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Top Developments• More access for foreign reporters, tighter rules for local assistants.• As online use grows, government censors sites, jails critics. Key Statistic 24: Journalists jailed as of December 1, 2009. While China’s ruling communist party celebrated 60 years in power in 2009, its critics commemorated antigovernment movements in Tibet in 1949 and Tiananmen Square…

Top Developments• Government fails to implement reforms allowing private media to operate.• Two international broadcasters allowed to resume operation. Key Statistic $32,000: Application and accreditation fees imposed on international journalists. In a measure of the deplorable state of press freedom in Zimbabwe, a year marked by harassment and obstruction was considered a small step forward. “Journalists…

New York, December 21, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists announced the addition of three leading journalists to its board of directors today: Rebecca MacKinnon of Global Voices, Ahmed Rashid, journalist and scholar, and María Teresa Ronderos of Semana.com.

You wouldn’t have heard it from her, but Hu Shuli resigned from her post as editor of Caijing magazine on Monday. The battle over political coverage and finances at Caijing (cai is  “finance” and jing is “economics”) had been reported for about three months, but the missing component in the coverage was Hu herself—she has…

New York, September 22, 2009—The Chinese government should stop censoring Web sites and protect Internet users from cyber attacks in advance of upcoming National Day celebrations, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. October 1 marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic. 

Madeline Earp, CPJ Asia research associate, testified in Washington today before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission at a public hearing on “China’s Media and Information Controls: The Impact in China and the United States.” 

China Daily filed an appeal on July 2, 2009, challenging the Taiwanese government’s decision to revoke distribution rights of the Beijing-based English-language newspaper in Taiwan, according to international news reports. 

Your Excellency: We are writing to express our grave concern at the detention of our esteemed fellow journalist Maziar Bahari and to request his immediate release. Mr. Bahari has been detained since June 21. No charges have been brought against him, and he has not been granted access to a lawyer. As one of the most impartial and committed journalists in his field, he has reported regularly over the past decade from the Middle East, principally from Iran and Iraq, and provided consistently balanced and insightful reports. As an award-winning documentary filmmaker, he has earned global respect for his work.

New York, July 13, 2009–Chinese police should halt the detentions of journalists reporting on ethnic violence in Xinjiang and reveal the whereabouts of a Uighur academic and Internet commentator who is missing and reportedly detained in Beijing, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.