Reporters Without Borders reiterates its call for the release of Diallo, his reporter Daouda Yacouba, and Niamey-based journalist Moussa Kaka. Moussa Kaka, director of privately-owned Radio Saraounia and Niger correspondent of both Radio France Internationale and Reporters Without Borders completed 100th day in detention and risks life imprisonment. Ibrahima Manzo Diallo, director of the bimonthly Aïr Info, in the northern town of Agadez, was arrested and he remained in police custody without charge.
African artists, performers, journalists, lawyers and were among the first people to sign a petition by Reporters Without Borders for the release of Kaka. Kaka was arrested on 20 September 2007 and charged with "complicity in a conspiracy against state authority" for his frequent contact with and reporting on the northern Tuareg rebels of the Niger People's Movement for Justice. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment. The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) reiterates its call on the government for the release of Moussa Kaka and to withdraw all the
“baseless†charges against him.
IFJ called on the President of the Republic of Niger to intervene to put an end to the repression on the media after the recent arrests of editor Ibrahim Manzo Diallo, accused of “working with Radio France Internationale†and the detention of correspondent Moussa Kaka. He is held on charges of endangering the safety of the state for suspected links with Tuareg rebels, allegedly based on yet to be made public recorded phone conversations. Reporters Without Borders is published a list of the first 68 people to sign the petition, to convince President which will remain open until Moussa Kaka is freed.
Diallo’s brother, Ali Diallo told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the policeman who arrested Diallo at the airport accused him of working for RFI. CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon voiced his opinion on the arrest stating that it is “Association with a foreign news agency should not be the grounds for arrest.†He also stated that the authorities must immediately release Diallo and abandon regressive practices of intimidating and stifling the press. CPJ condemned the outrages arrests made on laughable accusations.
Yacouba, who is the Agadez-based "Aïr Info"'s Ingall correspondent and helps Diallo run the newspaper, spoke to Reporters Without Borders from his place of detention, describing how gendarmes arrested him on 25 October, and took him to the gendarmerie headquarters in Agadez and questioned him about his articles and his alleged links with the Tuareg rebels of the Niger People's Movement for Justice (MNJ). He was then put in the same cell as Diallo.
It was Yacouba who, in Diallo's absence, took charge of publishing the newspaper's latest issue on 24 October, the day before he was arrested. Diallo told Reporters Without Borders by telephone that the two were now "detained together," were being "treated well" and were allowed to receive visits. Diallo's arrest came three weeks after that of Kaka
Director Gabriel Baglo of the IFJ Africa office in a letter to President Tandja expressed his worry about the continued detention of his colleagues and the serious charges they face stemming from their professional work.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) says the government has targeted Radio France Internationale (RFI) in recent months over its coverage of a deadly northern rebellion of nomadic Tuaregs, according to local journalists and news reports. Nigerian authorities have targeted RFI by banning RFI special envoy Ghislaine Dupont from heading north and suspending for a month the station’s FM broadcasts. The arrest followed the expulsion of French independent filmmaker François Bergeron, according to news reports. Bergeron was detained for a month after his arrest while filming in Agadez, according to French daily Libération.
Aïr Info had published a list of some 20 people arrested in the region on suspicion of links with the rebels. Authorities declared a three-month state of alert around Agadez in August, granting security forces blanket powers of arrest and detention. In June the state media regulatory body Conseil Supérieur de la Communication (CSC) suspended Aïr-Info for three months accusing it of inciting “hatred and violence†in the Tuareg conflict. Three other newspapers received warning letters from the CSC for their coverage of the conflict.
Kaka was charged with "involvement in a plot against the state's authority" for suspected links with the Tuareg-led rebels Niger Movement for Justice (MNJ). The authorities have been tapping Kaka's telephone conversations with MNJ members. There have been frequent armed clashes between the MNJ and government troops in the north of the country since February, and Kaka interviewed one of the MNJ's leaders several times for RFI.
On November 16, a magistrate decided not to accept as evidence the tapes of Kaka's conversations with the rebels, as they were not obtained legally. This was the only evidence the prosecution had in its case. It is therefore believed that without any further evidence against Kaka there is no longer any reason for him to be charged or detained. The prosecutor appealed against this decision and the Niamey appeal court must now give a ruling on the issue. If it rules in Kaka’s favour, he ought to be freed.
The IFJ called on President Tandja to take immediate action to secure the release of Kaka and Diallo and to ensure that all the charges against them are dropped. RSF also stated that it strives to put an end to the rash series of arrests in order to stop the progressive collapse of the rule of law in Niger. The press freedom organization said, "Two journalists are now being held in Agadez in an utterly illegal manner and in violation of the government's democratic undertakings. Yacouba, Diallo and Kaka must all be released at once."
Two French journalists who went to Niger on assignment for the Franco-German TV station Arte, Thomas Dandois and Pierre Creisson, have been held on a charge of “breach of national security†since 17 December. The authorities claim they were making an “illicit report†about the MNJ. They had a visa and permission to do a report on bird flu.
RSF brought out in its petition that bringing this kind of charge against professional newspaper editors, reporters is an insult to journalism.
