh)

Bangladeshi photographer Shahidul Alam detained after post about Dhaka protests

New York, August 5, 2018–A group of men who said they were from the detective branch of Dhaka police today took Shahidul Alam, a photographer, commentator, and the founder of the Bangladeshi multimedia organization Drik and Pathshala Media Institute, from his home, hours after he posted a video to Facebook about protests in the city,…

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The Bangladesh flag is waved during a cricket match in Dhaka in early 2018. At least four journalists were attacked in Bangladesh while covering local elections in July. (AFP/Munir Uz Zaman)

Journalists in Bangladesh attacked and beaten covering local election

New York, August 1, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists today condemned violence against journalists covering local elections in the Bangladesh city of Sylhet, and called on authorities to identify and hold the attackers to account. At least four journalists were beaten, allegedly by police and supporters of the ruling Awami League party, according to news…

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Bangladeshi editor Mahmudur Rahman (center) celebrates his release on bail from prison in Gazipur on November 23, 2016. Rahman was injured in an attack outside a courtroom in Kushtia on July 22, 2018. (AFP/Stringer)

Bangladeshi editor injured in attack outside courtroom

New York, July 24, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists today strongly condemned Sunday’s attack on editor Mahmudur Rahman in Kushtia, a city in Bangladesh, and urged the authorities to investigate and bring the perpetrators to justice.

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2018