Attacks on the Press 2010: Tunisia
Top Developments • Targeting journalists, government criminalizes contact with foreign organizations. • Private broadcast licenses are controlled by Ben Ali’s family and friends. Key Statistic 5: Years of imprisonment for violations of new law barring contact with foreign groups. Tunisia remained one of the region’s most repressive nations even as it sought to project an…
Attacks on the Press 2010: Turkey
Top Developments • Authorities use anti-terror, defamation, security laws to prosecute journalists. • EU criticizes press record, citing prosecutions, insufficient legal guarantees. Key Statistic 0: Convictions obtained in the 2007 slaying of editor Hrant Dink. Authorities paraded journalists into court on anti-terror, criminal defamation, and state security charges as they tried to suppress critical news…
Attacks on the Press 2010: Yemen
Top Developments • Special press and security courts are used to silence probing journalists. • Redlines bar critical coverage of civil unrest, terrorism, corruption. Key Statistic 29: Days that reporter Abulelah Shaea was held incommunicado after being seized by security agents. The government pursued a widening array of repressive tactics, prompting many journalists to say…
Attacks on the Press 2010: Middle East and North Africa Developments
ATTACKS ON THE PRESS: 2010 • Main Index Middle East and North Africa: • Suppression Under the Cover of National Security Country Summaries • Egypt • Iran • Iraq • Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory • Lebanon • Morocco • Sudan • Tunisia • Turkey • Yemen • Other nations ALGERIA In September, police…
Guardian correspondent expelled from Russia
New York, February 8, 2011–The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Russian authorities today to allow Luke Harding, Moscow correspondent for the U.K. Guardian, to return to Russia and resume his work. Harding, at left, was refused entry to Russia on Saturday.The journalist had temporarily returned to London in the fall to report on U.S.…
Internet freedom on trial in Thailand
Hearings commenced today in the trial of Chiranuch Premchaiporn, executive director of the Thailand-based independent news website Prachatai. She stands accused of 10 different violations of the country’s draconian 2007 Computer Crime Act (CCA), each of which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison.
Mubarak intensifies press attacks with assaults, detentions
New York, February 3, 2011–Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak unleashed an unprecedented and systematic attack on international media today as his supporters assaulted reporters in the streets while security forces began obstructing and detaining journalists covering the unrest that threatens to topple his government.
A Cuban journalist in exile: Unkept promises
The clouds of exile are twice as bitter. Being forced from your birthplace and into legal limbo in the land of your grandparents where you’re met by complete official abandonment only deepens the wounds. My gloominess has nothing to do with the affection and solidarity shown by the Spanish people, especially the citizens of Madrid.…
Facebook enables encryption: a first step on the right road
Facebook is rolling out a a new feature starting today: its users now have an option in their account settings that will protectively encrypt all their Facebook activity as it travels over the Internet. Flipping the switch won’t change much about how you use Facebook, but you’ll see Facebook web addresses will always start with…