International

The South East Asian Journalists Unions (SEAJU) have taken a united stand to combat the rampant state of impunity for journalist attacks in the region and to bring their unions together to advocate on the common issues central to the craft of journalism and a free and vibrant independent media. The second annual SEAJU networking meeting, convened by the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ...

The Committee to Protect Journalists has welcomed Facebook's move to enable access via a Tor hidden service, which came into effect on Friday. The step protects journalists and other users who are at risk of surveillance, censorship, or online attack. "Facebook's decision to enable access via a dedicated Tor hidden service provides journalists with substantial additional protection against network...

The International Press Institute (IPI) has welcomed two recent European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) decisions upholding the media's right to report on issues of public concern in the face of libel suits. In the first ruling, Erla Hlynsdóttir v. Iceland [No.2], published on October 21, the Court unanimously ruled that Iceland violated a journalist's right to free expression when a court there...

IFEX, the global network of 95 organisations defending and promoting free expression, has announced the launch of its 2014 End Impunity campaign in advance of the first-ever UN International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists, on November 2. This date was chosen by the UN to coincide with the day in 2013 when French journalists Ghislaine Dupont and Claude Verlon were executed by...

Reflective of a lack of global legal consensus, media policies toward anonymous online reader comments remain in an “experimental” stage, a new report commissioned by the International Press Institute (IPI) has concluded. The report, released last week, examines law and media best practices from around the world on the question of anonymous speech online, an issue viewed with increasing...

Islamic State’s Jihadi militants are imposing a news and information dictatorship in the areas they dominate in Iraq and Syria. Local and foreign journalists are no longer able to work properly and crimes of violence against them are on the increase, according to Reporters Without Borders. What with news media being closed, censored or self-censored and journalists being threatened, hunted down...

Freedom of the press and of expression in the hemisphere underwent a marked deterioration in the last six months due to a significant increase in direct and indirect censorship and physical attacks on journalists, the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) has said. Violence carried out by organised crime, drug traffic hitmen and police-style groups on the orders of several governments of the...

Global support for investigative journalism in Australia and New Zealand is a welcome response to law changes and a police raid, according to the Pacific Freedom Forum. "Particularly welcome is the call from the Freedom of the Press Foundation in the United States for worldwide fundraising for legal defence," said PFF Chair Titi Gabi. PFF is calling on Australia and New Zealand to urgently review...

Efforts to contain the Ebola outbreak in West Africa have been associated with various forms of press freedom restrictions and attacks on journalists, which continue to hamper the provision of timely and accurate information to the public. In a special report highlighting the impact of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) has noted that the Ebola outbreak...

The World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) has called on governments worldwide for greater protections for media working in conflict areas, in the wake of the widely reported murders of two photojournalists in the Middle East. A resolution issued by the Board of WAN-IFRA, meeting Sunday on the eve of the World Publishing Expo in Amsterdam, also called for a concerted global...