Iran

The notion that three American hikers could innocently wander across the border from Iraqi Kurdistan into Iran has elicited some understandable skepticism. But a statement from their friend who stayed behind in his hotel because he was ill helps explain how the situation unfolded. 

Roxana Saberi, who was imprisoned in Iran for nearly four months, published a statement on her personal Web site to Euna Lee and Laura Ling after their release from North Korea on Tuesday. Saberi had previously expressed her support for the two imprisoned journalists in an interview with CPJ on June 9.

CPJ will be collecting signatures until July 31 on a Facebook petition in support of Maziar Bahari, Newsweek’s Tehran correspondent, who is being held without charge in Iran.

Dear Mr. Cabello: The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned by your recent announcement that regulators may revoke the concessions of 240 radio stations for failing to update their registration papers. We believe that this decision is yet another attempt by Venezuelan authorities to expand pro-government media, control the flow of information, and suppress dissent.

July 2009News from the Committee to Protect Journalists

New York, July 16, 2009–Distributors blocked the July 4-10 edition of The Economist from entering Thailand for an article that covered the mounting threat of lese majeste complaints to the country’s Internet freedom and freedom of expression, according to a local distributor and international news reports. 

More than 100 prominent journalists from 47 countries sent a petition to the Iranian government today calling for the immediate release of Maziar Bahari, Newsweek’s Tehran correspondent, who has been held without charge in an Iranian jail since June 21. Compiled by CPJ, Index on Censorship, and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, the petition was…

This week CPJ congratulated the House sponsors of a bill that would expand the breadth and depth of the State Department’s annual reporting to Congress on press freedom abuses worldwide. The Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act passed the House last month; now the bill is being redrafted for the Senate by the Committee…

Newsweek has issued a statement on the detention of correspondent Maziar Bahari, who is detained in Iran. Newsweek points out that Bahari’s work over many years has been “accurate, even-handed, and widely respected.” The statement follows…

Nina Ognianova, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, provided testimony to the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe on the pressing issue of impunity in journalist murders in Russia. The commission held a hearing this week on Russia’s human rights record. A transcript of the testimony follows: