Iran

Bangkok, March 6, 2009–On the same day that Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva told a meeting of news editors of his intention to restore Thailand’s press freedom reputation, police officials raided the offices and arrested the executive director of a popular online news site, Prachatai. 

New York, March 6, 2009–The Sri Lankan government should release a journalist and his two colleagues who have spent a year behind bars on terrorism charges for publishing magazine articles, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

New York, March 5, 2009–The Committee to Protect Journalists has seen a groundswell of support for Roxana Saberi, an American journalist who is being held without charge at Tehran’s Evin prison, through its Facebook petition. Saberi, 31, was detained at the end of January and has not been heard from since February 10. She is…

CPJ will be collecting signatures until midnight tonight on a Facebook petition in support of Roxana Saberi, an American journalist who is being held without charge at Tehran’s Evin prison.

New York, March 3, 2009–A spokesman for Iran’s judiciary said at a press conference today that freelance U.S. journalist Roxana Saberi is being held at Tehran’s Evin prison, where political prisoners are routinely detained, according to international news reports. Saberi is an American citizen as well as an Iranian national.

Carl Bernstein discusses his preface. Table of Contents Preface by Carl Bernstein Introduction by Joel Simon Journalists Killed Journalists in Prison Regional Analyses AFRICA: In Text-Message Reporting, Opportunity and Risk AMERICAS: Drug Trade, Violent Gangs Pose Grave Danger ASIA: Media Freedom Stalls as China Sets the Course EUROPE and CENTRAL ASIA: Conquering Television to Control…

CPJ’s launch yesterday in Cairo of our 2008 edition of Attacks on the Press received widespread coverage in the Egyptian, regional, and international media. But not from the state media, which made little mention of Egypt’s ongoing repression of the country’s press, or of the astonishing number of lawsuits the government has pending against journalists,…

Uneasy about satellite television coverage of civil strife and economic hardship, Arab governments are trying to reassert control over the medium. Will a new regional agreement halt the satellite revolution? By Joel Campagna

The Georgia-Russia crisis in August diverted international attention from another strategically important Caucasus country–oil-rich Azerbaijan. The authoritarian president, Ilham Aliyev, gained a new term in a flawed October 15 vote. Aliyev, who effectively inherited the presidency from his father, Heydar, in 2003, defeated six virtual unknowns after top opposition parties boycotted the October vote to…