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The South Asian Centre for Journalists Reporting Conflict (SCJRC), a joint venture of the Press Institute of India (PII) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), was inaugurated in Chennai on Friday, according to the Hindu It was the need to uphold freedom of the press and to ensure the protection of those dedicated to journalism that spurred the two organisations to set up the...

Shortly after the editor of daily Hamro Prajashakti moved the High Court against the Sikkim Democratic Front (SDF) government, the newspaper office was attacked by masked men who injured seven journalists, including editor Anjan Upadhya, says a Press Trust of India (PTI) report. The journalists of various newspapers and agency who gathered at the office at Ranipool, about 10 km from here...

Taliban militants released two Pakistani journalists on Saturday more than 36-hours after they were abducted in a tribal region near the Afghan border, says a Reuters report. "When it was proven that they're journalists and not spies, we freed them," Taliban spokesman Asad said. A group of tribal elders had gone to negotiate for the release of the journalists, freelance reporter Pir Zubair Shah...

Two freelance journalists - reporter Pir Zubair Shah and photographer Akhtar Soomoro - were abducted thursday by a Taliban group in the Mohmand region of the Tribal Areas while doing a story on marble production, which the authorities plan to develop. "The abudction of these two respected journalists is incomprehensible and we hope the Taliban leaders will quickly heed the calls for their release...

Two journalists and their companion were Friday abducted by the local Taliban in Pakistan's Mohmand tribal region even as scribes expressed concern at the deteriorating law and order situation in the tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, says a Press Trust of India (PTI) report. Reporter Pir Zubair Shah, photo-journalist Akhtar Soomro and Abdul Hassan, a leader of the local unit of the ruling...

Two journalists in Russia's Bashkortostan Republic have been convicted under the country's vague extremism law. Each has been sentenced to serve a suspended two-year prison term. Their newspaper has been shuttered. On June 25, the Kirov District Court in the regional capital of Ufa, in the central Russian Republic of Bashkortostan, convicted and sentenced Viktor Shmakov, editor-in-chief of the...

Local Taliban have threatened four journalists in the South Waziristan Agency of Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), warning them to give up their profession or face the consequences, Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) has reported. According to press reports, the threat was issued in pamphlets circulated by local Taliban in the town of Wana in South Waziristan. The pamphlet...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) and the Burma Media Association (BMA) have called for the immediate release from prison of celebrated journalist U Win Tin, whose health has deteriorated badly in the past few days. The 78-year-old is suffering from lung problems with severe asthmatic attacks which prevent him from sleeping and eating properly. A relative who visited him on June 28 found him thin...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has called on Mongolian authorities and political parties to protect journalists and guarantee media freedom after a series of incidents involving the press during violent demonstrations following the June 29 legislative elections. "We condemn the violence by demonstrators, who seriously injured three reporters," RSF said. "It is also very regrettable that the...

A reporter for Hong Kong's Apple Daily newspaper was denied entry into Beijing this week, the paper's chief editor said on Thursday, according to a Reuters report. With just over a month to go before the start of the Beijing Olympics, the newspaper, known for its pro-democracy stance and critical Chinese reportage, said one of its senior reporters had been turned away at Beijing on July 1 and had...