Opinion: The dilemma facing journalists covering the Beijing Olympics
I don’t envy journalists from around the world who are entering China to cover the Beijing Olympics, held February 4 to 20. Perhaps never in history have the rules of the road for covering the games been so murky and the potential dangers so great for journalists who step over an as-yet-undefined red line that…
China finds new ways to intimidate foreign press, FCCC survey finds
On January 31, 2022, the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China (FCCC) released findings from its annual member survey about press conditions in the country. The report, “Locked Down or Kicked Out,” found that 99% of foreign correspondents said China’s reporting conditions did not meet what they considered “international standards.” The survey also documented ways Chinese…
Vigils across Mexico: Three journalists killed in two weeks
After the disturbing killings of three Mexican journalists in less than two weeks, journalists in nearly 40 locations around Mexico took to the streets Tuesday night to demand the federal government do more to ensure security for reporters under threat and to end impunity in cases of murdered journalists. The three Mexican journalists killed this…
Journalists at the Beijing Winter Olympics may test China’s tolerance for critical coverage
Can China and the International Olympic Committee maintain a “bubble” of total press freedom inside China’s vast sea of repression? That’s the question facing thousands of journalists as they arrive in the coming weeks to cover the Beijing Winter Olympics, which kick off on February 4. (CPJ’s safety advisory for those attending addresses coronavirus restrictions…
The most-read press freedom stories of 2021
2021 began with protestors threatening journalists covering the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The news at the end of the year isn’t much brighter, with Ethiopia using its emergency law to ramp up arrests of journalists and the first documented death of a journalist in custody in Myanmar since the country’s February coup….
CPJ’s Steven Butler: China’s sentencing of Jimmy Lai over Tiananmen Square vigil is ‘despicable’
Taipei, December 13, 2021 — In response to a Hong Kong court’s decision today to sentence Jimmy Lai, founder of the Next Digital media company and the pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, to 13 months imprisonment over his alleged connection to a 2020 vigil marking the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, the Committee to Protect…
‘A disturbing sign for press freedom’: A record 293 journalists imprisoned worldwide, the worst in 30 years
There are a record 293 journalists jailed worldwide for doing their job, according to CPJ’s 2021 prison census, the worst number CPJ has recorded since we began keeping track in 1992. Meanwhile, killings of journalists also continue to persist, with 24 documented by CPJ so far this year. The reasons for the relentless climb in…
Number of journalists imprisoned around the world sets new record
China remains the world’s worst jailer of journalists; India and Mexico rank among the deadliest New York December 9, 2021–The number of journalists behind bars reached a record high in 2021, with 293 behind bars as political upheaval and media crackdowns reflect increasing intolerance for independent reporting around the world. At the same time, targeted…
Number of journalists behind bars reaches global high
Editor’s note: Numbers for each prison census are adjusted yearly as CPJ learns of arrests, releases, or deaths in prison. The numbers for CPJ’s 2021 census have been revised from 293 to 302 in accordance with this policy. For the most recent data, see cpj.org/data/imprisoned/ The number of journalists jailed around the world set another record…
By the region: Where journalists are most at risk of jail or death
CPJ’s annual prison census found that a record 293 journalists were jailed for their work as of December 1, 2021. At least 24 journalists were killed because of their coverage so far this year. Read our analysis of the global data and click here to learn more from our interactive map. Related data and analysis CPJ’s database of…