Features & Analysis

2018

  
This screenshot of South Africa's Daily Maverick shows an op-ed by CPJ Africa Program Coordinator Angela Quintal about her experience in Tanzania.

Angela Quintal recounts CPJ’s ordeal in Tanzania

Johannesburg, November 13, 2018–“We drove down a dirt road and entered the premises of what appeared to be a safe house, through a large gate. Several men in plain clothes stood in the front yard. At least one appeared to be armed with a rifle. Their animosity was palpable… We were ordered out of the…

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A man walks through rubble in Damascus in October 2018, caused by years of war. Safety remains a key concern for Syrian journalists. (AP/Hassan Ammar)

Damascus journalist has a million stories but none she can safely report

Joudy Boulos has a million stories she wants to write. But as a Syrian freelance journalist living in Damascus, her ability to report is severely limited by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. It is so dangerous that “Joudy Boulos” is a pseudonym the journalist sometimes uses when reporting and to protect her safety.…

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Binali Yıldırım, pictured giving a speech at Turkey's Grand Assembly in March 2018. A court ordered the daily Evrensel to pay damages to the former prime minister over its caricature of him. (AFP/Adem Altan)

Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of November 1, 2018

Journalists in court An Istanbul court on November 5 convicted Yasir Kaya, a sports journalist formerly with Fenerbahçe TV or FBTV, of “being a member of a [terrorist] organization” and sentenced him to six years and three months in prison, according to reports. Kaya remained free pending appeal, according to the report. CPJ previously documented…

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A view of Istanbul's Bosphorus Bridge, taken in August 2018. A Turkish court this week ordered the chief editor of Çağdaş Ses to be detained pending the outcome of her trial. (AFP/Ozan Kose)

Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of October 26, 2018

Journalist freed pending trial An Istanbul court on October 31, ordered Ali Sönmez Kayar, a reporter for the socialist Etkin News Agency (ETHA), to be freed pending trial, the independent news website Bianet reported. Kayar, who is charged with “being a member of a [terrorist] organization,” was released under judicial control and is under a…

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A Saudi Arabia flag and a surveillance camera are seen in the backyard of the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul. Saudi actors are believed to have spied on phone calls and messages between murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi and his friend, Saudi dissident Omar Abdulaziz. (AFP/Ozan Kose)

How the Saudis may have spied on Jamal Khashoggi

Omar Abdulaziz, a 27-year-old Saudi Arabian dissident, can still remember the time Jamal Khashoggi, the storied Saudi journalist, unfollowed him on Twitter. It was in 2015, and Khashoggi had been tapped to head a new TV network called Al-Arab, a partnership between a member of the royal family and Bloomberg. Abdulaziz started haranguing Khashoggi online,…

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A protester wears a mask depicting Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman with painted hands next to people holding posters of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi during the demonstration outside the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul on October 25, 2018. (AFP/Yasin Akgul)

Saudi control of Arab media, lamented by Khashoggi, shapes coverage of his death

It is a cruel irony that Jamal Khashoggi’s last unpublished column for The Washington Post was a call for press freedom in the Arab world. His homeland, Saudi Arabia, has spent the last three decades and hundreds of millions of dollars to ensure that never happens.

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A man at a news kiosk in Brasilia on October 8 reads about the first round of Brazil's elections. CPJ and other rights groups are calling on candidates to denounce threats being made toward the press. (AFP/Evaristo SA)

CPJ joins call for Brazilian presidential candidates to condemn threats against journalists

The Committee to Protect Journalists joined five other rights organizations to call on Brazilian presidential candidates to denounce the threats and violence against journalists covering the electoral campaign, and urge their supports to stop harassing reporters.

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President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan addresses members of Turkey's parliament in Ankara on October 16, 2018. A court convicted three journalists of insulting the president in the pro-Kurdish daily Özgür Gündem. (AFP/Adem Altan)

Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of October 18

Court sentences journalists over Özgür Gündem campaignAn Istanbul court on October 24 sentenced three journalists to jail for “insulting the president” in the now shuttered pro-Kurdish daily Özgür Gündem, the daily Evrensel reported.

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The path(s) to justice in Jamal Khashoggi’s murder

In an emotional address to Turkey’s parliament today, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan described the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi as a savage and premeditated act and demanded that Saudi officials be brought to Turkey to stand trial. Most of the information about the investigation that has emerged has come through leaks to the Turkish…

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A memorial in Valletta for investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, who was murdered in Malta last year. (CPJ)

Efforts to find mastermind in murder of Malta journalist Caruana Galizia stalled

Journalists don’t typically get murdered in Western European democracies that are members of the European Union. Which is why the murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia in Malta last year was so shocking, and the lack of progress on finding the mastermind so disturbing.

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2018