Asia

The International Federation of Journalists has condemned changes being made in the management of major broadcast media in Korea which amount to political interference. According to IFJ affiliate, the Korean Association of Journalists (JAK), the government of Lee Myung Bak, which took over in February, is trying to manipulate media to suit their political tastes by appointing executives to state...

A reporter for a local Thai-language daily and a television station was shot dead inside his home on August 1 in Nakorn Sri Thammarat province, according to the hai Journalists Association (TJA). Police identified the victim as Athiwat Chaiyanurat, a reporter for Matichon newspaper and stringer for the army-owned Channel 7 television station. TJA condemned the killing of Athiwat as a reckless and...

Afghan television reporter Mohammad Nasir Fayyaz was detained one day after his television station aired a documentary that was critical of some cabinet members and their ministries, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). The programme was cut short while being broadcast, apparently at the demand of the government, media reports said. Afghan and foreign media reports said Fayyaz...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has called for the release of Mohammed Naseer Fayyaz, the host of the programme "Haqeeqat" (The Truth) on Afghanistan's privately-owned Ariana TV, who was arrested on July 28 by members of the Directorate for National Security (DNS) at the government's behest. "Harsh comments were made on the air about two ministers and the president but the government is making a...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has condemned the recent arrest and criminal defamation charges filed by the Malaysian government against prominent blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin, editor and founder of the Malaysia Today news website. Raja Petra was arrested and charged on July 17 at police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur and later released on bail, according to local news reports. The three...

An Afghan journalist, Rahmatullah Naikzad, has been freed after his pictures and video footage of 2 women brazenly executed by the Taliban led intelligence officials to hold him for questioning for two days, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. The pictures and footage of the slain women were aired internationally and in Afghanistan, prompting widespread anger in Afghanistan over the killings...

Iranian-Canadian photographer Zahra Kazemi died five years ago on July 10, 2003 from a cerebral haemorrhage following beatings she received in Evin prison, Tehran. In January, the Supreme Court ordered a retrial because of irregularities that affected the appeal court's verdict in November 2005. "Five years after the death of Zahra Kazemi and despite the decision to reopen the case, we have...

Aaj Kal, an Urdu-language daily published from Lahore, has been threatened by Islamic activists angered by the publication of a cartoon about Umme Hassaan, wife of Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz and also an editorial criticizing the religious militancy. The Lal Masjid, located in Pakistan's capital city of Islamabad, was the centre of a stand-off between the mosque...

Hundreds of Afghan journalists and writers took part in demonstrations on July 8 in 15 provinces to call for the release of Sayed Parvez Kambakhsh, a young journalist under sentence of death. This exemplary show of solidarity came as Kambakhsh's appeal against his conviction has ground to a halt in Kabul and no date has been set for the next hearing. "The appeal court should have quashed Kambakhsh...

One month before the start of the Beijing Olympics, China needs to make enormous progress to ensure the free access it promised journalists when the Games were awarded, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said Tuesday. Twenty-six Chinese journalists remain in prison and heavy government censorship remains in place despite Beijing's broad assurances—made in its 2001 bid to host the event...