News

Romeo Olea, a provincial radio commentator in the Philippines, was shot dead on his way to work Monday morning. Local and international media reports, quoting police sources, say Olea was shot twice in the back while riding his motorcycle to work in Iriga City in Camarines Sur province, about 300 km from Manila, according to New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)...

Two Pakistani journalists who captured images of apparent military violence against unarmed foreigners and a local man are being threatened, their colleagues have told New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The threats have come amid calls from high-ranking Pakistani military leaders to quell public criticism of their policies, made at a Thursday meeting of top...

Marco Antonio López Ortiz, the news editor of Novedades Acapulco, a daily based in the resort city of Acapulco (in the southwestern state of Guerrero), has been missing since 11:30 p.m. on June 7, when he was abducted by several individuals as he went to meet a woman friend in a bar, according to reports June 9 on the websites of his newspaper and El Sur, another local paper. Colleagues from...

Mario Estebán López, the owner and director of regional TV station Canal 22 RAV Televisión, could be executed if he does not leave the city of Ipiales, in the southwestern department of Nariño, by June 11, according to a warning he received on the night of June 8, nine days after he was nearly killed by three unidentified attackers armed with gasoline. In the attack with gasoline, which took place...

Justice has been served in the case of murdered journalist Chauncey Bailey. On June 9, an Alameda County jury convicted Yusuf Bey IV and his accomplice Antoine Mackey, both 25, of the murder of journalist Chauncey Bailey on August 2, 2007. Mackey and Bey IV had pleaded not guilty to all charges. The jury started deliberating on May 23. Bailey, 57, was shot to death as he walked to his job at the...

It has been exactly 500 days since Sri Lankan journalist Prageeth Eknelygoda disappeared. He has not been seen by his wife Sandhya Eknelygoda or by the couple's two teenage sons, Sanjay and Harith, since he left for work around 7:30 a.m., on the morning of January 24, 2010. Sandhya filed a complaint with the local police office at 11:30 a.m. the next day but so far no government official has given...

The trial of three people accused of killing Kyrgyz journalist Gennady Pavlyuk in the Kazakh capital of Almaty in December 2009 by throwing him from the 6th floor of a building opened two days ago in Almaty. At the time of his death, Pavlyuk had been given the job of creating a news website and a weekly newspaper for the Kyrgyz opposition party Ata-Meken. “The decision to hold an open trial at the...

Central African Republic authorities have charged the director of the independent weekly The Hills of Bangui, Faustin Bambou, with inciting hatred and disorder among the military forces and insulting the government, Bambou told New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The director was sent directly to Ngaragba Prison in the capital, Bangui. Four military policemen...

Sudan has pressed criminal charges against 10 journalists who have reported on the alleged rape and torture of a youth activist, according to New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The activist said she was raped after participating in a demonstration in January. "Rather than address the systematic failures that enable torture and rape, the Sudanese government...

The Supreme Court of Rwanda sentenced the exiled online editor of Umuvugizi, Jean Bosco Gasasira, on Friday to a two year and six month term in prison. Gasasira received this sentence for allegedly insulting Rwanda's president and inciting civil disobedience, local journalists told New York-based press freedom group Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). Gasasira believes the new sentence may...