Yemen / Middle East & North Africa

  
A pro-government fighter sits on the back of a military truck during clashes with Houthi fighters in the southwestern city of Taiz, Yemen on June 2, 2017. Photographer Mohammad al-Quadasi was killed in a missile strike in the Taiz governorate on January 22, 2018. (Reuters/Anees Mahyoub)

Missile strike kills local Yemeni photographer

New York, January 22, 2018–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the killing of Yemeni photographer Mohammad al-Qadasi in a missile strike allegedly by the Ansar Allah movement. Al-Qadasi, who worked for the privately owned Belqees TV station, was killed today in the Khayami area of Taiz governorate while on assignment, the channel’s director general Ahmed…

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A Houthi militant takes part in a parade held to mark 1,000 days of the Saudi-led military intervention in the Yemeni conflict, in Sanaa, Yemen on December 19, 2017. (Reuters/Khaled Abdullah)

Yemeni authorities force local Al Jazeera station to close

New York, January 10, 2018–The Yemeni government should allow the Qatari broadcaster Al-Jazeera to immediately reopen its Taiz office, and permit journalists in Yemen to do their jobs unencumbered, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Soldiers acting on orders from the Taiz Governorate Security Committee closed the office yesterday, according to Saeed Thabit Saeed,…

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Tribesmen loyal to the Houthi movement hold their weapons as they attend a gathering to mark 1,000 days of the Saudi-led military intervention in the Yemeni conflict, in Sanaa, Yemen December 21, 2017. (Reuters/Mohamed al-Sayaghi)

In Houthi-controlled Yemen, silence, exile, or detention; at least 13 journalists held

Torture. Denial of medical care. Repeated interrogations and accusations of collaborating with enemies: Yemeni journalist Youssef Ajlan’s story of his detention, which lasted over a year, hews closely to those of many journalists imprisoned for their work.

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A Houthi fighter stands on a truck outside the house of Yemen's former president Ali Abdullah Saleh after Saleh was killed, in Sanaa, Yemen December 4, 2017. (Reuters/Khaled Abdullah)

Yemeni TV guards injured, others taken hostage by Houthi forces

New York, December 4, 2017 — Gunmen from the Ansar Allah movement, commonly known as the Houthis, on December 2 stormed the Sanaa headquarters of the television channel Yemen Today and detained the channel’s employees, according to news reports. Mohammed Ghobari, a Reuters correspondent in Sanaa, told CPJ that at least three building guards were…

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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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A soldier holds a rifle with photos of Yemen's former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, right, and his son, Ahmed, during a rally in Sanaa, Yemen on August 24, 2017. (Reuters/Khaled Abdullah)

Unidentified armed group abducts local journalist in Yemen

New York, August 24, 2017–The Committee to Protect Journalists today called for the immediate release of freelance journalist Abdel-Raheem Mohsin who was abducted on August 22 in southwestern Yemen near the city of Taiz.

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Artist and activist Thiyazen al-Alawi paints a mural on a wall of a hospital in Sanaa as part of a cholera-awareness campaign. In one of the biggest outbreaks of the disease in modern history, more than 425,000 people in Yemen have contracted cholera, nearly 2,000 of whom have died, since the Saudi-led coalition began bombing the country in 2015. (REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah)

Yemeni journalists injured in airstrike

Shawqi Hussein, a reporter for the broadcaster Al-Maseerah, and cameraman Kamal al-Kabsi were injured in an airstrike on July 30, 2017, in the Shabwa province town of Bayhan, Yahya al-Kabsi, a graphic designer in Al-Maseerah’s Beirut office, told CPJ.

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Mohammed al-Hudhaifi, the father of Takieddin al-Hudhaifi, looks at the body of his son, who was killed covering fighting in the Yemeni city of Taiz, May 26, 2016. (Reuters/Anes Mahyoub)

Two journalists killed, two injured in Yemeni city of Taiz

New York, May 30, 2017–The deaths of two journalists and the serious injury of two others in the Yemeni city of Taiz late last week are a grim reminder of the risks journalists face reporting on the two-year-old conflict, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

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Houthis fighters secure a road between Hodeidah and Sanaa in Yemen on April 19, 2017. Journalists have been threatened and attacked in areas controlled by the Houthis. (AP/Hani Mohammed)

Collapse of state institutions leaves Yemeni journalists vulnerable

A journalist dies mysteriously in Yemen after receiving threats because of his work, and the resulting autopsy raises more questions than answers. A columnist in the same country is sentenced to death on espionage charges in an opaque trial.

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Journalist killings ease from record highs as murders down, combat deaths up

Deadly violence against the media eased in 2016 from recent record levels as the number of journalists singled out for murder declined. A CPJ special report by Elana Beiser and Elisabeth Witchel

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