Abducted

New York, November 12, 2009—A Norwegian freelance journalist and an Afghan colleague were released Thursday after nearly a week in captivity in eastern Afghanistan, according to international news reports.

Dear Prime Minister Brown: The Committee to Protect Journalists wishes to offer our condolences on the loss of British Parachute Regiment Cpl. John Harrison, who died in a September 9 military operation to rescue two journalists kidnapped by Taliban forces in Afghanistan. We are grateful that New York Times reporter Stephen Farrell, a British-Irish national, was safely rescued, but we’re saddened by the loss of his colleague, fellow New York Times reporter Sultan Munadi.

David Rohde’s gripping five-part series on his abduction in Afghanistan and Pakistan ends today with his dramatic escape from his abductors.  His series—and the reaction to it—bring into high relief the challenges that journalists face as they confront growing risk around the world.  Rohde, for example, felt the need, both in his article and in…

New York, September 25, 2009—The Committee to Protect journalists calls on Yemeni authorities to clarify the circumstances of the disappearance and current whereabouts of Muhammad al-Maqaleh, editor of Aleshteraki, a Web site affiliated with the opposition Socialist Party. Al-Maqaleh was detained by unidentified men on September 18 in Sana’a, according to local news reports. 

We issued the following statement after Afghan journalist Sultan Mohammed Munadi was killed during a raid to free him and his colleague, New York Times reporter Stephen Farrell. The two journalists had been kidnapped in the northern Afghan province of Kunduz on Saturday…

Ahead of the first anniversary on Sunday, August 23, of the kidnapping in Mogadishu of Canadian Amanda Lindhout and Australian Nigel Brennan we issued the following statement today on behalf of the families of the two journalists…

Journalist Shiva Oli returned to his village in Doti district, in western Nepal, on July 28, 2009, after hiding for three days following harassment for his work, according to the Federation of Nepali Journalists (FNJ) and other news sources. 

Tahir Ludin, David Rohde, and their driver, Asadullah Mangal, were kidnapped on November 10, 2008, after Rohde was invited to interview a Taliban commander in Logar province outside Kabul. Ludin, an Afghan journalist, was acting as Rohde’s translator. Rohde was on book leave from The New York Times at the time of their abduction. According…

Reacting to reports that New York Times reporter David Rohde and his assistant Tahir Ludin have escaped Taliban captors who held them for more than seven months, we issued the following statement: