New York, December 8, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by an anonymous death threat made against Drago Hedl, editor of the independent Croatian satirical weekly Feral Tribune. Hedl said on Wednesday he received a letter mailed December 5 in his home city of Osijek that in letters cut from newspapers threatened to kill…
New York, December 7, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by draft legislation that makes criticism of authoritarian President Aleksandr Lukashenko and his government punishable by up to five years in prison. The lower house of parliament passed amendments to the Penal Code on December 2, a move criticized by the United States and…
New York, December 7, 2005 — A Cuban journalist detained without charge for nearly five months has lost 30 pounds (13.5 kilograms) in prison and is suffering from serious health problems his wife told the Committee to Protect Journalists. Oscar Mario González, a journalist with the independent news agency, Grupo de Trabajo Decoro, was arrested…
New York, December 7, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the eight-month jail sentence for criminal libel handed down by the Federal High Court to a journalist already in prison as part of Ethiopia’s ongoing crackdown on the independent media. On Tuesday, the court convicted Wosonseged Gebrekidan, former editor of the Amharic-language weekly Ethiop, of…
New York, December 7, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by an apparent government attempt to intimidate journalists from the independent daily Al-Ayyam by sending elite Yemeni Republican Guards to its Aden office. Around 1 a.m. on December 5, five soldiers in a gray-blue Mercedes circled Al-Ayyam’s headquarters several times before asking to meet…
New York, December 6, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is shocked and saddened by the crash today of an Iranian military plane that claimed the lives of more than 100 people, mostly journalists. An Iranian C-130 military transport plane crashed into a Tehran apartment building, killing its 10 person crew and all 84 passengers, who…
New York, December 6, 2005—The Moscow City Court today held a preliminary hearing behind closed doors for three men accused in the July 2004 murder of Forbes Russia editor-in-chief Paul Klebnikov. The court ordered a jury trial to begin December 29, Moscow radio station Ekho Moskvy reported. The Committee to Protect Journalists has urged prosecutors…
New York, December 5, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is outraged by news that Eritrean journalist Dawit Isaac was returned to jail just two days after being released in mid-November. Isaac is one of 15 Eritrean journalists who have been jailed incommunicado and without charge or forced into extended military service following a September 2001…
New York, December 5, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is outraged by news that Eritrean journalist Dawit Isaac was returned to jail just two days after being released in mid-November. Isaac is one of 15 Eritrean journalists who have been jailed incommunicado and without charge or forced into extended military service following a September 2001…
New York, December 5, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by the continued imprisonment of Salifou Soumaila Abdoulkarim, director of the private weekly Le Visionnaire. Abdoulkarim was sentenced on Friday to two months in jail and a symbolic one-franc CFA fine for allegedly defaming State Treasurer Siddo Elhadj. “Jailing journalists for critical reporting…