2005-2014

A 10-day prison sentence has been handed down to independent journalist Mazen Darwish, President of the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression, according to the Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). He was sentenced under Article 387 of the criminal code for "defamation and insulting state administrative bodies". The verdict will appear on his record for a period of three to...

An 11-year prison sentence has been imposed on Kurdish journalist Mohammad Sadegh Kabovand for "activity against national security." The former editor of Payam-e Mardom-e Kurdestan, a weekly closed down in 2005, Kabovand received his 11-year sentence on June 22 from a Tehran revolutionary court for creating a human rights organisation in Iran's Kurdish region. Since his arrest in July 2007, he has...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has welcomed the "transparency" of a US Defence Department report released on June 16 confirming that US soldiers were responsible for the fatal shooting of Reuters soundman Waleed Khaled in Baghdad on August 28, 2005. Khaled drove with Reuters cameraman Haider Kadhem to the Baghdad district of Al-Adil to cover a situation in which an Iraqi police unit had been...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has condemned the arrest of journalist Ahmed Al-Majoun in a raid by US and Iraqi soldiers on his home in Tikrit (180 km north of Baghdad) early on June 24. His son was also arrested. Majoun heads a journalists union based in Salah El Din, the province of which Tikrit is the capital. No reason has been given for their arrests. "We are disturbed to see that, just a...

The ministerial council of Arab information ministers, held in the headquarters of the Arab League on June 20 and 21, has sought to further restrict satellite television broadcasting. The meeting resulted in the release of a document employing overly broad terms to define a proposed regulatory framework for satellite channel transmissions, according to the Arabic Network for Human Rights...

Bomb attacks were carried out Saturday against the privately-owned television station Canal 4-Unitel in Yacuiba, Tarija department, southern Bolivia, and against the radio station Radio Kollasuyo in Potosí, in the department of the same name in the country's southwest. Political and media polarisation that is undermining the country was behind both attacks, which caused severe damage in both cases...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has deplored the Niamey public prosecutor's decision to file an immediate appeal against an investigating judge's June 23 decision to allow detained journalist Moussa Kaka to be released provisionally. The appeal blocked the release of Kaka, who continues to be held in a Niamey prison. The director of privately-owned Radio Saraounia and the Niger correspondent of...

A South Korean journalist was deported from Burma by the ruling military junta on June 22 for visiting the office of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD). Lee Yu Kyong, a freelance journalist from South Korea, was deported to Thailand, according to Mizzima News. "At about 7:00 am, five policemen from Special Branch (a police unit in Rangoon) arrived at my hotel. They asked me where I...

Radio Sucre deputy news director Raúl Rodríguez was gunned down in in the western Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil, according to Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). The attack took place at about 7:20 a.m. (local time) as Rodríguez returned to his home in the northern district of Guayacanes after hosting his early morning programme "Good Morning Ecuador" on Radio Sucre. He was getting out of...

The International Press Institute (IPI) has condemned the jailing of Mohammed Al-Mokaleh, one of the founding members of the Yemeni Journalist Syndicate, for laughing in a Yemeni court. On June 15, a Yemeni prosecutor accused Al-Mokaleh of "attacking and defaming the judicial system," for laughing out loud during the concluding moments of the trial of Abdelkarim Al-Khaiwani, former editor-in-chief...