News

The extent to which the internet has changed the media landscape is revealed in a survey conducted for A1 Telekom Austria by Zukunftsinstitut. According to the study of residential customers, Austrians on average spend just over three hours per day online, 11 per cent of which is via smartphones. Among younger users, mobile phones and the Internet have long since replaced television as the...

The Court of Justice of the State of São Paulo has reversed the earlier decision to award compensation to Brazilian photographer Alexandro Wagner Oliveira da Silveira, known as Alex Silva. The compensation was awarded for medical bills and damages after the photographer lost the sight of his left eye due to being shot with a rubber bullet by troops from the Military Police while covering a...

ARTICLE 19, which it said has reviewed the new Moroccan Draft Law No 31.13 on the Right of Access to Information, has found that it fails to adequately recognise the right to information and threatens free expression. The Draft Law No. 31.13 on the Right of Access to Information was adopted by the Moroccan Cabinet on July 31, 2014. The new draft is significantly weaker than previous versions...

On Right to Know Day, September 28, ARTICLE 19 published a study on access to information in the fight against obstetric fistula in Tambacounda, South eastern region of Senegal, and called on the authorities to adopt a law on access to information and improve access to information on women’s reproductive health. Access to information is mentioned in the Senegalese Constitution but there is no...

In civil war-torn South Sudan, government censorship seems to have found a new target, Catholic Church-run community radio stations. Just weeks after Radio Bakhita was forced off the air in Juba, the country’s capital, Voice of Hope is now under threat in Wau, the capital of Western Bahr el Ghazal state. Operated under the aegis of the diocese of Wau, Voice of Hope has been told it will be...

Honduran opposition broadcaster Julio Ernesto Alvarado is again subject to a 16-month ban on working as a journalist. After originally taking effect in February as part of a sentence for a criminal defamation, the ban was suspended in April but an appeal court reimposed it on September 24. The case stems from a case by Belinda Flores, the former economics faculty dean at the Autonomous University...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has strongly criticised the internet censorship being employed by Mainland Chinese authorities as pro-democracy protests entered their fourth day in Hong Kong Tuesday and demanded that the media should be allowed to report freely in the wake of a series of attacks on media workers over recent days. Since the start of the protests across Hong Kong...

The International Federation of Journalists and its affiliate Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance (MEAA) have described the National Security Legislation Amendment Bill No 1 as an outrageous attack on press freedom in Australia. The amendment bill was ‘urgently’ pushed through the Senate receiving 44 votes to 12 on the night of Thursday September 25 with bipartisan support from the Labor...

The Committee to Protect Journalists has expressed alarm at death threats against numerous journalists in different states in Colombia over the past week and calls on authorities to ensure the journalists' safety. All of the journalists had reported on criminal activities in the region. "Local criminal groups are unabashedly and publicly threatening journalists as a means of silencing reporting on...

Australia's National Security Reform Bill One was passed in the upper house on Thursday and would become law if passed by the lower house this week as expected, according to reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said it is gravely concerned over the national security-related bill, which could result in prison time of up to 10 years for journalists who report on intelligence in...