On September 27, in a landmark decision for press freedom in South Africa, a Johannesburg court dismissed a defamation lawsuit filed by Minister of Housing Sankie Mthembi-Mahanyele against the independent daily Mail & Guardian and its former editor Phillip van Niekerk. Van Niekerk and the Mail & Guardian had been sued over the paper’s December…
President Kim Dae Jung, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2000 for his efforts to reconcile with North Korea, spent his final year in office politically isolated and unloved. His unpopularity came partly from the constant hammering he took from the country’s major media outlets, which oppose his “Sunshine Policy” of engagement with the…
A cease-fire agreement signed in February by the government and the rebel Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) ushered in a period of relative calm in Sri Lanka after 19 years of war. The LTTE has been fighting for an independent homeland for the country’s ethnic Tamil community, which has suffered discrimination from the Sinhalese…
The Sudanese public has access to several high-profile independent newspapers that criticize government authorities and policies. But that criticism comes at a price, especially when it relates to the Muslim government’s nearly 20-year-old civil war with Christian and animist rebels in the south of the country.
An ongoing state crackdown against pro-democracy activists continued to stunt what were once promising media reforms introduced in 2000 by Syria’s young president, Bashar al-Assad. For a short time, it appeared that Bashar, who replaced his authoritarian father, the late Hafez al-Assad, in 2000, would inspire a more liberal media and greater government transparency. After…
The devastating legacy of the civil war (1992-1997) between President Imomali Rakhmonov’s government and various opposition parties for control over the country continued to haunt the Tajik media in 2002. Because of widespread poverty–a result of the war and a subsequent string of natural disasters–reporters often work in run-down offices with outdated equipment. Only a…
Like many of its East African neighbors,Tanzania has been overwhelmed by the proliferation of pornographic tabloids. Since 1992, when the advent of multiparty politics fostered media liberalization, the number of privately owned newspapers has steadily increased to about 400.
During 2002, Thailand’s reputation as a regional haven of constitutionally guaranteed free expression was frequently assaulted by the country’s powerful prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, and his political allies. The government booted radio and television programs off the air, threatened Thai journalists with financial investigations and foreign reporters with expulsion, and engaged in angry exchanges with…
The Togolese government attempted to create a veneer of openness and democracy by finally holding twice-postponed legislative elections, while President Gnassingbé Eyadéma and his ruling Rassemblement du Peuple Togolais (Rally of the Togolese People, or RPT) increasingly harassed the private press. Authorities’ routine censorship of private publications, imprisonment of reporters, and attempts to impose new…