New York, May 15, 2002—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the release of journalist Sein Hlaing, one of nine political prisoners freed this week by Burma’s military rulers. The journalist had spent more than 11 years in prison. A spokesman for the regime announced yesterday, May 14, that the prisoners, all members of the opposition…
Your Excellency: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is deeply concerned about the detention of Amardeep Bassey, investigations editor for the British newspaper The Sunday Mercury, and his two Pakistani guides, Naoshad Ali Afridi and Khitab Shah Shinwari. Pakistani officials have told journalists that Bassey is being held on suspicion of espionage.
New York, May 13, 2002—Panamanian journalist Miguel Antonio Bernal will go to court tomorrow morning to face criminal defamation charges filed in 1998 by then-National Police director José Luis Sosa. During a February 1998 broadcast of the news program “TVN-Noticias,” Bernal held the National Police responsible for the decapitation of four Coiba Island Prison inmates…
New York, April 5, 2002— CPJ is outraged that Israel Defense Forces (IDF) fired stun grenades and rubber bullets at reporters outside the Ramallah compound of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Israeli troops fired stun grenades at a group of at least two dozen reporters attempting to cover the pending arrival of U.S. Mideast envoy Anthony…
New York, June 5, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists joins with our colleagues at the Tribal Union of Journalists (TUJ) in mourning the death of Noor Hakim Khan, a correspondent for the Daily Pakistan and vice president of the TUJ in Peshawar. According to local media reports, Hakim was one of five people killed by…
New York, May 10, 2002–In the latest wave of Iran’s ongoing crackdown on the press, the country’s conservative Press Court has sentenced two journalists to prison and banned three newspapers during the last two weeks. CPJ learned that on May 8, Iran’s Press Court convicted Mohsen Mirdamadi, a member of Parliament and director of the…
New York, May 10, 2002—A Mexican newspaper publisher appeared on Wednesday, May 8, before a public prosecutor in Mexico City to respond to criminal defamation charges brought against him by a local politician. Alejandro Junco de la Vega, president and publisher of the Mexico City daily REFORMA, was charged over an article alleging that Carlos…
New York, May 9, 2002—The Committee to Protect Journalists is extremely concerned about a series of menacing threats against four Colombian journalists, including an incident yesterday. At around 6:30 a.m. on May 8, two men approached Carlos Pulgarín—a journalism professor at the Universidad de La Sabana, a private university in the capital, Bogotá—as he was…