New York, September 22, 2003—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is dismayed at the results of the U.S. military’s investigation into the August 17 killing of Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana, which concluded that U.S. soldiers acted within the rules of engagement when they shot Dana. “The U.S. military is acting as judge and jury in…
New York, September 22, 2003—Four directors of the Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe (ANZ), the company that owns Zimbabwe’s only independent daily, the Daily News, were arrested today and charged with violating the repressive Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act (AIPPA), according to ANZ Chief Executive Sam Sipepa Nkomo. Earlier today, Nkomo and three…
New York, September 19, 2003—Today, the Ministry of Communications lifted the ban against Radio Publique Africaine (RPA), which was ordered shut “for an indefinite period” on Tuesday, September 16. The order stemmed from an interview the station aired with Pasteur Habimana, a spokesman for the rebel National Liberation Forces, about the government’s closure of the…
New York, September 19, 2003—Indonesia’s Central Jakarta District Court is scheduled to deliver a verdict on Tuesday, September 23 in a case involving police negligence in a March disturbance that injured several journalists. The Jakarta chapter of the Alliance for Independent Journalists’ (AJI) filed the suit on behalf of Tempo magazine journalists. According to AJI’s…
New York, September 19, 2003—Sitaram Baral, the assistant editor of the weekly Janaastha, was released from detention by Nepalese security forces on Wednesday, September 17, according to local journalists. Four days earlier, however, local sources told CPJ that security forces arrested another journalist, Premnath Joshi, editor of the monthly English-language magazine Shangrila Voice. Baral was…
New York, September 19, 2003—Yesterday evening, police again occupied the offices of the Daily News and prevented journalists from putting out a Friday edition of the paper. The move was in defiance of a High Court ruling that same day allowing the newspaper to reopen and directing police to return confiscated equipment. Journalists at the…
New York, September 18, 2003—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) today marked the second anniversary of the Eritrean government’s crackdown on the country’s political opposition and the private press by calling for the release of 17 jailed journalists.[See list of jailed journalists.] With the journalists in prison and no domestic independent media, Eritrea has earned…
New York, September 18, 2003—Lithuanian border guards detained and expelled a film crew from the independent, Moscow-based national television station NTV on Sunday, September 14, after they filmed a protest on a train near the Lithuanian-Russian border. According to Russian and Lithuanian press reports, NTV journalist Vadim Fefilov, cameraman Vladimir Chervyakov, and sound technician Aleksey…
New York, September 18, 2003—Zimbabwe’s High Court ruled today to allow the Daily News, the country’s only independent daily, to resume publishing after being closed for seven days. A High Court judge also ordered authorities to immediately return computers and other equipment confiscated by the police during a Tuesday, September 16, raid on the newspaper’s…
New York, September 17, 2003—In a widening crackdown in Burundi, authorities yesterday closed Radio Publique Africaine (RPA) indefinitely, only days after closing another station, Radio Isanganiro. The shutdown of RPA came after the station broadcast an interview with a rebel spokesman. On September 13, Radio Isanganiro was ordered closed for one week for airing a…