Local prosecutor in Gongadze case convicted and amnestied
New York, May 7, 2003—The Shevchenko District Court in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, yesterday convicted and then amnestied Serhy Obozov, the former prosecutor of Tarashcha District, for obstructing the criminal inquiry into the September 2000 disappearance and murder of Internet journalist Georgy Gongadze, according to local and international press reports. Obozov, who was arrested in August…
Attacks on the Press 2002: The Hague
December 11 Jonathan C. Randal, The Washington Post The U.N. International War Crimes Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague (ICTY) ruled to limit compelled testimony from war correspondents. The decision, announced at the tribunal’s Appeals Chamber, came in response to the appeal by former Washington Post reporter Jonathan C. Randal, who had been…
Attacks on the Press 2002: Kyrgystan
Emboldened by the growing number of U.S. troops in the country, President Askar Akayev has used the threat of international terrorism as an excuse to curb political dissent and suppress the independent and opposition media in Kyrgyzstan. Compliant courts often issue exorbitant damage awards in politically motivated libel suits, driving even the country’s most prominent…
Attacks on the Press 2002: Ukraine
During 2002, President Leonid Kuchma’s relationship with the United States hit an all-time low over suspicions that he sold a sophisticated radar system to Iraq. At home, his presidency was threatened by court rulings that opened a criminal case against him (and that were later overturned) for alleged involvement in the 2000 murder of journalist…
Attacks on the Press 2002: United Kingdom
Press freedom is generally respected in the United Kingdom, but CPJ was alarmed by a legal case in which Interbrew, a Belgium-based brewing group, and the British Financial Services Authority (FSA), a banking and investment watchdog agency, demanded that several U.K. media outlets turn over documents that had been leaked to them. The case threatened…
CPJ concerned about alleged death threat against editor
New York, February 19, 2003—Vira Kytaihorodska, editor-in-chief of the twice-weekly newspaper Bukovynske Viche in the western city of Chernivtsi, said that a local government official has threatened to kill her for republishing an article on February 7 that accused Chernivtsi regional governor Teofil Bauer of corruption and violating customs regulations. The official, deputy head of…
CPJ marks second anniversary of journalist’s disappearance
New York, September 13, 2002—Two years after the disappearance of Ukrainian journalist Georgy Gongadze, the Committee to Protect Journalists is dismayed by the lack of progress in the government’s inquiry into this case. “President Leonid Kuchma’s government continues to obstruct the official inquiry,” said CPJ executive director Ann Cooper. “Journalists in Ukraine will not feel…
Suspect charged with journalist’s murder acquitted
New York, May 17, 2002—The man accused in the July 2001 murder of prominent television journalist Igor Aleksandrov was acquitted today by the Donetsk Court of Appeals in eastern Ukraine. The court ruled that there was not enough evidence to convict Yuri Verdyuk and instructed officials to reopen the murder investigation, according to local and…
Attacks on the Press 2001: Europe & Central Asia
The exhilarating prospect of broad press freedoms that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union a decade ago has faded dramatically in much of the post-communist world. A considerable decline in press freedom conditions in Russia during the last year, along with the stranglehold authoritarian leaders have imposed on media in Central Asia, the Caucasus,…