News

Reporters Without Borders welcomes a Dubai appeal court’s decision on 8 November to overturn the convictions of the former editor of the English-language Khaleej Times, Shimba Kassiril Ganjadahran, and one of his reporters, Mohsen Rashed, on charges of libel. The two journalists had been sentenced on 24 September to two months in prison for a story about a Dubai woman’s lawsuit against her husband...

Reporters Without Borders firmly condemns physical attacks on five journalists on 9 November by opponents of a constituent assembly sitting in Sucre. Claims by President Evo Morales in the past few days that “the media” are systematically opposing his government are all the more regrettable as the victims of the violence are employed by both state and privately-owned media. “We have written to...

Reporters Without Borders firmly condemns the arbitrary closure of Mogadishu’s embattled Radio Shabelle by the security forces today as a major sweep got under way against Islamist insurgents in the nearby Bakara market. “The contempt displayed by the Somali authorities for independent news media has reached a new level with Radio Shabelle’s closure,” the press freedom organisation said....

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's muzzled press and burgeoning Internet have given citizen reporters an audience and an opportunity -- however fleeting -- to spread news quicker than government censors can control it. Zhou Shuguang, whose amateur reporting of a famous property dispute lead to him being hailed as China's "first citizen reporter", poses in front of a dismantled house in Beijing November 2...

Chinese authorities closed an unregistered newspaper and arrested two "fake" reporters, state media reported yesterday. Social News was not licensed for publication in China and provided false information about its registration in Hong Kong, the Xinhua news agency quoted the General Administration of Press and Publication saying. President and chief reporter Gao Yang, who was not accredited by the...

In the introduction to Nelson Mandela's autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, the former South African president speaks of his deep gratitude to Richard Stengel for his efforts in editing, revising and writing parts of the 630-page opus. "I recall with fondness our early morning walks in Transkei and the many hours of interviews in Johannesburg," says Mr Mandela of the American. Sitting in the...

In the introduction to Nelson Mandela’s autobiography Long Walk to Freedom, the former South African president speaks of his deep gratitude to Richard Stengel for his efforts in editing, revising and writing parts of the 630-page opus. “I recall with fondness our early morning walks in Transkei and the many hours of interviews in Johannesburg,” says Mr Mandela of the American. Sitting in the...

(IFJ/IFEX) - The International Federation of Journalists deplores the intimidation of journalists in the Nandigram area of West Bengal state in India by armed vigilantes belonging to the principal constituent of the state's ruling coalition. According to information received by the IFJ, heavily armed cadres of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) have been engaged over the past many days in an...

WASHINGTON: The offending word is "sonofabitch." Pakistan has expelled three British reporters after a UK daily twice referred the country's military dictator Pervez Musharraf as a "sonofabitch," sparking off a yet another fervent debate about language, stylebook and the limits of editorial expression. The comment, deemed offensive by the Pakistani government, appeared in a November 9 editorial in...

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka: A Sri Lankan newspaper chose a graphic way to illustrate how a media rights dispute between Cricket Australia and the major international news agencies is hurting its coverage of the series. With its national squad in Brisbane, Australia, for the first test match against the world's top-ranked team, Sri Lanka's Sunday Times would usually rely on The Associated Press, Reuters...