Ukraine says late minister ordered Gongadze murder
New York, September 16, 2010–On Tuesday, Ukrainian prosecutors announced that the late Interior Minister Yuri Kravchenko had ordered the 2000 murder of muckraking Internet journalist Georgy Gongadze, left, whose decapitated body was found 10 years ago today in a forest outside Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv.Ukraine’s prosecutor-general’s office said in a statement that investigators have finished their probe. The investigation…
Critical Honduran reporter survives shooting attack
New York, September 16, 2010–Honduran authorities must fully investigate an attempted shooting on Tuesday of journalist Luis Galdámez Álvarez, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Unidentified gunmen in the capital, Tegucigalpa, shot at Galdámez outside his home, he told CPJ. Galdámez was uninjured.
European Court ruling protects media sources
New York, September 16, 2010–The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights unanimously held that media premises are exempt from police searches, marking a major victory for press freedom across the continent on Tuesday, the Committee to Protect Journalists said. CPJ had joined in the amicus curiae.
Nothing: What Pakistan is doing to find Cheema’s abductors
Just in case you were one of the few people in Pakistan or any other part of the world, for that matter, who thought that the six-hour abduction of Umar Cheema over the weekend of September 4 and 5 in Islamabad was going to be investigated and the culprits–men “dressed in police uniform”–brought to justice, here is…
Investigation of Kurdish journalist’s murder lacks credibility
New York, September 15, 2010–The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) today released the result of a five-month-long investigation into the death of Sardasht Osman, a freelance journalist who was shot to death in May. The Committee to Protect Journalists is dismayed by the deficient inquiry and calls on Kurdish authorities to conduct a thorough and credible…
Second journalist killed in three days in Uganda
New York, September 15, 2010–Unidentified assailants beat and killed news presenter Dickson Ssentongo Monday morning on his way to work at Prime Radio in Mukono district, central Uganda. Assailants beat Ssentongo with metal bars and dragged him into a nearby cassava field, local journalists told CPJ. He was the second journalist murdered in three days…
Turkey must bring justice in Dink murder after ECHR ruling
New York, September 15, 2010–On Tuesday, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) based in Strasbourg, ruled that Turkey failed to protect the life and freedom of expression of murdered Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink. The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the verdict and urges the Turkish authorizes to finally bring the perpetrators of Dink’s 2007 murder to…
Why South Africa’s media fight matters to Botswana
For Batswana journalists, news that their South African colleagues are busy warding off a proposed statutory media tribunal from the ruling African National Congress sounds all too familiar. For more than a decade, the government of Botswana has been trying to push a media law that would effectively shift the whole media under state control.This was eventually…
Pakistani journalist killed in Afghan-Pakistan border area
New York, September 14, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists calls for an immediate investigation into today’s shooting death of Misri Khan, president of the Hangu Union of Journalists in Pakistan’s Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province (formerly known as the North West Frontier Province).