Middle East & North Africa

Iraqi Kurdish political leaders have cultivated an image of freedom and tolerance, but that increasingly clashes with reality. As the independent press has grown more assertive, attacks and arrests have increased.

Joel Campagna: The backstory of this report

New York, May 2, 2008–To mark World Press Freedom Day, Moroccan journalist Mustafa Hormatallah began a three-day hunger strike today to protest his imprisonment in Casablanca, while journalists led by the National Syndicate of the Moroccan Press planned to stage a sit-in on Saturday.

New York, May 2, 2008—To mark World Press Freedom Day, Moroccan journalist Mustafa Hormatallah began a three-day hunger strike today to protest his imprisonment in Casablanca, while journalists led by the National Syndicate of the Moroccan Press planned to stage a sit-in on Saturday.   Hormatallah, a journalist with the independent weekly Al-Watan Al An,…

New York, May 1, 2008–The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the release today of an Al-Jazeera cameraman who was held for six years without charge or trial at the U.S. Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Al-Jazeera reported late this afternoon that Sami al-Haj had been freed and was on a plane that was expected…

May 2008 News from the Committee to Protect Journalists

CPJ’s Impunity Index ranks countries where killers of journalists go free New York, April 30, 2008 — Democracies from Colombia to India and Russia to the Philippines are among the worst countries in the world at prosecuting journalists’ killers according to the Impunity Index, a list of countries compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists…

Tunisia: New York, April 21, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned about the Tunisian government’s increasing harassment of the opposition weekly Al-Mawkif. Over the past month, Tunisian authorities have prevented distribution of 4 issues of Al-Mawkif, published since 1984 by the opposition Progressive Democratic Party (PDP). The paper has been targeted by a…

IRAQ: New York, April 16, 2008—Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein was freed today from U.S. custody in Iraq, ending a two-year ordeal in which he fended off unsubstantiated accusations from the U.S. military that he collaborated with Iraqi insurgents. The AP reported that Hussein was “handed over to AP colleagues on Wednesday in Baghdad.”

New York, April 16, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists mourns the death today of a Reuters cameraman who was killed in the Gaza strip while filming an Israeli tank. Cameraman Fadel Shana, 23, was killed and soundman Wafa Abu Mizyed, also in his 20s, was wounded after the crew stopped their car and began filming…