United States In 2004, U.S. prosecutors and judges showed a new and alarming willingness to compel reporters to reveal confidential sources. Prosecutors in several high-profile cases insisted that journalists name their sources, and judges backed up the demands by ordering reporters to testify or face fines and imprisonment.
Uruguay Although the Uruguayan media did not face significant restrictions in 2004, civil and criminal defamation lawsuits against journalists increased during the year. At least 15 journalists were charged with criminal defamation and 10 with civil defamation, an increase compared with recent years. Under Uruguayan law, defamation is a criminal offense and carries prison sentences…
UzbekistanUzbekistan’s stagnant economy and Soviet-style dictatorship continued to fuel popular discontent in 2004, and President Islam Karimov brutally suppressed dissenters to -maintain his control of the country. Karimov stonewalled U.S. and Western pressure for reforms throughout the year, cultivating his image as an American ally in the “war on -terror” and calculating that the Bush…
Venezuela Several worrying legal developments in Venezuela curtailed press freedom in 2004. In particular, a new broadcast media law could be used to restrict news coverage critical of the government. Conflict between President Hugo Chávez Frías and the private media continued in 2004. Soon after Chávez was elected in 1998 on promises of a “democratic…
VietnamDespite U.S. and international pressure, Vietnam showed few signs of relaxing its choke hold on the press in 2004. While maintaining control of traditional media, the government intensified its crackdown on Internet dissent. “Vietnam’s press has been developing stronger than ever,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Le Dung told foreign reporters in March in response…
YemenYemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh said in May that he would work to decriminalize press offenses. Yet three months later, a prominent editor who published opinion pieces opposing the president’s handling of a bloody armed rebellion was sentenced to a year in prison, and his newspaper was suspended for six months.
Zimbabwe CPJ named Zimbabwe one of the “World’s Worst Places to Be a Journalist” in 2004, with the government of President Robert Mugabe continuing to crack down on the private media. Repressive legislation was used to close the country’s only independent daily newspaper, The Daily News, and to detain and harass journalists. Authorities were particularly…
MARCH 13, 2005 Posted: March 17, 2005 Mohamed Ould Lamine Mahmoudi, freelance IMPRISONED According to press reports and a Mauritanian source, police detained freelance journalist Mahmoudi after he interviewed a woman in the southern town Mederdra who claimed that she was kept as a slave by a family in another small Mauritanian town.
JULY 3, 2005 Updated: August 10, 2005 Rolando “Dodong” Morales, dxMD KILLED—CONFIRMED The radio commentator was ambushed and shot at least 15 times by a gang of motorcycle-riding assailants while driving home on the southern island of Mindanao. Morales, who died at the scene, had just finished hosting his weekly program on radio dxMD in…
MARCH 11, 2005 Posted: April 8, 2005 Martyn See, documentary filmmaker THREATENED, CENSORED Independent documentary filmmaker Martyn See pulled his short documentary, “Singapore Rebel”, from the Singapore International Film Festival after officials warned him that he might face criminal charges if the film was screened at the festival in April. The film chronicles the civil…