Iranian journalist imprisoned, fired, and forced into exile over a single word
In October 2018, authorities arrested Pouyan Khoshhal as he drove through the northern Iranian city of Rasht, by the Caspian Sea. The reason for the journalist’s arrest: his use of the word “death” instead of “martyrdom” to describe a Shiite saint in an article for the reformist newspaper Ebtekar.
Nicaragua: A crackdown in four parts
When protests erupted in Nicaragua in April last year, it was clear from the beginning that the country’s media landscape would be a battleground. One day into the unrest, the government ordered cable providers to cut the signals of at least five TV channels. By the end of the year, CPJ had documented attacks, arrests,…
For Turkish journalists in Berlin exile, threats remain, but in different forms
For Can Dündar, sitting in the audience of a theater performance near Dortmund in Germany in May was an emotional moment. In an interview with CPJ, he recalled how during the premiere night, he watched the main actor on stage playing a journalist as he was imprisoned in Turkey, had his house searched, his books…
Tajik authorities harass journalist Humayra Bakhtiyar and family
In July 2019, Humayra Bakhtiyar, a Tajik journalist living in exile who was recently granted asylum in a European Union country, told CPJ in a phone call that Tajik authorities have harassed and intimidated her family over the past several years as retribution for her critical reporting.
Moroccan independent journalists describe climate of pervasive surveillance, harassment
In March 2015, Hicham Mansouri emailed an anti-malware company, suspicious of possible signs that someone was able to access his device remotely, without permission. He remembers exchanging a few messages with the software company, but the correspondence was interrupted after a few days, when around 10 police officers in civilian clothes arrived at his home…
Venezuela’s biggest daily, El Nacional, latest casualty of newsprint restrictions
New York, December 17, 2018–Venezuela’s biggest independent daily, El Nacional, printed its last edition on December 14, its editor and owner Miguel Henrique Otero announced. In an interview published in the paper, Otero, who manages the paper from self-imposed exile in Madrid, said that El Nacional would be available online only because of restrictions that…
Journalists fleeing threats at home trapped in ICE detention over US asylum seeker policy
When Cuban police escorted Serafín Morán Santiago on to a plane to Guyana in 2016, they warned the journalist he could be jailed for 15 years if he tried to return. Authorities there had already detained and tortured him for his reporting. But when he was attacked in Guyana and then threatened in Mexico, Morán…
CPJ submits amicus brief to European Court on Azerbaijani journalist Emin Huseynov
The Committee to Protect Journalists, along with the organizations International Media Support, IFEX, and the International Senior Lawyers Project submitted an amicus curiae brief to the European Court of Human Rights in support of a legal complaint by Azerbaijani journalist and human rights advocate Emin Huseynov.