2013

A court in Dakar, the capital, on August 14, 2013, sentenced Mamadou Biaye, former editor of the private daily Le Quotidien, and Bastien David, an intern reporter for the paper, to one month in prison each on charges of criminal defamation, Agence France-Presse reported.

Soldiers from the Mozambique Defense Force (FADM) beat up two journalists from Independent Television Mozambique (TIM) who were reporting on a confrontation between the military and locals in a town close to the capital Maputo on November 7, 2013.

Two Peruvian journalists in the central Peruvian city of Ayacucho who had reported on alleged government corruption were convicted of criminal defamation, fined, and handed suspended jail sentences in two separate cases on October 21, 2013, according to news reports.

Togolese authorities shut down the leading private Radio Légende FM on August 27, 2013, after suspending the station for one month in connection with its coverage of concluded parliamentary elections, according to news reports.

The Nigerian government on September 27, 2013, accused two leading independent online news websites–the Abuja-based Premium Times and the New York-based Sahara Reporters–of publishing frequent reports that “incite mutiny” within the military and undermine ongoing military operations against terrorist activities in northern Nigeria, according to news reports. 

On September 18, 2013, British freelance journalist and former videographer for The Times of London Kieron Bryan, 29, was detained along with Russian freelance photographer Denis Sinyakov and 28 Greenpeace activists and ship crew members off the north coast of Russia. Bryan was covering a Greenpeace demonstration in protest of oil mining in the Arctic,…

Peruvian journalist Humberto Espinoza Maguiña was convicted twice in two consecutive days in September 2013 on charges of defaming the governor of the northeastern state of Ancash, according to news reports. He received a two-year suspended prison sentence and was fined US$2,000 in damages.

A judge in Tripoli on August 21, 2013, lifted the travel ban placed on Amara al-Khatabi, editor of the daily Al-Ummah, and ordered the return of the journalist’s passport, al-Khatabi’s lawyer, Ramadan Farag Salem, told CPJ and human rights organizations. 

On July 2, 2013, nine judges on Ghana’s Supreme Court convicted Ken Kuranchie, editor-in-chief of the Daily Searchlight, of criminal contempt in connection with his critical articles. The journalist was sentenced to 10 days in jail, according to news reports.

A radio station in the eastern Guinean city of Kankan was raided and attacked twice in three days in mid-August, according to news reports. At least three journalists reported being briefly detained.