Newspaper editor jailed for defamation in Peru
New York, January 14, 2010—The editor of a Peruvian weekly newspaper in the Amazonian city of Bagua, Utcubamba province, was sentenced on Tuesday to one year in jail on defamation charges, according to local news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists called today for his immediate release.Alejandro Carrascal Carrasco, at right, editor of the Bagua-based…
Prison term completed, Mauritanian editor still jailed
New York, January 5, 2010—Mauritanian authorities should immediately release an editor who has served his prison term in its entirety, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. The refusal to free Hanevy Ould Dehah, editor of the online publication Taqadoumy, appears to be unlawful and reflective of the politically motivated nature of the case.
Kazakh journalist and newspaper persecuted
After receiving reports of at least three defamation lawsuits filed recently against Lukpan Akhmedyarov, a prominent journalist with the independent newspaper Uralskaya Nedelya in Western Kazakhstan, in retaliation for his critical reporting on a state construction company’s illegal work on a gas pipe project, er issued the following statement…
Free Speech Protection Act could slow ‘libel tourism’
Free press advocates in Britain are looking to a bill stuck in the U.S. Congress for moral support in the fight to reform England’s draconian defamation laws. The U.S. bill, the Free Speech Protection Act 2009, is itself the product of those laws, which have made London the capital of “libel tourism.”
Iraqi court fines Guardian for defaming al-Maliki
New York, November 11, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists denounces a Baghdad court’s ruling that the London-based Guardian newspaper defamed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, left, in an April 2009 article depicting increasing authoritarianism in his government. CPJ calls on an appeals court to overturn the decision.
Sierra Leone’s criminal libel law sparks barber boycott
My looks have completely changed in recent months. Long hair now colonizes my chin and my head. Never in my adult life have I waited longer than a week without a shave or a haircut, let alone for four months. One ends up doing the strangest things for press freedom in Sierra Leone.
U.S. reporter faces ‘insult’ suit in Brazil air crash aftermath
New York, September 29, 2009—U.S. freelance journalist Joe Sharkey, who covered a 2006 plane crash in Brazil in which he was a passenger, faces an onerous civil defamation suit for comments he said were wrongly attributed to him. On the third anniversary of the accident, the Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Brazilian judicial authorities…