New York, August 26, 2003—Earlier this month, Hiramon Mondol, a correspondent for the daily Dainik Prabarttan, in Khulna, a town in southwestern Bangladesh was brutally assaulted by the police before being taken into custody, and jailed on theft charges. Fearing reprisal from an August 3 article he wrote that accused police and security forces of…
New York, August 26, 2003— In an August 14 letter to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs William J. Burns said that U.S. officials have repeatedly expressed their concern about the ongoing imprisonment of Internet journalist Zouhair Yahyaoui. “In the last week both Acting Assistant Secretary…
New York, August 26, 2003—In an appeal trial heard today, the Hanoi Supreme Court reduced the prison sentence of journalist Pham Hong Son from 13 years to five years. Son is still required to serve three years of administrative detention, or house arrest, upon release. Son’s wife, Vu Thuy Ha, was the only witness allowed…
New York, August 25, 2003— The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemns last week’s incident in which a journalist was killed and another one was seriously injured when the vehicle in which they were traveling was fired on at a checkpoint allegedly guarded by rebels near the town of Puerto Caicedo, in southern Colombia. On…
Nova York, 25 de agosto de 2003—O Comitê para a Proteção dos Jornalistas (CPJ) condena o incidente da semana passada no qual um jornalista foi assassinado e outro seriamente ferido, quando o veículo em que viajavam foi baleado em um posto de controle guardado pelos rebeldes perto da cidade de Puerto Caicedo, no sul da…
New York, August 25, 2003— An Iranian criminal court investigating the death of Canadian-Iranian journalist Zahra Kazemi in July announced today that two interrogators were responsible for her murder. The official news agency IRNA reported that court officials called Kazemi’s death in custody a “quasi intentional murder” and ordered the two interrogators, who were not…
New York, August 22, 2003—Earlier this month, Gambian police assaulted Buya Jammeh, a reporter for the English-language biweekly The Independent, near the newspaper’s offices in the capital, Banjul. According to sources familiar with the incident, on August 9, two police officers stationed a short distance from the newspaper stopped Jammeh on his way to a…
New York, August 22, 2003—Vietnam’s Hanoi Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the appeal of journalist Pham Hong Son on Tuesday, August 26. Son is serving a 13-year sentence on espionage charges. “Pham Hong Son should never have been imprisoned,” said Ann Cooper, the executive director of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). “We believe…
New York, August 21, 2003—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemns the continued detention of South Korean journalists Kim Seung Jin and Geum Myeong Seok in Shanghai. On August 7, Shanghai police arrested Kim and Geum as they were filming North Korean refugees who were attempting to gain asylum by forcibly entering a school run…
New York, August 21, 2003—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemns this week’s murder of journalist Noel Villarante in Santa Cruz, a town in the Philippine’s central Laguna Province. At about 6:30 p.m. on August 19, an unidentified gunman shot Villarante as he was standing in front of his house, according to reports in Philippine…