CPJ Impact
News from the Committee to Protect Journalists, April 2010 More than 3,500 petition Iran to free journalists, writersAs the leading sponsor of “Our Society Will Be a Free Society,” a joint campaign with 15 other human rights organizations seeking the release of dozens of jailed journalists in Iran, CPJ helped gather more than 3,500 signatures on a…
Journalist held incommunicado in Moldova’s Transdniester
New York, April 16, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists called on authorities in the unrecognized Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR) to immediately release journalist Ernest Vardanian, at left, who has been jailed in the regional capital of Tiraspol for treason since April 7.
One cameraman dead, several injured in Quetta bombing
New York, April 16, 2010–At least one Pakistani journalist was killed and others were injured in a suicide bombing at a hospital in Quetta today, according to international news reports. Details are still emerging, and some of the injured are reported to be in critical condition, but Pakistani colleagues tell CPJ that a senior Samaa TV cameraman,…
Dawit Isaac: Jailed 3,127 days in Eritrea without trial
Journalist Dawit Isaac has spent 3,127 days in government custody in his native Eritrea, according to the ticker on FreeDawit, a Web site based in Sweden, Isaac’s adopted country, where he is a citizen. He has never been publicly charged with a crime or been given a trial. A thorny issue between Sweden and the…
Yemeni editor, long harassed, is charged again
New York, April 15, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists calls on Yemeni authorities to drop new charges brought against Muhammad al-Maqaleh, editor of the opposition Yemeni Socialist Party’s news Web site Aleshteraki, in connection with a 2005 article.
In Afghanistan, concern about journalists held by Taliban
New York, April 14, 2010–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned by the new demands made by a Taliban group that is holding captive two French television journalists, Hervé Ghesquière and Stéphane Taponier, translator Mohammed Reza, and the group’s driver. They were taken in Kapisa province, northeast of Kabul, in December.
Freed Cuban journalist tells of his ‘dreadful experience’
When I asked Cuban journalist Oscar Sánchez Madan to describe in one sentence his three years in jail, he told me: “I don’t wish on anybody the dreadful experience I had in prison.” A municipal court in Unión de Reyes, province of Matanzas, freed him on Sunday after he completed a three-year prison term. Around 6 a.m.,…
Oscar Sánchez Madan freed from jail in Cuba
In early 2007, freelancer Oscar Sánchez Madan was detained twice and warned to stop working for the independent press after he covered a local corruption scandal and social problems in western Matanzas province, where he lived. He was arrested in April 2007 and, after a one-day trial, Cuban authorities convicted him of “social dangerousness,” a vague charge contained in…
Rwanda shuts critical papers in run-up to presidential vote
New York, April 13, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns today’s decision by Rwanda’s Media High Council to suspend two independent weeklies just months prior to presidential elections. At a press conference, attended only by state broadcasters and the pro-government radio station Contact FM, the Media High Council announced an immediate six month suspension of…