CPJ urges respect for media freedom in South Africa
Dear Hlaudi Motsoeneng: The Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent, nonprofit organization that promotes press freedom worldwide, is writing to express its concern at recent anti-press statements you made at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.
Sri Lanka’s Free Media Movement speaks out against government
In a high-risk move, the Free Media Movement in Sri Lanka released a statement condemning the government’s ban on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) holding press conferences and issuing press releases. CPJ blogged about the government’s move last week.
Twenty Ethiopia state journalists dismissed, in hiding
“If they cannot indoctrinate you into their thinking, they fire you,” said one former staff member of the state-run Oromia Radio and Television Organization (ORTO), who was dismissed from work last month after six years of service. “Now we are in hiding since we fear they will find excuses to arrest us soon,” the journalist,…
Israeli airstrike destroys press car, killing Palestinian media worker
New York, July 10, 2014–The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the Israel Defense Forces’ airstrike on a car clearly marked as a press vehicle in Gaza City on Wednesday. The airstrike killed Hamid Shihab, a driver for the Gaza-based press agency Media 24, according to the agency.
Burma takes another step toward repressing its media
New York, July 10, 2014–Donor countries should bring diplomatic pressure on Burma’s government and reconsider their economic support for the country following Thursday’s sentencing of four journalists of a magazine and the publication’s chief executive to 10 years of hard labor in prison, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.
Turkish journalist on trial for insulting prime minister
Erol Özkoray, Turkish journalist and author, appeared in court for the third time on June 18, 2014, on charges of insulting the Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in his book, The Gezi Phenomenon, according to news reports. The book covered the popular anti-government protests that erupted in Turkey in 2013 after the government announced its…
Turkish cartoonist jailed for insulting religious leader
On June 12, 2014, Mehmet Düzenli, a cartoonist, was taken into custody to begin serving a three-month prison term he was given after being convicted of insulting controversial religious leader and TV figure Adnan Oktar (also known as Harun Yahya) in his drawings. The daily pro-opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet reported that Düzenli was convicted by the…
In China, journalist released after weeks in jail
Shi Ping, a Henan-born Time Weekly journalist who wrote under the penname Shi Yu, was arrested on May 26, 2014, in connection with his alleged attendance at small-scale Tiananmen memorial events, the journalist said on his Weibo microblog page. He was accused of “gathering a crowd to disturb social order.”