2005-2014

Authorities in Azerbaijan have decided to halt local broadcasts by foreign stations by the end of the year. The chairman of Azerbaijan's National Television and Radio Council, Nushiravan Meherremli, told independent news agency Turan that his country is not interested in granting local frequencies to foreign broadcasters. The policy change will affect the the British Broadcasting Corporation, and...

An Ethiopian Federal High Court judge has convicted an editor on criminal charges of "inciting the public through false rumors" over a reporting mistake, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported. Editor-in-Chief Tsion Girima of the private weekly Enbilta is being held in Kality prison, outside the capital, Addis Ababa, pending sentencing on Tuesday. Charged under article 486 of the...

The police on Friday arrested Vanita Ghag, a Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) corporator from the Malad are, and six other party workers for assaulting a journalist in the presence of the police in Mumbai in the early hours of Thursday morning, the Times of India has reported. A mob of around 100 MNS supporters, who were shouting slogans in favour of party chief Raj Thackeray at the premises of...

A senior journalist from Uttar Pradesh was on Thursday brutally beaten by supporters of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in Mumbai, a day after a young man from the state died after being thrashed in a suburban train, Indo-Asian News Service has reported. Some details from the IANS report: [ Link] Dinanath Tiwari, 45, who works for the Nirbhay Pathik tabloid, had gone to Kurar village in the...

Gannett Company, the largest newspaper chain in the US, is slashing about 3,000 jobs and the 100-year-old Christian Science Monitor is ending its print edition, the latest cost-cutting moves in a beleaguered US newspaper industry. Last week, the Los Angeles Times announced its decision to lay off 10 per cent of its news staff, while the Star-Ledger newspaper in New Jersey said about 40 per cent of...

It was the the fear of newspapers' backlash that forced the Associated Press (AP) last week to retract its plans of new fees. News agency AP, which is owned by its US member newspapers, has said its board of directors has asked the management to complete a sweeping review of the news cooperative's membership policies by next April. A note to staff said some job cuts are likely. [ Link] "It is time...

Circulation figures of daily newspapers in the US have dropped again. The country's Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC), citing preliminary figures, said on Monday that the circulation for 507 daily newspapers fell 4.64 per cent in the six months ending September to 38.16 million copies from 40.02 million in the same period last year. The Associated Press gave some figures about specific newspapers...

The Zimbabwean government had asked officials to spy on the emails of editors employed by the state-owned Zimpapers group from August 3-15 this year to gauge their loyal to President Robert Mugabe, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. “As a result of this illegal decision, editor Bhekinkosi Ncube of the magazine Umthunywa has been suspended for nearly two months and could lose his job...

At least eight of ten users checking news online in India are males. Almost eight of ten engaging in such activity fall in the 19-35 age bracket. These and other key insights have emerged out of one of the largest surveys conducted by JuxtConsult earlier this year among Internet users in India. The habit of checking news online is indulged in by 63 per cent of online users. Though this is up 2 per

Sami al-Haj of Sudan and Shakeman Mugari of Zimbabwe have been awarded the 2008 International Press Freedom Awards for extraordinary courage and overcoming tremendous odds to report the news. The Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE), which gives away these awards, has also decided to acknowledge Jim Poling of Canada with the Vox Libera Award for his long-standing commitment to freedom...