POLITICAL REFORMS AND ECONOMIC GROWTH, along with the advent of democratic governments in Croatia and Serbia, brightened the security prospects for journalists in Central Europe and the Balkans. In contrast, Russian’s new government imposed press restrictions, and authoritarian regimes entrenched themselves in other countries of the former Soviet Union, particularly in Central Asia, further threatening…
WHILE THE PRESS IN KYRGYZSTAN HAS ENJOYED A REPUTATION for greater freedom than in any other Central Asian republic, that freedom has in fact been eroding since the mid-1990s. In 2000, pressure on the independent media greatly intensified in advance of parliamentary and presidential elections. Many observers believe President Askar Akayev is resorting to more…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is alarmed by the harsh treatment to which three journalists from the Bishkek independent weekly Delo N were recently subjected by agents of the Ministry of National Security. After a long and brutal interrogation on August 16, one of the journalists was hospitalized with a heart condition, according to CPJ sources.
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is greatly disturbed by the fact that an independent journalist in your country has been jailed for insulting a judge. On June 19, a Jalal-Abad city court sentenced Moldosali Ibraimov, a reporter with the independent regional weekly Akyikat, to two years imprisonment for criminal defamation. He was also fined 100,000 soms (US$1,230); a similar fine was imposed on Akyikat, according to local news reports and CPJ sources in Bishkek. He is currently in jail pending an appeal.
Click here to read more about press freedom conditions in KYRGYZSTAN. New York, April 4, 2000 — A Bishkek city court recently found the local independent weekly Res Publika liable in yet another defamation suit. The paper is currently banned from publishing until it pays a fine resulting from an earlier lawsuit.
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply concerned about the recent arrest of veteran journalist Aziza Abdrasulova and the continued legal harassment of her newspaper, the Bishkek weekly Res Publika. We believe the arrest is part of an intimidation campaign being mounted by your government against independent media during the run-up to parliamentary elections in Kyrgyzstan.
By Chrystyna Lapychak Wars in Yugoslavia and Chechnya dominated regional and international headlines in 1999. The conflicts raised the journalists’ death toll in the region and prompted crackdowns, as governments blocked access to war zones and engaged in propaganda campaigns.
Among the increasingly authoritarian leaders of Central Asia, Kyrgyz president Askar Akayev is perceived as relatively democratic. At least publicly, Akayev has attempted to accommodate Western demands for improvements in the legal climate for media. Yet Kyrgyzstan’s small but feisty independent press is increasingly muzzled, and journalists say the Akayev administration is to blame. In…
Your Excellency, The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is writing to express great concern about the recent harassment of Alexander Kim, chief editor of the independent daily Vecherny Bishkek. On August 24, representatives from the Kyrgyz State Tax Police attempted to arrest Kim on charges of tax evasion and ordered him to provide a number of the newspaper’s financial documents. Kim argued that Vecherny Bishkek had successfully passed a tax audit in December, and that, according to Article 13 of the Kyrgyz Tax Code, no additional review could be performed for another year.
There are two views of the press in Armenia today. The first holds that the press is entirely free to report as it chooses. The second is that the press is irresponsible. One thing is certain: In the absence of censorship, Armenian officials resort to verbal pressure and sometimes physical retribution, to knock journalists into…