Europe - Central Asia

Slovenia has charged Finnish journalist Magnus Berglund with two counts of criminal defamation after a documentary he produced quoted unnamed sources as saying that members of the former Slovene government – including former Prime Minister Janez Jansa – accepted bribes in arms deals with Finnish arms maker Patria. Berglund made the allegations in a September 2008 documentary produced by Finland’s...

Forensics experts in Ukraine are trying to identify fragments of a human skull found in the Bilotserkivski district of Kyiv Oblast, Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) has reported. The investigators suspect that the remains are those of independent journalist Heorhiy Gongadze, who was abducted and beheaded by unknown assailants in 2000. Gongadze, known for his criticism of the Ukrainian...

South African President Jacob Zuma accepted "very substantial damages" from Britain's Guardian newspaper over an article that wrongly suggested he was a rapist, Reuters repored quoting his lawyers on Thursday. The March article, headlined "Get used to a corrupt and chaotic South Africa. But don't write it off" also alleged Zuma was guilty of corruption and bribery arising out of his involvement in...

The Russian government has drafted legislation that would make it easier for news agencies to contest plagiarism of their reports, drawing cheers from big outlets like Interfax and RIA-Novosti, but critics say the bill is too vague to be effective, according to a Moscow Times report. The law, drafted by the Communications and Press Ministry, would extend copyright protection to news reports, with...

A former senior figure in Ukraine's interior ministry has confessed to the murder in 2000 of journalist Heorhiy Gongadze and implicated high-ranking state officials, Agence France-Presse (AFP) has reported quoting authorities. Details: [ Link] Asked by reporters if the suspect, arrested on Tuesday, had confessed and if he implicated senior Ukrainian officials in the killing, Vassyl Grytsak, deputy...

Media representatives are frequently being prevented by Moldovan authorities from reporting freely, especially following parliamentary elections in April this year, the South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO) has said. According to SEEMO, on July 12 two journalists, Ivan Melnic and Vladimir Thorik from the Moldovan newspaper Moldavskie Vedomosti, were forcefully prevented from entering a...

After reporting 10 claims of women being raped since a new police chief came to the Turkish town of Diyarbakır, an issue of the Azadiya Welat newspaper was confiscated, IPS Communication Foundation (BIANET) has reported. The Diyarbakır 1st Criminal Court of Peace confiscated the July 8, 2009 issue of Azadiya Welat because it reported the claims of a 23-year-old woman who said she had been raped by...

An iconic Spanish Civil War photo that shows a Republican soldier at the apparent moment he was fatally hit in the back by a bullet was in fact staged, a Spanish newspaper claimed on Friday. "(Robert) Capa photographed his soldier at a location where there was no fighting," wrote Barcelona-based newspaper El Periodico which carried out a study of the photograph taken in September 1936, the third...

There have been continuing threats against journalists working for the Charter 97 news and opposition website (charter97.org) in Belarus, according to Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). In the latest case, site editor Natallya Radzina received a threatening email message on July 15 that was prompted by a report about a pro-Russian neo-fascist group. The email that Radzina received on...

A policeman has confessed to beating a Kyrgyz journalist in the southern Osh region who later died from his injuries, RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service has reported quoting the country's Deputy Interior Minister Sabyrbek Kurmanaliev. Almaz Tashiyev, 32, was buried on July 13 in the Nookat district. He died the previous day from massive internal injuries suffered during a beating in Nookat on July 4. Details...