News

Gabon has banned a private newspaper for republishing a report on President Omar Bongo’s private wealth in France. The original story appeared in French daily Le Monde at the end of January. Gabon’s state-run National Communications Council accused Tendance Gabon, a private semimonthly, of spreading “a campaign of denigration” against Bongo after questioning Director Edwige Anyouzoa during a nine...

Press freedom organisation Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has accused UNESCO of "grovelling" to authoritarian governments by dropping sponsorship of a free speech day on Wednesday. Paris-based RSF organised its second Online Free Expression Day on which it published a list of "Internet Enemies" — governments that imprison Internet users. RSF accused the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural...

An Australian magazine has apologised to readers and troops serving abroad for publishing a story revealing that Prince Harry was fighting with British troops in Afghanistan, the Associated Press (AP) reported. New Idea magazine said when it ran the story in January it was unaware of an agreement between the British Ministry of Defense and major news organizations not to disclose Harry's...

The editor of a Swedish newspaper has received death threats for publishing a picture of Jesus being defecated on by the devil, acording to a report in the Local website. Östgöta Correspondenten editor Ola Sigvardsson has received several death threats since the publication of the picture, which featured on posters for a punk festival. The poster depicted a Satan figure defecating on Jesus...

Google has complied with a request by the Pentagon to remove some online images from its street-level map service because they pose a security threat to US military bases, acording to Reuters. Gen Gene Renuart, head of the military command responsible for homeland defence, said the Pentagon had talked to Google about the risks and expected the company to cooperate in removing selected images from...

Deported US freelance journalist William Nessen left Aceh province for Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday, according to Indonesian news agency Antara. Nessen who was barred from entering the province for having allegedly violated immigration rules left the Sultan Iskandar Muda Airport at Blang Bintang for the Malaysian capital at 02.37 p.m. by a chartered plane, an Antara journalist observed. Nessen arrived...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has welcomed the release on March 8 of reporter Khalil Khosa of Azadi, a daily based in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province of Pakistan. Khosa had been missing for eight days, after failing to return from a news conference in Nasirabad, in the south of the province, on February 29. Khosa has not described the circumstances of his abduction but he said his...

Nothing is sacred except the flagship newspaper, New York Times Co said on Tuesday, addressing investor concern over a sluggish share price and calls by an investor group to sell non-core assets, acording to Reuters. The company, whose stock has sunk 35 per cent since a high last June, faces a proxy battle by dissident shareholders Harbinger Capital Partners and Firebrand Partners, who aim to push...

An Egyptian court sentenced a journalist to one year in jail on Monday for libelling imprisoned opposition leader Ayman Nour and his wife, Reuters has reported. But Nour, who is serving a five-year sentence on what he says are baseless fraud charges, asked the court to drop the custodial sentence because he does not approve of jailing journalists for publishing offences. The journalist, Taher...

A former USA Today reporter who was ordered to pay hefty fines starting at midnight Tuesday for refusing to name confidential sources for a story, has been granted a stay, Agence France-Presse (AFP) has reported quoting court sources. "It is ordered that the motion for a stay pending appeal be granted," a clerk at a US court of appeals in Washington told AFP, reading from the order. "Appellant has...