Morocco prison confiscates journalist’s letter to wife, prompting hunger strike
New York, March 4, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns Moroccan prison authorities’ decision to prevent imprisoned journalist Soulaiman Raissouni from sending a letter to his wife and urgently calls for his immediate release. After authorities in the Ain Borja prison confiscated and withheld a letter meant for his wife, Raissouni, editor-in-chief of independent newspaper Akhbar…
A ‘slow death’ for Yemen’s media: the country’s journalists report through displacement and exile
March 2018 was a low point for Akhbar al-Youm, an independent daily newspaper in Yemen. Three weeks after the newspaper’s Aden office was set ablaze by unidentified arsonists, seven of its employees were abducted for a month by forces under the secessionist Southern Transitional Council, which controls the southern port city. The attacks forced the publication to relocate from Aden to…
Morocco’s new tactic to punish journalists: charge them with sex crimes
Moroccan journalists Taoufik Bouachrine, Soulaiman Raissouni, and Omar Radi have a lot in common. All three have a nose for corruption, penning op-eds or investigations alleging government abuse. And all three have been charged with or sentenced to prison for sex crimes. Press freedom advocates and the journalists’ family members told CPJ that Moroccan authorities are using trumped up…
Egypt arrests 3 more journalists amid crackdown
Washington, D.C., September 30, 2019 — Egyptian authorities should immediately release journalists Alaa Abdelfattah, Nasser Abdelhafez, Engi Abdel Wahab, and all others who have been imprisoned for their reporting, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.
Moroccan authorities arrest journalist Hajar Raissouni
Moroccan security forces arrested Hajar Raissouni, a reporter for independent news website Akhbar al-Youm, on August 31, 2019, as she was leaving her doctor’s office with her fiancé in Rabat, according to her employer and Huffington Post Maghreb. Akhbar al-Youm reported that plainclothes agents also arrested her fiancé, the doctor, and two medical staff from…
Journalists in Yemen under attack from all sides as rival forces crack down on critics
In its report released late last month, the U.N. Human Rights Council found that all groups involved in the Yemen conflict–from the government-controlled south, with its militias propped up by the UAE-led coalition and loyal to the secessionist Southern Transitional Council, and areas held by the rebel Ansar Allah or Houthi movement–were responsible for widespread…
Journalist detained by Houthis at Yemen checkpoint
Yemeni journalist Eissa Abad was stopped at a checkpoint controlled by the Ansar Allah movement, commonly known as the Houthis, in the town of Rahda, on July 22, 2018, and detained, according to reports. The journalist was stopped while on the way to Aden, where he was due to catch a flight to Lebanon for…
Houthis detain at least three more journalists in late June and early July
The Ansar Allah movement, commonly known as the Houthis, detained at least three current and former Yemeni journalists–Iyad al-Wasmani, Abdulsalam al-Doaiss, and Abed al-Jaradi–between June 27 and July 7, 2018, according to news reports and the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate.
Gunmen abduct at least seven from Yemen media foundation
New York, March 26, 2018 -Yemeni authorities should investigate an attack on a media foundation’s offices and the abduction of at least seven people from the building, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Armed attackers on March 23 broke into the media foundation’s Aden offices, where the daily Akhbar al-youm and the weekly al-Shomou…