Rafael Marques

New York, July 13, 2001 — Authorities in Angola detained journalist and human-rights activist Rafael Marques this afternoon for approximately one hour, according to Angolan sources. Marques was covering the government’s forced relocation of residents from the Boavista district of Luanda to a camp in Viana (approximately 40 km outside Luanda). He, along with other…

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) strongly protests your government’s continued harassment of journalist Rafael Marques, who was refused the right to leave the country this morning despite official assurances, and a signed court order, stating clearly that all travel restrictions against him had been lifted.

Special coverage from Luanda, Angola: Journalist charged with defaming the president

On Tuesday, less than a week after receiving an award for his journalism from the London-based freedom of expression group Index on Censorship, veteran journalist Rafael Marques de Morais will stand trial in Angola on charges of criminal defamation.

Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is outraged by the prison sentences recently imposed on free-lance journalist Rafael Marques and on Aguiar dos Santos, publisher of the private weekly newspaper Agora.

Locals walk along the beach during sunset in the capital Luanda, Angola in June 2016. CPJ today condemned a decision by Angolan authorities to continue the trial of journalists Rafael Marques de Morais, who runs the anti-corruption news website Maka Angola, and Mariano Bras Lourenco, a correspondent for the newspaper O Crime, behind closed doors instead of in open court. (Reuters/Ed Cropley)

In this November 4, 2014, file photo, editor Rafael Marques de Morais smiles on a visit to Johannesburg, South Africa. (AP/Simon Allison)