Richard Durbin

By Aminata Le Bas/CPJ Africa Program Intern

On Thursday, U.S. Senator Richard Durbin sent a letter to Gambia's justice minister, Edward Gomez, renewing his appeal for the release of local journalist Ebrima "Chief" Manneh. Manneh disappeared more than five years ago after security agents seized him at the offices of his newspaper, the Daily Observer.

By Frank Smyth/Washington Representative

Did you miss it? Yesterday was the 61^st anniversary of the United Nation General Assembly’s adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. President Barack Obama, as he was leaving for Oslo to accept the Nobel Peace Prize, declared December 10 Human Rights Day. To help mark it, his national security advisor, the retired Marine General James L. Jones, at left, invited representatives of a number of human rights and related groups including CPJ to meet with him and other senior national security advisors in the White House.

News from the Committee to Protect Journalists

By Tom Rhodes/Africa Program Coordinator

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) leads a group of six senators to call for the immediate release of the former state Daily Observer newspaper, "Chief" Ebrima Manneh today. Colleagues at the newspaper say they witnessed two plainclothes Gambian National Intelligence Agency officers whisk Manneh, right, away in July 2006. He has not been seen since despite repeated calls to the government to disclose his whereabouts. 

By Tom Rhodes/Africa Program Coordinator

Considerable international press coverage arose from U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin's statements on the Senate floor last week, calling on the Gambian government to release imprisoned journalist Chief Ebrima Manneh. But Durbin's request has not drawn a response from the Gambian Embassy in Washington. Ambassador Abdul R. Cole told CPJ today that his government would not "be making any comment on this."

By Frank Smyth/Washington Representative and Journalist Security Coordinator

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) said he wanted to focus his colleagues' attention on a tragic story in a small West African nation. Chief Ebrima Manneh is a reporter in the Gambia for the state-controlled Daily Observer newspaper. He was arrested by two plainclothes officers from the country's National Intelligence Agency at the newspaper's office building in July 2006. Why? He tried to republish in the Daily Observer a BBC report critical of President Yahya Jammeh, local journalists and the Gambian press union told CPJ at the time.

As far as anyone knows, Manneh was never charged with a crime. Gambian authorities have refused to provide information on the journalist's whereabouts, health and legal status. In a 2007 interview with CPJ, then government communications secretary Neneh Macdouall-Gaye denied that Manneh was in government custody.

But local journalists reported that Manneh was seen under armed guard at the Royal Victorian Teaching Hospital in July 2007 in Banjul, and again that September in the far eastern Fatoto Prison.