News

Israel’s government should seriously consider the press freedom implications of some aspects of a recommendation to close the nation’s public broadcaster and transform it into a new agency that would be funded through a combination of state funding and advertising, the International Press Institute has said, expressing concern about the prospect of political influence in the radio and...

Iraqi authorities are turning increasingly hostile towards critical journalists, according to Reporters Without Borders. One of latest violations of freedom of information is a warrant for the arrest of Awn Al-Khashlok, the head of Baghdadia TV, and Anwar Al-Hamdani, the host of the station’s “Ninth Studio” programme, on charges of disturbing public order and inciting chaos and inter...

Two Venezuelan journalists were briefly arrested and interrogated by National Guard troops in late March 2014, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported quoting news reports. Dayana Méndez, an intern for the daily Notitarde newspaper in the city of Valencia, suffered slight injuries by buckshot in the left leg, arms, and back while she was covering a protest on March 20, 2014. The...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) on thursday backed a call by its affiliate in Somalia, the National Union of Somali Journalists, to the Prime Minister of Ethiopia Hailemariam Desalegn to free Somali journalist, Mohamed Aweys Mudey, found guilty under Ethiopia’s notoriously harsh anti-terror laws and sentenced to 27 years in jail. The call was made on the occasion of a summit of...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ) have joined their affiliate, the Union of Journalists in Finland (UJF), to call on the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to grant an appeal hearing of the case brought by photojournalist and UJF member Markus Pentikäinen relating to the violation of his freedom of expression. The case concerns...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its affiliate Association of Taiwan Journalists (ATJ) have condemned the restraining of media reporting on a student-led demonstration in Taiwan which led to a violent confrontation between police and protestors earlier this week. This week, the ATJ issued a declaration on the infringement of coverage with calls for police education in the wake...

Wednesday's conviction of freelance photographer Ahmed Humaidan is an attempt by Bahraini authorities to censor independent and dissident voices in the lead-up to the Formula One race in April, the Committee to Protect Journalists has said. Humaidan, who has been imprisoned since December 2012, was sentenced to 10 years in jail, according to news reports. Humaidan was one of more than 30 other...

Mohamed Baidawi, Radio Free Iraq’s Baghdad bureau chief, was shot dead in Baghdad on March 22, while Radio Babel journalist Raji Hamadallah was badly injured in a shooting attack on March 24 in Babil province, according to Reporters Without Borders. Baidawi was trying to enter the high security “Green Zone” where the Radio Free Iraq’s office is located when he got into an argument at a...

The International Press Institute (IPI) has welcomed a Costa Rican court's ruling that government surveillance of a reporter's phone records was unconstitutional. Costa Rica's Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court made the ruling Friday (March 21, 2014) in the case of Diario Extra journalist, Manuel Estrada, who was targeted by the Judicial Investigation Police (OIJ) after he wrote an...

Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) detained six Palestinian journalists in different locations in the West Bank on March 22 while the latter were on the job, according to Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA). Those detained were Dubai TV correspondent Mohamed Assayed, Associated Press cameraman Mohamed Hassan and producer Rami Abdu, French Agency photographer Mousa Alshaer...