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KHARTOUM, June 14 (Reuters) - The United Nations on Tuesday condemned the closure of Sudan’s only opposition English language daily, saying freedom of the press was essential for Sudan’s transition to democracy. The Khartoum Monitor, one of three independent dailies in Sudan, was closed and had its licence revoked by a Supreme Court order on Sunday after it said it had suffered weeks of heavy...

Ethiopian journalists forced into exile in neighbouring countries are crying out for global help, saying a state crackdown in their country has made it impossible for the independent press to report anything, including religious issues. "We have been robbed of our right as free journalists," Wondwosen Teklu, an Ethiopian journalist exiled in Kenya told a media conference in Nairobi on 2 May, the...

Over the course of the past year, first in Seoul and then in Moscow, the biggest players in the global newspaper industry have met to discuss ways of coping with a dire reality. Internet aggregators. Satellite TV. Bloggers. Free mass circulation dailies. These and a host of other new media products are the driving forces of what is clearly set to be the biggest transformation in the history of...

(CPJ/IFEX) - New York, June 15, 2006 - The Committee to Protect Journalists is dismayed by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez's threat to block the renewal of broadcast licenses for privately owned television and radio stations that oppose his government. Chávez said Wednesday that he had ordered a review of licenses for media outlets that supported the 2002 coup attempt against him. He did not name...

More than 1,000 journalists have visited Guantanamo Bay since the U.S. military began locking up suspected al-Qaida and Taliban militants there 4 1/2 years ago. But access has been severely restricted: Journalists could not talk to detainees, they had to be accompanied by a military escort and their photos were censored. Now, the Pentagon has shut down access entirely - at least temporarily -...

A Chinese journalist found guilty of extortion after writing articles about official corruption was sentenced Thursday to one year in prison, his wife and lawyer said. Yang Xiaoqing, a reporter for the state-run China Industrial Economy News, was sentenced at the Longhui No. 1 People’s Court in Hunan province, his lawyer, Zhang Xingshui said. Yang’s wife, Gong Jie, said she would appeal the...

If you thought the US media's credibility has been on the decline, you would have had a good reason to believe that. But wait, here's more food for your thought – almost 50 per cent of senior marketing executives have reported paying for an editorial or broadcast placement – and almost half of those who haven't said they would. CONTENTIOUS: According to the PRWeek survey, 24 per cent of senior...

Journalists from all over the world Thursday joined journalists in Iraq in their appeal for action to curb the violence against media staff which has claimed at least 130 lives in just three years. A statement from a global Committee for the Defence of Journalists in Iraq also highlighted a worldwide humanitarian appeal to help the media victims of violence. THEIR PHOTOGRAPHS: An Iraqi journalist...

Sun editor Rebekah Wade, Channel 4 News anchor Jon Snow and Newsnight's Jeremy Paxman all did, but Today presenter John Humphrys, News of the World editor Andy Coulson and BBC Ten O'Clock News presenter Fiona Bruce did not. More than half of Britain's top 100 journalists were educated at private schools, a proportion that has increased over the past two decades, according to research. The figures...

SEVERAL Australian newspapers are gearing up to follow the lead of British counterparts in putting exclusive breaking news online before it appears in print and devoting more newsroom resources to the internet. This week Fleet Street fired the first shots in a revolution that will fundamentally change the way newspapers operate and could even hasten the end of the newsprint era. On Monday, The...