Syria / Middle East & North Africa

  
A worker cleans a EU flag in Berlin on May 19, 2017. The EU parliament is due to vote on October 12 on a proposed review mechanism of surveillance tool exports. (AFP/John MacDougall)

Press at risk as EU-based companies export surveillance software to hostile regimes

In August, Danish Foreign Minister Anders Samuelsen told the daily newspaper Information that the government had authorized sales of online surveillance software to several Middle Eastern countries. While acknowledging the potential for human rights violations that could result from the use of these tools, the minister said that Denmark has an interest in the fight…

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Members of the Kurdish Security Forces, Asayish, distribute food for prisoners inside Derick central prison, in the east of Syrian Kurdish city of Qamishli on September 10, 2015. Asyish is holding Zagros TV reporter Barzan Liani at Navkour Jail in the village of Qamishli. (Reuters/Rodi Said)

Kurdish security forces detain local reporter, whereabouts unknown

New York, September 29, 2017-Kurdish security forces in northern Syria should immediately release Ibrahim Ali al-Suleiman, a local reporter for the independent Euphrates Post, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Members of Asayish, the security force for the defacto authorities of the Rojava region in northern Syria, on September 15 detained al-Suleiman at his…

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Journalist for Syrian Media Organization killed in roadside bombing

Beirut, August 23, 2017–The regional director of the rebel-affiliated Syrian Media Organization was killed August 21 in a roadside bombing in the southwestern province of Daraa, according to the group’s executive director Abu al-Majd al-Zoabi.

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Children play in an inflatable castle in the rebel-held city of Douma, Syria, June 26, 2017. (Reuters/Bassem Khabieh)

Court sentences two Syrian journalists for blasphemy, shutters magazine

The Court of First Instance of the Second Criminal Court of the Syrian city of Douma, which is under the control of the rebel group the Army of Islam, on July 11, 2017, sentenced Shawkat Gharz al-Din, a journalist for Rising for Freedom, and Laila Safadi, the editor of the magazine, to two months in…

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A damaged building is seen in Raqqa, Syria, July 28, 2017. (Reuters/Rodi Said)

Syrian journalist killed near Homs

New York, July 31, 2017–The death of Khaled al-Khateb, a Syrian freelance correspondent for the Russian government-funded broadcaster RT’s Arabic-language service, in Homs province yesterday is a tragic reminder of the risks journalists face covering Syria’s conflict, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

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CPJ calls for release of Zagros TV journalist detained in Syria

The Committee to Protect Journalists writes to the co-chairs of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria and authorities governing the Cizire Canton in Syria, to request the release of Zagros TV journalist Barzan Hussein Liani, whom security forces detained in May.

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Kurdish security forces, or Asayish, feed prisoners in Derick Central Prison in Qamishli, northern Syria, November 16, 2016. (Reuters/Rodi Said)

Kurdish security forces detain TV journalist in Syria

New York, May 17, 2017–Kurdish security forces in northern Syria should immediately release Zagros TV journalist Barzan Hussein Liani, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Members of the Asayish, the security force for the de facto government of the Rojava region in northern Syria, on May 13 detained Liani as they patrolled the area…

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Being a Target

A reporter learns how to dodge terrorist threats to get the story By Rukmini Callimachi The convoy of cars flying al-Qaeda’s black flag swept across northern Mali in 2012. Within weeks, it felt like a curtain had been drawn.

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Zone of Silence

The public is robbed of information when journalists are murdered By Robert Mahoney Journalist Avijit Roy founded the blog “Mukto-Mona,” or Free Thinker, as a forum for free expression and ideas that challenged the growing religious intolerance in his native Bangladesh. His blog for intellectual freedom cost him his life.

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Where I’ve Never Set Foot

Barred from Syria, a journalist must make sense of what she’s told By Alessandria Masi The morning after the attack, my deputy editor and I lit cigarettes as we squatted on the green couch in our closet-size Beirut office, hanging out the window and talking about what we thought had really happened in Syria.

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