CPJ: India’s blocking of BBC documentary on PM Modi contradicts commitment to democracy
New Delhi, January 23, 2023 – In response to Indian authorities’ restricting access to the BBC documentary “India: The Modi Question” on YouTube and Twitter, the Committee to Protect Journalists issued the following statement calling for access to the documentary to be restored: “The Indian government’s order to social media platforms to block a BBC…
Forensic tools open new front for using phone data to prosecute journalists
On April 13, police in Russia’s Khakassiya republic arrested Mikhail Afanasyev and seized his digital devices. Afanasyev, chief editor of the online magazine Novy Fokus, was detained based on an article about riot police in southern Siberia refusing to serve in Ukraine. He faces a possible 10-year prison sentence for spreading “false” information. It’s not surprising for…
Police in India-administered Jammu and Kashmir raid homes of seven journalists
On November 19, 2022, police in India-administered Jammu and Kashmir conducted raids in 12 locations including the homes of at least seven journalists — Mohammad Rafi, Gowhar Geelani, Khalid Gul, Rashid Maqbool, Sajjad Kralyari, Qazi Shibli, and Waseem Khalid — according to Indian newspaper The Telegraph and a police statement reviewed by CPJ. The journalists are all…
Killing with impunity: Vast majority of journalists’ murderers go free
By Jennifer Dunham/CPJ Deputy Editorial Director No one has been held to account in nearly 80% of journalist murders during the last 10 years, CPJ’s 2022 Global Impunity Index found, and governments show little interest in tackling the issue. Published November 1, 2022 Statistical table | Methodology | Database: All journalists murdered for their work…
Delhi police raid The Wire office and homes of its editors over retracted Meta reports
New Delhi, October 31, 2022 — Indian authorities must stop harassing employees of the news website The Wire and let them work freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Monday. On Monday, officials with the Delhi police crime branch searched the New Delhi office of The Wire and the residences of editors Siddharth Vardarajan, M.K….
Indian authorities prevent Pulitzer-winning Kashmiri journalist Sanna Irshad Mattoo from flying abroad
New Delhi, October 18, 2022 – Indian authorities should allow Kashmiri photojournalist Sanna Irshad Mattoo to travel abroad freely and collect her Pulitzer Prize in New York, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Tuesday. On Monday evening, immigration officials at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi stopped Mattoo, who was flying to New…
Special report: When spyware turns phones into weapons
How zero-click surveillance threatens reporters, sources, and global press freedom By Fred Guterl Published October 13, 2022 Aida Alami has always been wary of surveillance. As a journalist from Morocco, a state with a track record of intercepting phone calls and messages of political rivals, activists, and journalists, she habitually took precautions to protect her…
In India’s hardest-hit newsroom, surveilled reporters fear for their families and future journalists
M.K. Venu, a founding editor at India’s independent non-profit news site The Wire, says he has become used to having his phone tapped in the course of his career. But that didn’t diminish his shock last year when he learned that he, along with at least five others from The Wire, were among those listed…
‘An open-air prison’: Kashmiri journalists on how travel bans undermine press freedom
When Indian immigration officials stopped freelance Kashmiri journalist Aakash Hassan at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi international airport on July 26, they held him for several hours and questioned him about his family, his professional background and his reason for traveling – and refused to allow him to board his Sri Lanka flight because, they said, he was listed…
Indian tax authorities ‘survey’ media funding organization IPSMF
On the afternoon of September 7, 2022, officials with India’s Income Tax Department conducted a “survey” of the Independent and Public-Spirited Media Foundation, a philanthropic organization that provides financial support to independent digital news outlets in the country, at the foundation’s office in Bengaluru, the capital of the southern state of Karnataka, according to multiple…