CPJ urges Guatemalan authorities to release José Rubén Zamora, allow fair trial
Update: A Guatemalan court ordered on May 15 that José Rubén Zamora be released to house arrest to await trial in the first of three cases against him. He was not immediately released as decisions remained pending in the other two cases. Mexico City, May 14, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls upon Guatemalan authorities…
Iranian economic reporter begins 5-year prison sentence after lengthy pre-trial detention
Washington, D.C., May 9, 2024—Iranian authorities should immediately release economic journalist Shirin Saeedi from prison, drop all charges against her, and cease jailing members of the press for doing their jobs, said the Committee to Protect Journalists on Thursday. Saeedi entered pre-trial detention on December 23, 2023, on charges of “colluding and assembling against the national…
Palestinian journalist Rula Hassanein charged with incitement for social media posts
New York, May 8, 2024 – The Committee to Protect Journalists on Wednesday urged Israeli authorities to release Palestinian freelance journalist Rula Hassanein on humanitarian grounds as her health and that of her infant daughter had deteriorated since Hassanein’s March arrest over her social media posts. On March 19, Israeli military forces arrested Hassanein, who…
Why impact of Israel-Gaza war has become harder to document
Israel’s surprise attack on Al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza on March 18, and the two weeks of fighting that followed, resulted in hundreds of deaths and a trail of destruction. It also left a morass of contradictory information about exactly who was killed there, who was arrested, and who went missing. As the Israel-Gaza war…
CPJ calls for release of Turkish journalists Esra Solin Dal, Mehmet Aslan, and Erdoğan Alayumat
The Committee to Protect Journalists joined 26 press freedom and human rights organizations in a Friday statement condemning the surge of arrests of Kurdish media workers in Turkey and calling on authorities to release journalists Esra Solin Dal, Mehmet Aslan, and Erdoğan Alayumat. The three journalists were jailed by an Istanbul court on April 27,…
Iranian economics reporter begins 5-month sentence in Karaj prison
Washington, D.C., April 30, 2024—Iranian authorities must immediately release journalist Parisa Salehi from prison and cease jailing members of the press for doing their jobs by reporting on events of public interest, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Tuesday. On January 24, Judge Asef Al-Hosseini, in Branch one of Karaj Revolutionary Court, sentenced Parisa Salehi, an economics reporter for the state-run financial…
Iraqi Kurdish journalist Guhdar Zebari is free from prison, but not from threats
On February 17, 2024, Iraqi Kurdish journalist Guhdar Zebari was released from prison, concluding a three-and-a-half year legal saga that saw him convicted on anti-state and other charges in retaliation for his work. Zebari is one of the so-called “Badinan prisoners” – a group of journalists and activists from the ethnic Badinani group who were…
European Parliament calls for repeal of Hong Kong security laws
Brussels, April 25, 2024—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomed Thursday’s call by the European Parliament for the repeal of two Hong Kong security laws that it said undermine press freedom and for the release of Jimmy Lai, founder of the now-shuttered pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily. The parliamentary resolution condemned Hong Kong’s adoption last month of…
CPJ recognizes vital role of free press on democracy ahead of White House Correspondents’ Association’s annual dinner
New York, April 24, 2024 — Ahead of the White House Correspondents’ Association’s (WHCA) annual dinner on Saturday, April 27, the Committee to Protect Journalists reaffirms the importance of press freedom for democracy. This year’s WHCA dinner takes place at a time when journalists face grave threats globally and in a year when much of…
Indian journalists’ 2024 election concerns: political violence, trolling, device hacking
As the scorching summer peaks this year, India’s political landscape is coming to a boil. From April 19 until June 1, the world’s biggest democracy will hold the world’s biggest election, which the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has been in power since 2014, is expected to win….