2005

Your Highness: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply concerned by recent statements Your Highness made threatening to suspend or shut down newspapers that publish information related to the Kuwaiti government’s current fight against religious extremists.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply disturbed by an ongoing government ban on news programming on Radio Dzialandzé Mutsamudu (RDM), a popular, privately owned station based in Mutsamudu, capital of the semi-autonomous island of Anjouan.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is heartened by your stated commitment to improve the poor press freedom climate in Ukraine. There is much to be remedied–and many benefits to be gained–as your administration ushers in what is widely hoped to be a new democratic era.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply disturbed that the Ministry of Justice suspended two Arabic-language weeklies. According to press reports and local journalists, intelligence agents notified the editors of the Oujda-based weeklies Al-Sharq and Al-Hayat Al-Maghribiya on January 18 that they were to cease publication of their weeklies immediately for three months on order of the ministry.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is writing to protest the continued detention of Mohamed al-Oshen, editor-in-chief of the Riyadh-based Islamist weekly Al-Mohayed, who has been in detention for almost two weeks.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the recent jailing of Jules Koum Koum, publication director of the private bimonthly Le Jeune Observateur, on criminal defamation charges. Two journalists are now imprisoned in Cameroon for their work.

Dear Ambassador Brotodiningrat: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned by restrictions imposed by the Indonesian government on reporting in the province of Aceh, which suffered so much in the December 26 tsunami. We urge your government to lift the limitations immediately so journalists can fully document the massive international humanitarian effort.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by a series of criminal convictions handed down against several Yemeni newspaper editors and reporters in reprisal for their work. These convictions have severely undermined press freedom in Yemen.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the recent violent attack on journalists by government security forces. On Tuesday, January 4, police acting as security at a meeting of the National Executive Council of Your Excellency’s ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the capital, Abuja, assaulted at least 10 journalists who were covering the meeting.