Legal Action

In a joint letter, the Committee to Protect Journalists and 31 other press freedom and human rights organizations urged UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer to intensify his diplomatic efforts to secure Egyptian-British writer Alaa Abdelfattah’s release. The letter follows a February call between Starmer and Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, which has yet to yield…

Dakar, May 21, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on authorities in the Central African Republic to drop their prosecution of journalist Landry Ulrich Nguéma Ngokpélé, editor of the privately owned newspaper Le Quotidien de Bangui, who was arrested and jailed on May 8 over his newspaper’s report on the alleged return of former President…

Editor’s note: On May 22, Öznur Değer was released under a travel ban and judicial control until her next hearing on October 21. Istanbul, May 21, 2025—Turkish authorities should release Öznur Değer ahead of her trial on Thursday and stop conflating reporting on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) with publishing propaganda for the outlawed group, the Committee to…

Istanbul, May 16, 2025—Turkish authorities should immediately release freelance court reporter Furkan Karabay, who was detained during a police raid early Thursday in Istanbul, and stop detaining journalists who are trying to report the news, the Committee to Protect Journalists said. The detention marks at least the third in recent years. Later Thursday, an Istanbul…

New York, May 16, 2025—Pakistani authorities must immediately restore access to exiled investigative journalist Ahmad Noorani’s YouTube channel in Pakistan and stop law enforcement agencies harassing him and his family, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Friday. “Blocking journalist Ahmad Noorani’s YouTube channel and filing a criminal case against him is indicative of Pakistan’s relentless…

Nairobi, May 16, 2025—Journalist Ahmed Awga has been in prison for over three weeks for interviewing a man who said his 16-year-old son Shafi’i Abdikarim Ali died following a police beating — one of at least seven journalists arrested in Ethiopia in the last month as the government tightens the screws on the media. After…

Brussels, May 15, 2025—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on European Union leaders to unequivocally and immediately condemn Hungary’s proposed “foreign agent” law, which would grant its government sweeping powers to impose restrictions on NGOs, independent media outlets and other organizations receiving foreign funding. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party introduced the bill on Tuesday in Parliament…

New York, May 14, 2025—CPJ and 58 other press freedom and human rights groups condemned the Chinese government’s ongoing arbitrary detention of independent journalist Zhang Zhan and called for her immediate release on the fifth anniversary of her arrest. Zhang was first detained on May 14, 2020, while reporting on the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, China. Zhang completed a four-year prison sentence for…

Documentary filmmaker Maryia Bulavinskaya’s love of history led her to buy a traditional wood home in the Belarusian village of Rogi-Iletsky in 2019. Her plans to renovate and eventually live in the house were put on hold in 2020 when she fled the country out of fear of being detained for her coverage of anti-government…

New York, May 9, 2025— After 18 months, Azerbaijan’s vast media crackdown shows no signs of abating, as police arrested two independent journalists, Ulviyya Ali and Ahmad Mammadli, on the night of May 6-7. The arrests bring the total number of journalists jailed in Azerbaijan since late 2023 to at least 25, with several others…