News

New York, December 4, 2006—The Committee to Protect Journalists said today it was investigating whether the shooting of journalist Arnie Pullan on the central Philippine island of Iloilo was related to his work as a radio host. An unidentified gunman shot and seriously wounded Pullan on December 1 as he left the station of MBC-Radio Natin in the town of Estancia. Pullan hosts a radio show called...

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 4 (Reuters) - European nations on the Security Council plan to ask the 15-member U.N. body this week to take steps to protect journalists working in war zones, diplomats said on Monday. "Members of the media, acting as the world's witnesses to atrocities and humanitarian needs, alerting all of us to our responsibilities, have ... been increasingly subject to attack," U.N...

PARIS: When the maker of Canderel, an artificial sweetener, cast about for strategies to reach a young, trendy female market, it relied on the breezy counsel of the Buzz Angels, bloggers variously known as Eklektic, Velvetine 2 and Miss Blablabla. This digital match between fashion-conscious French bloggers and Merisant, the sweetener company based in Chicago, was forged by Buzz Paradise, a year...

MUMBAI, DEC 2 : Sometimes a photograph says what an entire news report cannot. Whether it's a riot-stricken city or people displaced by natural calamities, it is often the photojournalist who braves his surroundings for that perfect frame. The India Press Photo Awards instituted by The Ramnath Goenka Foundation are an initiative to identify, promote and reward excellence in photojournalism and...

(CPJ/IFEX) - New York, December 1, 2006 - The Committee to Protect Journalists said today it was investigating whether the shooting death of Adolfo Sánchez Guzmán was related to his work as reporter for the Mexican news Web site Orizaba en Vivo. The journalist's body was found yesterday on the banks of the Blanco River near Mendoza, 74 miles (120 kilometers) from Xalapa, capital of the...

(ARTICLE 19/IFEX) - ARTICLE 19 today released an analysis of Nepal's Right to Information Bill - 2063 (2006). Although the Bill includes some very positive features, there are a number of shortcomings, including the seriously overbroad regime of exceptions, Law/Asia Programmes Director Toby Mendel said: "Nepal now has an historic opportunity to put in place a truly democratic framework for freedom...

(RSF/IFEX) - Reporters Without Borders has voiced concern about a government decision, taken at a cabinet meeting on 27 November 2006, that all websites dealing with Iran will have to register with the culture ministry in the next two months. The new rule will probably be difficult to implement and seems designed above all to give the authorities grounds to close down independent news sites....

(RSF/IFEX) - Reporters Without Borders has called on the Chinese government to reveal the names of the journalist and his three assistants from the southern Guizhou province who were reportedly arrested in Linfen, in the central province of Shanxi, on 3 November 2006 for investigating an explosion at the Luweitan coal mine. The organisation also asked the authorities to explain why they were...

(CEMESP/IFEX) - On 1 December 2006, two editors of the independent "Public Agenda" newspaper in Liberia's capital Monrovia complained of threats on their lives by people believed to be agents of Special Security Service (SSS) Director Chris Massaquoi. Managing Editor Gibson Jerue and Editor-in-Chief Lyndon Ponnie said the agents have been threatening to "get rid" of them if they continue critical...

(RSF/IFEX) - Reporters Without Borders has condemned the opening of a formal judicial investigation into three journalists with the Montpellier-based daily "Midi Libre" on suspicion of "violating professional confidentiality." It stems from a complaint by former Languedoc-Roussillon regional council president Jacques Blanc of the ruling UMP party over a leaked official audit. "We very much hope a...