News

A suicide bomb attack on October 29 outside the Ethiopian consulate in Hargeisa, Somaliland, injured three journalists who were walking in front of the consular premises, according to delayed reports. The National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) said in a statement that journalist Mohamed Harun Ahmed of the Somaliland Space Channel, was severely injured as both of his legs were broken by the...

Civil society groups have urged the Council of Europe not to ignore calls by its Parliamentary Assembly to send the draft Convention on Access to Official Documents back for redrafting so that it provides strong recognition of the right of access to information. The Parliamentary Assembly's opinion is due to be considered on November 12 by representatives of the 47 European governments that make...

A Damascus appeal court judge on Sunday overturned a criminal court's refusal in August to release imprisoned writer and journalist Michel Kilo on completion of three-quarters of a three-year sentence, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. However, Kilo has not been freed and the attorney general of the Damascus prosecutor's office on Tuesday appealed against the decision "in the interests...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) and the Burma Media Association have obtained a copy of a directive (attached file) which the military government’s censorship office recently sent to the Burmese media spelling out 10 rules for editors and the sanctions they will incur for not respecting them. "The directive is a paragon of news control inasmuch as editors are threatened with punishments ranging up...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has called for the release of Zakari Alzouma, the editor the independent weekly Opinions, who has been detained since October 30 in Niamey as a result of a libel complaint by the interior minister and whose case will not be heard for another week. “Niger’s legislation on press offences comes in handy for a government that does not want to give up its bad habits,”...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) on Tuesday condemned Nigeria's arrest of online journalist Emmanuel Emeka Asiwe, a US national, at the Muritala Muhammed international airport on his arrival from the United States on October 28 to visit his sick mother and attend to family matters. He is currently being held at the headquarters of the internal intelligence service, the State Security Service (SSS)...

The struggling US News & World Report is getting out of print and will gradually shift operations to the Web, according to reports. While it will publish one print edition each month, according to staffers briefed on the decision, these will be entirely devoted to consumer guides—such as its annual rankings of colleges and hospitals—and contain no other news, the Washington Post reported. Some...

Sudanese journalists have launched a mass hunger strike and three independent newspapers stopped work for three days in the country's biggest organised media protest against censorship. Over 150 journalists began a 24-hour hungerstrike and the Ajras al-Hurriya, Al-Maidan and Rayal al-Shab newspapers halted production, saying they could no longer accept government restrictions over editorial...

The Jammu and Kashmir government has asked the local press to refrain from publication of advertisements of separatists asking people to boycott the elections in the state or be ready to lose its advertisements, the Press Trust of India (PTI) has reported [ Link]. "You are advised to please refrain from publication of objectionable and seditious material in your newspapers failing which the...

Twelve prominent human rights activists, including three leading journalists, who advocate for reform in Syria have been sentenced to two and a half years in prison. The leaders of the Damascus Declaration for Democratic Change—the largest opposition coalition in Syria—were sentenced on October 29 under criminal legislation that prohibits “spreading false news” and “weakening national sentiment”...