Hunkering down to defend the Communist Party as the country’s sole voice of political power, Vietnam’s Politburo continues to bar virtually all attempts at free expression that violate the guidelines of the party leadership. Vietnam’s National Assembly amended and tightened an already repressive press law in June, centralizing media control–including the Internet–within the Ministry of…
“When the bombs began falling in Yugoslavia on March 24, the seven Serb journalists who happened to be visiting our offices in New York during a tour of the United States all ran for the phones. They were worried about the families they had left behind, but they also feared for the survival of Serbia’s…
Washington, D.C., March 25 — The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported today in its annual worldwide study of press freedom that at least 118 journalists were in prison in 25 countries at the end of 1998, and 24 journalists in 17 countries were murdered during the year in reprisal for their reporting.
“Investigative reporter Alejandra Matus spent six years researching The Black Book of Chilean Justice. But her book, a historical exposé of the judiciary’s lack of independence, spent less than two days on Chilean bookshelves: On April 14, police confiscated its entire press run at the order of a Santiago Appeals Court judge. That same day,…
A Summarized Report Doan Viet Hoat was released from prison in Vietnam on September 1, 1998, midway through a 15-year sentence for publishing pro-democracy newsletters. He was set free under an amnesty program timed to coincide with Vietnam’s national day, but was then immediately expelled from the country.
The publication in March of CPJ’s Attacks on the Press in 1996 was the culmination of months of intense preparation by CPJ staff, investigating and verifying more than 1,000 documented cases of violations of press freedom worldwide. The 376-page volume, edited by Publications Director Alice Chasan, is the longest and most comprehensive of CPJ’s annual…
CPJ’s 1995 report surveys 101 countries The bullet-ridden wall pictured on the cover is a detail from a photograph taken in Somalia by American photojournalist Dan Eldon of Reuters. Eldon, Associated Press photojournalist Hansi Krauss, and Reuter colleagues Hosea Maina and Anthony Macharia were murdered in July 1993 by a Somali crowd angered by the…