Features & Analysis

What you can do: Write a letter to your Iranian embassy or mission, and have your friends write letters too. Respectful language and a moderate tone will be most helpful for Roxana Saberi. 

CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon spoke extensively to CNN.com’s Tom Watkins about the huge number of journalists imprisoned for their work around the globe. The piece comes at a time when two high profile cases–that of Roxana Saberi in Iran, and Euna Lee and Laura Ling in North Korea–have put the spotlight on jailed journalists. Read…

CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon and Senior Program Coordinator Carlos Lauría co-authored an op-ed that appeared today in the Spanish-language El Universal, a national paper based in Mexico City. The piece examines the importance of protecting freedom of expression in Mexico in light of increased violence and U.S. President Barack Obama’s recent meeting with counterpart Felipe Calderón.

CPJ’s Robert Mahoney says in an interview with NPR that Roxana Saberi’s trial was not transparent. He urges restrained rhetoric but continued advocacy and diplomacy with Iran. 

China’s National Human Rights Action Plan for 2009-2010 (English/Chinese), released Monday, contained plenty for the domestic media to praise, but enough omissions for international rights activists to jump on. 

The Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility reports today that a Philippine court has denied a motion to dismiss murder charges against two government officials accused of ordering the 2005 murder of journalist Marlene Garcia-Esperat.

Eyewitnesses saw him being led away. “We were in our Banjul newsroom on July 7, 2006, working on the next issue of the Daily Observer, when two plainclothes officers with the Gambian National Intelligence Agency approached Chief,” wrote Observer editor and correspondent Ousman Darboe. “I knew one of the officers as a Corporal Sey. They…

Clarence Page, the Chicago Tribune columnist and CPJ board member, is disappointed the Congressional Black Caucus ignored human rights violations, including the imprisonment of journalists, during its recent visit to Cuba. In his column, Page notes that Cuba is now jailing 21 editors and writers, making it the world’s second-leading jailer of journalists.

“Get that guy–he’s a reporter.” The order, shouted in Burmese amid the chilling sound of gunfire, can be heard in the preview of the new documentary, “Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country” by Danish filmmaker Anders Ostergaard. The preview also includes the now-notorious footage of a Burmese soldier fatally shooting Japanese cameraman Kenji Nagai…