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New York, February 2, 2022 – Yemen’s Houthi rebels must stop harassing and shuttering media outlets, and should allow all broadcasters to operate freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said on Wednesday. On January 25, Houthi forces raided and shuttered at least five radio stations in Sanaa, the capital, according to the Media Freedom Observatory…

Miami, February 1, 2022 – Cuba’s National Assembly should reject a proposed amendment to the penal code that risks criminalizing funding for independent journalists and media organizations, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Tuesday. On January 20, Cuba’s Supreme Tribunal proposed a bill amending the penal code to prohibit Cuban citizens from receiving foreign funding,…

Three Philippine news websites, ABS-CBN News, Rappler, and Vera Files, publicized separate distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks between December 11 and 23, 2021. The attacks flood websites with requests to prevent them from functioning, and the sites were periodically forced offline by huge spikes in traffic coinciding with political news coverage. All three sites have been…

Lawmakers’ whispers, eyerolls, and other hints about the course of debate are no longer visible to journalists covering the state Senates in Kansas and Iowa.   In a break with decades of precedent, journalists in both states have been barred from the Senate floors, instead relegated to designated media galleries upstairs. Mike Pirner, communications director…

New York, January 31, 2022–Botswana authorities should retract or reform a bill that could help police and other investigators intercept journalists’ communications without oversight, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Monday. The Criminal Procedure and Evidence (Controlled Investigation) Bill was published in the government gazette on January 12, according to a press release by local…

One year since a democracy-suspending coup, press freedom is dying in Myanmar. A military campaign of intimidation, censorship, arrests, and detentions of journalists has more recently graduated to outright killing, an escalation of repression that aims ultimately to stop independent media reporting on the junta’s crimes and abuses. In January, military authorities abducted local news…

Fatima Khan had just returned home from a reporting assignment when she discovered she’d become of more than 100 women listed as being “for sale” in the notorious app Bulli Bai. The site, named by combining a vulgar, derogatory slang for Muslim women (bulli) with the Hindi word for female servant (bai), operated by pulling…

Abuja, January 31, 2022 — Ghanaian authorities should swiftly identify and hold to account the people behind the recent attack on the Radio Ada FM broadcaster, and ensure that journalists can work safely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Monday. At about 11:30 a.m. on January 13, ten masked men forced open a studio door…

Syrian journalist Amer Matar was regularly blindfolded, handcuffed, and beaten with cables, whips, and fists during the eight months he was held in a Syrian prison. When a German court sentenced one of his torturers – Syrian army colonel Anwar Raslan – to life in prison earlier this month, Matar finally felt that at least…

Throughout the pandemic journalists have played a crucial role informing the public about the risks of COVID-19.  The global situation continues to evolve, and many countries are increasing or relaxing travel restrictions and safety measures as coronavirus variants of concern are identified, and as the COVID-19 vaccination program gathers pace. Basic COVID-19 mitigation Consider getting…