Letters

Dear Mr. González Rodas, The Committee to Protect Journalists is greatly concerned for the safety of journalists in Guatemala, based on information we have received from the Centro para la Defensa de la Libertad de Expresión (CEDEX), a Guatemalan press freedom organization. According to a CEDEX communiqué sent yesterday, May 18, at least four reporters for the Guatemala City daily elPeriódico were threatened or intimidated while the newspaper was preparing an investigative article about a secret intelligence operation.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply disturbed by recent serious press freedom violations in Sierra Leone. We are particularly concerned about the continued illegal detention of Abdoul Kouyateh, acting editor of the private Freetown weekly Wisdom Newspaper.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is gravely concerned about government restrictions on press freedom in Morocco this year. During the past four months, Moroccan authorities have taken several punitive measures against the press, including the censorship of newspapers and the criminal prosecution of journalists.

Your Excellency: CPJ is gravely concerned by your government’s further tightening of censorship restrictions governing coverage of the civil war between the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The recent regulations are the most draconian ever imposed on the media in Sri Lanka, according to local journalists.

Your Excellency, The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is alarmed by yesterday’s raid on the head office of Media-Most, the company that owns NTV Television, Ekho Moskvy radio, the daily newspaper Segodnya and the weekly news magazine Itogi.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is outraged by the prison sentences recently imposed on free-lance journalist Rafael Marques and on Aguiar dos Santos, publisher of the private weekly newspaper Agora.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply disturbed by the recent attack on the Surabaya-based daily newspaper Jawa Pos by members of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the grassroots Muslim organization that you chaired for fifteen years before becoming president of Indonesia.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is writing to strongly protest the prosecution of Hisham Basharaheel, the editor in chief and publisher of the independent thrice-weekly newspaper Al-Ayyam.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemns the May 2 murder of Sufi Mohammad Khan, an investigative reporter with the Daily Ummat Karachi. While we are relieved that the gunman and two accomplices are now in police custody, we believe, based on interviews with local sources, that others involved in this crime may still be at large. We call on you to ensure that a complete and impartial investigation is carried out.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is disturbed by the continued detention of Hippolyte Agboh, publisher of the private weekly L’Exilé, who is being prosecuted on criminal defamation charges. We are equally concerned about the recent spate of reprisals against news organizations that have criticized your government.