News

NEW YORK: Nearly two-thirds of Americans do not trust press coverage of the 2008 presidential campaign, according to a new Harvard University survey, which also revealed four out of five people believe coverage focuses too much on the trivial -- and more than 60% believe coverage is politically biased. The findings were among those in Harvard's Center for Public Leadership National Leadership...

Reporters Without Borders voiced concern today about the threats to press freedom from two articles in a reform of the 1999 constitution which the national assembly approved on 26 October and which Venezuelans are being asked to endorse in a referendum on 2 December. The organisation also fears for the safety of journalists in a media war waged during the referendum campaign and fed by clashes...

New York, November 28, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists expressed alarm today at the imprisonment of Nikolai Andrushchenko, co-founder and an editor of the weekly newspaper Novy Peterburg in the Russian city of St. Petersburg. On Saturday, a court sentenced Andrushchenko to two months of pre-trial detention on charges of defamation and obstruction of justice. If convicted, the journalist...

Athens - Greece was under a 24-hour news blackout as journalists launched work stoppages Tuesday as part of a wave of anti-government rallies against social security reforms. The strike, which is to also include a march in downtown Athens, is to disrupt newspaper production, radio and television news broadcasts and internet news sites across the country. Journalists are opposed to government plans...

Reporters Without Borders today condemned allegations made by national police director Gen. Oscar Naranjo against journalist William Parra of the pan-Latin American TV news station Telesur over an interview with an army captain, Guillermo Javier Solórzano, who is being held hostage by the guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Gen. Naranjo has accused Parra of being a...

(IPYS/IFEX) - On 16 November 2007, a group of demonstrators, members of the Public Works Construction Worker's Union (Sindicato de Trabajadores de Construcción Civil, STCC), hit journalist Mayra Azán Mestanza as she was covering a protest from inside the offices of the Punchana's District Council, in Loreto region of northern Peru. The demonstrators gathered at the council building's main door to...

(RSF/IFEX) - Reporters Without Borders has protested against the arrest of journalist Slim Boukhdir, who according to latest reports is being held at a police station in the suburbs of Sfax, 231 kilometres south of Tunis. Boukhdir, 39, who ended a two-week hunger strike on 14 November 2007 after the authorities promised that his passport would be restored to him, was arrested on 26 November during...

TEHRAN, Nov. 27 — The Iranian Supreme Court has ordered a new investigation into the death of an Iranian-Canadian photojournalist who was killed in Tehran in 2003 while in custody, the judiciary spokesman said Tuesday. Zahra Kazemi, a photojournalist who was killed in 2003 after being arrested in Tehran. The spokesman, Alireza Jamshidi, told journalists on Tuesday that the court had objected to...

November 27, 2007 - Declining readership has hit several news journals hard, leading to loss of revenue. This despite the fact that the Burmese military junta has relatively slackened its control over issuing of journal publishing license, editors in Rangoon said. Obtaining a journal publishing license has become relatively easier with the Burmese Information Ministry loosening its tight control...

Baghdad - Unidentified gunmen murdered 11 family members of an Iraqi journalist in east Baghdad, independent Voices of Iraq reported Monday citing a statement by the Iraqi committee to protect journalists. About seven armed men in a civilian car broke into the house of Diyaa al-Wakaz Sunday, shooting dead all his family members including his wife and children, witnesses said. Al-Wakaz, who...