Sudan

Sudan has decided to lift prior censorship on the written press. Paris-based Reporters Sans Frontières (RSF), however, called for this announcement to be followed by real change and accompanied by further steps allowing greater press freedom in Sudan. President Omar al-Bashir on September 27 put an end by decree to censorship of all publications before printing that has been carried out by the...

A woman journalist convicted of public indecency for wearing trousers outdoors was freed Tuesday, despite her own desire to serve a month in prison as protest against Sudan's draconian morality laws, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. The judge who convicted Lubna Hussein had imposed a $200 fine as her sentence, avoiding the maximum sentence of 40 lashes in an apparent attempt to put an end...

The trial of Sudanese journalist Lubna Hussein, who faces 40 lashes after being arrested a month ago for wearing trousers, has been postponed, again, until September 7, according to International Press Institute (IPI) fellow Vuslat Dogan Sabancı, who was in Khartoum for the hearing. The delay in Hussein’s trial is apparently designed to give the judges time to decide whether Hussein’s job as a UN...

Sudanese media has suffered multiple blows in recent months as parliament considers a harshly repressive press bill and authorities impose an exceptional level of censorship. The press bill, introduced in the Sudanese National Assembly in April, falls far short of international standards for free expression, according to an analysis by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The

Sudan's execution this week of nine men found guilty of involvement in the 2006 assassination of editor Mohammed Taha Mohammed Ahmed is seen by many there as an outrageous miscarriage of justice, spurred by a thirst on the part of President Omar al-Bashir's regime for settling scores with the rebellious region of Darfur. All nine men were from this oppressed and poverty-stricken region of Sudan

Sudan has deported Tunisian journalist Zouhir Latif. Latif, who has political refugee status in Britain, was put on a flight bound for London on Sunday, according to Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). A freelance journalist who works for France 24’s Arabic-language service and the pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat, Latif was arrested at his home by intelligence agents on February 27 and was held for 48 hours...

The Sudanese embassy in Cairo is said to have launched an extensive media campaign in Egyptian and Arab mass media in the wake of the release and distribution of the documentary Darfur Destroyed. The documentary, which was created by Aegis Trust and released on February 10, featured credible and documented testimonies and confessions of perpetrators of war crimes committed in Darfur, particularly

The Sudanese government is censoring the media and cracking down on human rights activists and journalists who speak out on human rights and justice. Harassment, repression and censorship has worsened in the last year, particularly since the International Criminal Court's (ICC) request for an arrest warrant for President Omar al-Bashir in July 2008. A 21-page report by Human Rights Watch (HRW),

Sudan has expelled a foreign journalist for reporting on the country's Darfur crisis and arms industry. Canadian-Egyptian reporter Heba Aly, who wrote for US news agency Bloomberg, Boston-based Christian Science Monitor newspaper and the United Nations news service IRIN, left the country last week. She told colleagues that officers from Sudan's security service contacted her and ordered her to...

The Sudanese police Monday arrested 70 journalists in capital Khartoum where they had gathered to present a memorandum to lawmakers asking them to revise the Press and Media Law and to make it conform to the interim constitution. Scores of journalists rallied outside parliament condemning the censorship which flouts the freedom of expression supposed to be enshrined in Sudan's interim constitution...