Two journalists employed by Urdu-language Baloch daily Azadi went missing in the Pakistan province of Balochistan within three days of each other, on February 29 and March 3, according to delayed reports received by Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). The two are feared to have been abducted. “The current deterioration in press freedom in Balochistan has become quite intolerable," Paris-based RSF...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has expressed concern at the safety of tabloid newspaper reporter Jet Sinocruz after death threats were sent to his mobile phone via text message. Sinocruz, a reporter for Abante, received a text message from an unknown sender on his birthday, warning him to enjoy his birthday celebrations as they would be his last. According to the National Union...
Those might have been bad times for press freedon in Pakistan. The number of newspapers and other periodicals in the country has decreased rapidly, but circulation has doubled from 1997 to 2006, the Daily Times has reported. According to a survey conducted by the Statistical Department of Pakistan over a period of ten years, there were 4,455 newspapers and other periodicals in all languages spoken...
Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has condemned two physical attacks on journalists on February 27 that seem to be linked to their coverage of a December incident in which Labour Minister Mervyn Silva stormed into the Sri Lanka Rupavahini Corporation (SLRC), a state-owned television station, and assaulted its news director. “Physical attacks and acts of intimidation against SLRC journalists for...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has voiced strong concern over the detention of a foreign journalist and his translator by authorities last month. Mark Magnier, Beijing bureau chief of the Los Angeles Times, accompanied by a translator and a lawyer visited citizens of a so-called “grievance village” in Beijing on February 27 2008. A number of officials approached Magnier and his...
A correspondent of an English-language newspaper was one of the at least 40 people who were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up at the funeral of a slain police officer on February 29 in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province, according to Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). The journalist was identified as Siraj Uddin. No organisation has claimed responsibility for the attack on the...
It seems to be becoming a habit of the US — an Afghan journalist working for Canada's CTV television network in Afghanistan has been designated an unlawful enemy combatant. The journalist, Jawed Ahmad, has been held without charge for the past four months at the US military compound in Bagram, 50 km north of Kabul. Major Chris Belcher, a spokesman for the US-led coalition, said that an "enemy
Conditions for domestic journalists remain poor in China despite the government’s promises to improve the press freedom environment before the Beijing Olympics, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) told the Congressional-Executive Commission on China Thursday. Bob Dietz, CPJ Asia Programme Coordinator, told the commission in Washington that China is holding at least 25...
The World Association of Newspapers and World Editors Forum have called on China to immediately release three journalists who are being held in violation of Chinese laws against lengthy detentions without trial. The journalists — two reporters and a photographer — were arrested in June 2007 after reporting on a case of corruption in the Communist Party. Chinese authorities failed to release them...
Leaders and representatives of journalists’ associations and trade unions across the Asia-Pacific region will work together more closely within the new International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) Asia-Pacific, launched in Kuala Lumpur at the weekend. IFJ affiliates, gathered for a regional meeting on February 2-3, pledged to work together in a formal group to fight for the rights of journalists...
