CPJ in joint call for release of bloggers, activists in Bahrain
CPJ is among 50 organizations that have signed a joint letter to Bahrain’s king calling for the release of detained bloggers, activists, and human rights defenders and to drop all charges that violate the right to peaceful expression ahead of the Formula One motor racing event to be held in Manama on April 22.
A year of repression: Bahrain continues crackdown on press
In the year since peaceful protests began in Bahrain on February 14, 2011, the government has targeted the press corps with assault, detention, harassment, and torture to obstruct their coverage. My organization, the Gulf Centre for Human Rights, has documented a systematic campaign by authorities to silence coverage of our country’s unrest. Here are just…
Awardees to their colleagues: Buck the system
The Grand Ballroom of the Waldorf Astoria might seem like an odd venue to stage a call for resistance. Nine hundred people in tuxedos and gowns. Champagne and cocktails. Bill Cunningham snapping photos. This combination is generally more likely to coax a boozy nostalgia than foment a revolution. But the journalists honored last night at…
Kings, queens, and torture in Bahrain
Queen Margrethe II of Denmark visited Bahrain in February at the invitation of King Hamad ibn Isa Al Khalifa. As part of the official program, the queen honored Hamad with the “Storkorset af Dannebrog,” the second highest Danish royal order. Although the visit took place about two weeks before Bahraini authorities began a violent crackdown…
Libya’s disordered Internet
Craig Labowitz at Arbor has been sifting through the evidence of how countries in the Middle East have been blocking and throttling the Internet in the last week. His analysis indicates that while both Bahrain and Yemen had periods of slowed or impaired access, only Libya seems to have taken the drastic step of shutting off the…
Internet blotter
CPJ protested the arrest of Bahrain blogger Ali Abdel Imam back in September — The Wall Street Journal has a story on his continuing detainment. Activism around the imprisonment of Canadian-Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan continues: PEN Canada is focusing on his case and Canada and France’s foreign ministers have urged his release. Local Thai ISPs are…
Why governments don’t need RIM to crack the BlackBerry
The United Arab Emirates’ Telecommunications Regulation Authority (TRA) announced on Sunday that it would be suspending BlackBerry “messenger, e-mail and Web-browsing services” in the country from October 11, until these “applications were in full compliance with UAE regulations.” Given the popularity of the BlackBerry platform in the country (an estimated 500,000 users from a population of 4.5 million) one…