2005-2014

The Zimbabwean government is cracking down on independent media with barely one month to go before presidential elections on March 29. Journalists have been arrested, summoned and ordered to reveal sources, charged with “publication of false news” and newspapers threatened with closure if they fail to comply, in an upsurge of harassment that seriously threatens press freedom ahead of polling,”...

Outgoing Russian President Vladimir Putin and his chosen successor Dmitry Medvedev are benefitting from partisan broadcast media coverage in their favour, presidential election monitoring by the Centre for Journalism in Extreme Situations (CJES) has shown. CJES Thursday released results of its monitoring of media coverage of candidates for the March 2 presidential election as well as of the

Security guards at Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow continued to hold Natalya Morar and her husband Ilya Barabanov, both reporters with the independent newsweekly the New Times, for a second consecutive day, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported. Authorities have denied Morar access to her lawyer while pressuring her to buy a return ticket to her native...

The police in the Cameroon's capital, Yaoundé, Thursday forced a popular radio station off the air and confiscated its equipment over commentary critical of the government during a call-in programme, according to local journalists, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported. Magic FM is the third broadcaster summarily closed by authorities within a week in response to...

The Cuban government should release 22 imprisoned independent journalists in keeping with an international accord protecting free expression that was signed Thursday by Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has demanded. Pérez Roque signed at the UN headquarters the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which provides “the...

Conditions for domestic journalists remain poor in China despite the government’s promises to improve the press freedom environment before the Beijing Olympics, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) told the Congressional-Executive Commission on China Thursday. Bob Dietz, CPJ Asia Programme Coordinator, told the commission in Washington that China is holding at least 25...

Karan Thapar has been appointed editorial advisor of INX's soon-to-be-launched English news channel NewsX. INX News, a part of INX Network, has signed up with Karan's company ITV (Infotainment Television Private Limited) as the editorial advisor and the services will comprise a review of the progress and consultancy on future editorial development of the channel, the Indo-Asian News Service (IANS)...

The Belarusian Supreme Court has ordered the early release of Aleksandr Sdvizhkov, former deputy editor of the now-shuttered independent newspaper Zgoda, who was sentenced in January to three years in a high-security prison for reprinting controversial Danish cartoons of the prophet Mohammed in 2006. “We’re relieved at the Belarusian Supreme Court’s decision to grant early release to Aleksandr...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today called on Belarus’s Supreme Court to overturn a ruling that found Aliaksandar Zdzvizhkou, former deputy editor of Zhoda newspaper guilty of inciting religious hatred for re-printing the Danish caricatures of the prophet Mohammed in 2006. “This prosecution is an attack on press freedom that the government has tried to disguise by claiming...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) today condemned the Moroccan Supreme Court’s decision to reject an appeal by journalist Mustapha Hurmatallah and to force him to complete a seven-month jail sentence in connection with his story in Al-Watan Al-An newspaper that published extracts from internal government documents on security and terrorism. “We are outraged by this decision from...