Middle East & North Africa
2009
Canadian delegation should raise Tunisia’s poor record
Dear members of the Canada-Africa Parliamentary Association: Having learned of your coming visit to Tunisia, the Committee to Protect Journalists wishes to bring to your attention the Tunisian government’s unrelenting harassment of independent journalists and its routine use of plainclothes police and the judiciary to retaliate against critical voices.
Launching ‘Attacks on the Press’ in Cairo
CPJ’s launch yesterday in Cairo of our 2008 edition of Attacks on the Press received widespread coverage in the Egyptian, regional, and international media. But not from the state media, which made little mention of Egypt’s ongoing repression of the country’s press, or of the astonishing number of lawsuits the government has pending against journalists,…
Algerian author’s manuscript confiscated
Algerian police confiscated journalist Mohamed Benchicou’s new manuscript, The Journal a Free Man, from a printing plant in Blida, south of Algiers. In a statement posted on several news Web sites, Benchicou said security forces raided the printer and ordered the director to cease the printing job. The raid came a few days before Algeria…
An Iraqi cameraman’s pursuit of surgery continues
When Iraqi cameraman Jehad Ali came to the United States last September to have corrective surgery for severe injuries he sustained in a December 2005 attack by gunmen in Baghdad, the plan was to spend two months in Valencia, California. Orthopedic surgeon Dr. Donald Wiss had offered to waive his fee and the Henry Mayo Newhall…
Attacks on the Press in 2008: Preface
By Carl Bernstein When the Committee to Protect Journalists was founded in 1981, the prevailing threats to freedom of the press around the world were still from juntas, dictators, authoritarian regimes, and social systems determined to dominate the media as a means of maintaining control over citizens, usually within the boundaries of the nation-state. Toward…
Attacks on the Press in 2008: Introduction
By Joel Simon In 2008, the numbers of journalists killed and jailed both dropped for the first time since the war on terror was launched in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. This is welcome news, but it is tempered by harsh realities. The war on terror had a devastating effect on journalists, and…
Attacks on the Press in 2008: Egypt
Egypt took a lead role in developing a regional charter designed to restrict satellite broadcasting throughout the Arab world. At the behest of President Hosni Mubarak, parliament extended the 27-year-old Emergency Law, keeping intact for two additional years a key tool for stifling free expression. In this environment, journalists continued to fend off a rash…
Attacks on the Press in 2008: Iran
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s economic policies and human rights record drew widespread criticism from academics, activists, and journalists. In response, Ahmadinejad sought to suppress independent media by manipulating government subsidies, exerting censorship, and using the punitive tools of detention and harassment.
Attacks on the Press in 2008: Iraq
Eleven journalists were killed because of their work, making Iraq the most dangerous nation for the press for the sixth consecutive year. Nevertheless, the figure was the lowest yearly toll since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003–and two-thirds lower than the annual figures for 2007 or 2006.