Europe & Central Asia

  
Graffiti attributed to the street artist Banksy is seen near the offices of Britain's eavesdropping agency, Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ, in Cheltenham, England, on April 16, 2014. (Reuters/Eddie Keogh)

Surveillance forces journalists to think and act like spies

Once upon a time, a journalist never gave up a confidential source. When someone comes forward, anonymously, to inform the public, it’s better to risk time incarcerated than give them up. This ethical responsibility was also a practical and professional necessity. If you promise anonymity, you’re obliged to deliver. If you can’t keep your word,…

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Mario Costeja Gonzalez speaks on his mobile phone outside a court in Barakaldo, Spain, on June 25, 2013. As a result of a lawsuit he filed against Google, Internet companies can be made to remove irrelevant or excessive personal information from search engine results, Europe's top court ruled.  (Reuters/Vincent West)

Two continents, two courts, two approaches to privacy

At 3:20 a.m. on August 24, 2014, the strongest earthquake in a quarter-century rocked the San Francisco Bay Area, causing damage widely estimated at between $300 million and $1 billion.

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Supporters of the extreme-right Golden Dawn party raise flares as they celebrate polls results in Thessaloniki, Greece, on May 6, 2012. (Reuters/Grigoris Siamidis)

Journalists grapple with increasing power of European extremists

Athens, May 6, 2012. Journalists attending Golden Dawn’s triumphal election night news conference are ordered to stand up when the group’s leader, Nikos Michaloliakos, enters the room. “Rise up! Rise up! Show your respect!” barks the master of ceremonies, an agitated black-clad, bald-headed toughie. The journalists who refuse the injunction are asked to leave the…

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Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny, right, talks with his brother and co-defendant Oleg inside a defendants' cage during a court hearing in Moscow on December 30, 2014. (Reuters/Sergei Karpukhin)

The death of glasnost: How Russia’s attempt at openness failed

Before Maidan, before Tahrir Square, before the “color revolutions” that overthrew entrenched autocrats, there was the Soviet revolution of the late 1980s.

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A masked pro-Russian protester poses for a photo inside a regional government building overtaken by his group in Donetsk, Ukraine, on April 25, 2014. (Reuters/Marko Djurica)

Media wars create information vacuum in Ukraine

More than a year after the December 2013 mass attack against journalists at Kiev’s Maidan Square, which coincided with the Ukrainian police’s violent dispersal of protesters rallying against the policies of then-President Viktor Yanukovych, the press in the beleaguered nation continue the battle for survival. The biggest problem remains impunity in attacks against journalists.

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The rubble of a school bombed by the Sudanese government in 2012. To set up a news agency to cover the conflict, humanitarian worker Ryan Boyette used crowdfunding. (AP/Ryan Boyette)

Journalists overcome obstacles through crowdfunding and determination

During South Africa’s Boer War, at the turn of the 20th century, a determined news organization relocated reporters, copy editors, and printing presses to the front line to ensure accurate reporting. In the Warsaw Ghetto, during World War II, a literal underground press, established to counter Nazi propaganda, required the nightly movement of cumbersome printing…

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International coalition calls on European Court to prioritize Azerbaijani press cases

Azerbaijan, one of the 10 Most Censored Countries in the world, according to new research by the Committee to Protect Journalists, is to host the first-ever European Games this June. As Baku prepares to bask in the spotlight by hosting an international mega-event yet again, eight of the country’s independent journalists, including award-winning investigative reporter…

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10 Most Censored Countries

10 Most Censored Countries 1. Eritrea 2. North Korea 3. Saudi Arabia 4. Ethiopia 5. Azerbaijan 6. Vietnam 7. Iran 8. China 9. Myanmar 10. Cuba Methodology » See updated list of 10 Most Censored Countries at https://cpj.org/reports/2019/09/10-most-censored-eritrea-north-korea-turkmenistan-journalist.php. The 2015 list of 10 Most Censored Countries is part of CPJ’s annual publication, Attacks on the…

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TV journalist wounded in eastern Ukraine

On April 14, 2015, in Shyrokyne, a village in eastern Ukraine, local journalist Andrei Lunyov was wounded after accidentally triggering a trip wire that led to an explosion, regional and international press reported.

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A picture taken on April 9, 2015, shows a note on the window of a newsroom at French television network TV5Monde headquarters in Paris, after TV5Monde was hacked by individuals claiming to belong to the Islamic State group. (AFP/Thomas Samson)

Cyberattacks rattle French, Belgian media outlets

The headquarters of Le Soir in the center of Brussels, two blocks away from the Parliament, look serene in the spring sunshine. No sign of violence scars the glass and stone facade. But the leading Belgian francophone daily, the flagship of the Rossel media group, has suffered a concussion. On Sunday a wave of hacking…

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