Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has expressed concern over the detention of freelance journalist Al-Ghali Yahya Shegifat, who has been held incommunicado in an unknown location since May 14. Neither his family nor his lawyer has been able to contact him and the charges against him are unknown.
"The way this journalist has been made to virtually disappear is illegal and outrageous," Paris-based RSF said in a statement. "The authorities must announce the charges against Shegifat and guarantee his rights as a citizen. The regime's crackdown on the independent press since the armed attacks by the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) on May 10 is very disturbing. This wave of censorship will just aggravate the current instability."
A freelancer who heads the Association of Darfur Journalists and writes for the privately-owned daily Ray Al-Shaab, Shegifat was first arrested by national security agents on May 12 in Khartoum and was released on the evening of the same day. The Save Darfur NGO collective said it believed he was physically mistreated during this first period of detention. He was then arrested again on May 14 and no one has had any contact with him since.
According to the Sudan Organisation Against Torture (SOAT), around 100 people were arrested during the three days following the JEM attacks.
