Attacks on the Press: From Uprisings, Trends to Watch
The Middle East’s political shifts changed conditions for journalists dramatically. The emerging trends favor free expression, but are filled with ambiguity and depend on the political configurations to emerge after the revolutionary dust has settled. By Mohamed Abdel Dayem
Reporter’s Death Puts Focus on Difficulties of Covering a Secretive Syria
In search of the truth in Syria, foreign correspondents face unprecedented restrictions and are often left with choice of sneaking into the country using dangerous overland smuggling routes, or not going at all. Violence in the country has already claimed 4 journalists, and the difficult journey itself led to the death of Anthony Shadid, who…
In Ecuador, a crushed and silenced democracy
The sentence against Ecuadoran newspaper El Universo, its opinion editor, Emilio Palacio Urrutia, and its three top executives, Carlos Eduardo Pérez Barriga, César Enrique Pérez Barriga, and Carlos Nicolás Pérez Lapentti, for supposed offenses against Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa in Palacio’s article “NO to lies,” is a worn-out manifestation of the perverse concept of public…
BBC reporter attacked in Yemen three times in past year
New York, February 17, 2012–Yemeni authorities must ensure the safety and protection of journalists covering protests in the country and allow them to carry out their work freely, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today after a BBC Arabic correspondent was attacked for the third time in a year.
CPJ mourns the death of journalist Anthony Shadid
New York, February 16, 2012–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply saddened by the death of New York Times foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid, a towering figure in international crisis reporting. Shadid perished following an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.
In China, journalists attacked while covering land dispute
New York, February 16, 2012–The Committee to Protect Journalists is disturbed by a series of violent attacks on international journalists that appear aimed at suppressing coverage of land-related protests in Panhe, in eastern China’s Zhejiang province.
El Universo verdict bad precedent for free press in Americas
New York, February 16, 2012–Today’s decision by Ecuador’s highest court to uphold the criminal libel conviction brought by President Rafael Correa against El Universo represents a serious blow to freedom of expression and a setback for democracy, the Committee to Protect Journalists said.
Rwandan exiled journalist comes out of hiding
I must have received at least a dozen communications from worried friends and colleagues, asking the whereabouts of the chief editor of the highly critical Rwandan website, Umuvugizi. By mid-January, no one had heard from John Bosco Gasasira, nothing new had been published on Umuvugizi since January 11, and his cell phones were switched off.…
CPJ urges Kazakhstan to stop repressing media
Dear President Nazarbayev: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply disturbed by the ongoing crackdown by Kazakhstan’s security service, the KNB, against independent journalists. The imprisonment of Vzglyad editor Igor Vinyavsky and interrogations of independent reporters by KNB agents appear to be reprisals for critical reporting on government policies, including a December 2011 confrontation in which authorities killed civilians.