Gunmen attack newspaper in Acapulco
New York, November 12, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned Wednesday’s shooting attack against Mexican newspaper El Sur in the port city of Acapulco, Guerrero state. Unidentified armed men fired at the paper and then stormed into the newsroom and threatened to set it on fire, according to local news reports and CPJ interviews.
Russia reopens investigation into Beketov attack
New York, November 11, 2010–Russia’s top investigator, Aleksandr Bastrykin, today ordered the reopening of a probe into a near-lethal November 2008 attack on Mikhail Beketov, editor of the independent newspaper Khimkinskaya Pravda. Bastrykin’s order comes a day after a court in the Moscow suburb of Khimki convicted Beketov of criminally slandering local mayor Vladimir Strelchenko.…
Beketov convicted of defamation, his assailants still at large
New York, November 10, 2010–A court in the Moscow suburb of Khimki today convicted Mikhail Beketov, the editor of the independent newspaper Khimkinskaya Pravda, of criminally slandering Khimki’s mayor, Vladimir Strelchenko, in a 2007 television interview. Beketov, who is in a wheelchair and unable to speak two years after a near-lethal attack, was wheeled into the courtroom for…
Egypt should free blogger held beyond his term
New York, November 10, 2010–Egyptian authorities must immediately release blogger Abdel Karim Suleiman, known online as Karim Amer, who completed his four-year prison sentence on November 5, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. CPJ also calls on authorities to investigate and punish a security officer who reportedly assaulted Amer on Tuesday.
Moroccan authorities impeding Spanish journalists
New York, November 9, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by an increasing climate of hostility for Spanish journalists in Morocco, highlighted by official measures to prevent Spanish journalists from covering clashes in the Western Sahara. CPJ calls on Rabat to allow journalists to do their work unimpeded.
CPJ welcomes release of Puntland journalist
New York, November 8, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the presidential pardon and release today of radio journalist Abdifatah Jama, who was imprisoned in August for airing an interview with an Islamist rebel leader in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland. CPJ had repeatedly called for his release.Jama, deputy director of Horseed Media, had begun serving a six-year prison sentence after being…
Russian reporters beaten; both covered highway project
New York, November 8, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists denounces two attacks on journalists in the Moscow region and calls on authorities to end impunity in crimes against reporters in Russia. Both victims, Oleg Kashin of the business daily Kommersant and Anatoly Adamchuk of the independent weekly Zhukovskiye Vesti, have covered a contentious highway project…
Japanese journalist held by Burmese government
New York, November 8, 2010–Burma must immediately release Toru Yamaji, a reporter with Tokyo-based APF news agency, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Yamaji, 49, was detained Sunday in Myawaddy, on the country’s eastern border with Thailand while trying to cover the country’s first elections in two decades, according to international media reports, which quoted Japan’s embassy in Rangoon. He…