Nepal

KATHMANDU: In an echo of media curbs imposed in February 2005 when King Gyanendra seized power, the royalist government was trying to censor the Indian media as Nepal was thrown into fresh turmoil, reports said. Last year, after the royal coup, Indian news channels Aaj Tak and Star News had been closed down. This week, after opposition parties called a mass protest meet in Kathmandu on Friday and...

Media personnel blamed that the proposed the Broadcasting Authority Act is the conspicuous evident of the panic stricken mentality on the part of government." They accused the government of attempting to curtail press freedom through the introduction of the act, while the controversial Media Ordinance promulgated some months back is still under consideration of the Supreme Court. Speaking at the...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has voiced outrage at the continuing harassment of the independent press by the security forces in both Kathmandu and the districts, in which at least six journalists have been detained, attacked or threatened already this year. DOWN WITH THE KING: Supporters of the Nepal Workers and Peasant Party take part in a massive rally against the monarchy in the capital...

Kathmandu, Jan 9 (PTI) Police in an eastern Nepal district have allegedly grilled a journalist with a leading English-language daily to reveal the source of a report he had filed and threatened him with "trouble" if he failed to do so. A Deputy Superintendent of Police yesterday pressurised 'The Kathmandu Post' reporter Benupraj Bhattarai to reveal the source of his news story, which said a group...

Journalists across the country staged demonstrations on Friday, demanding press freedom and early end to the fresh curb on independent media. Hundreds of journalists, human rights activists and representatives of professional organisations joined a rally organised by the Federation of Nepalese Journalists (FNJ) in the capital in the afternoon. Addressing a gathering at Indra Chowk after a rally...

The Supreme Court of Nepal ordered the government Wednesday to allow a private radio station to relay BBC programmes, the station's chief said. "We will resume the broadcast of the BBC Nepali Service from Wednesday," Radio Sagarmatha chief Lakshman Upreti said. RED RIDING HOODS: Nepalese activists shout anti-monarch slogans during a rally at Naya Baneswar in the capital Kathamandu December 2,2005...

Nepal's Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the government not to close a radio station after police raided its premises to prevent it from relaying a BBC interview with Maoist leader Prachanda. More than 500 journalists organised a public meeting to express their solidarity for Radio Sagarmatha in nepal capital Kathmandu on Monday. © Dinesh Wagle/United We Blog A single-bench of justice Badri Kumar...

Nepal police stormed a community FM radio station, arrested four journalists and seized equipment in order to block a BBC interview with Maoist leader Prachanda late Sunday. "The legal action has been against Radio Sagarmatha as it has been found that topics prohibited or banned has been broadcast," state-run Radio Nepal quoted a statement by the Nepal information and communications ministry as...

BUTWAL, Nov 20 - A fierce debate ensued between local journalists and a team of Press Council currently in Butwal, monitoring the code of conduct for journalists, on Sunday. Local journalists criticized the council's chairman Mathabar Singh Basnet's remark that the government was forced to introduce new media ordinance due to difficult situation in the country. Basnet in his speech had said that...

Over 2,000 professionals from various walks of life including lawyers, journalists, teachers and doctors staged demonstrations in Nepal's capital Kathmandu on Sunday to protest media repression and the recent rejection by the Supreme Court of a petition seeking a stay order on the controversial media ordinance introduced by the government in early October. Pro-democracy activists demonstrate in...