Pacific Region

Australian federal police raided the house of a Canberra journalist Tuesday seeking to identify the source for a story quoting classified material from the top-secret Defence Intelligence Organisation, the Age has reported. Seven officers searched the home of Canberra Times national affairs correspondent Philip Dorling at 8.30 am. They took Dorling's laptop computer, the hard drive from a second...

Australia's second largest press group Fairfax Media announced Tuesday it would slash five percent of its workforce, or 550 jobs, as part of a plan to save 50 million dollars (43 million US). Unions said the redundancies in Australia and New Zealand would affect around 180 journalists in the group that publishes the flagship Sydney Morning Herald and the Age newspapers, Agence France-Presse (AFP)...

Newspaper publisher John Woods was convicted in the Rarotonga High Court on two charges of contempt of court, reports Cook Island News. Fines amounting to approx. US$60 and court costs were imposed on Woods. The convictions were handed down against the 55-year-old Arorangi resident by Justice of the Peace John Kenning. Both charges relate to the breach of a gag order handed down by Justice...

Fiji's military government deported the Australian publisher of Rupert Murdoch's Fiji Times newspaper on Friday, after declaring him a threat to national security, according to Reuters. The move is the latest crackdown on the media in Fiji since military commander Frank Bainimarama seized power in a bloodless coup in late 2006, and comes amid growing international criticism of the slow progress in...

Fiji's military government defied a High Court order and deported the Australian publisher of the South Pacific country's leading newspaper Friday, continuing a campaign of media intimidation it began within days of seizing power, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. The coup-installed government said Fiji Times publisher Evan Hannah was a threat to national security who breached his work...

Contempt of court proceedings have been started against the editor and owner of a New Zealand newspaper over the publication of suppressed police evidence collected during last year's police raids in the Ureweras. Solicitor-General David Collins filed papers in the High Court in Wellington on Monday against editor Tim Pankhurst and Fairfax New Zealand, the publisher of the Dominion Post, according...

MELBOURNE: Hedley Thomas, the journalist who wrote a series of stories about the Australian government’s handling of Indian doctor Mohammed Haneef’s arrest on suspected terror charge, has won the country’s most coveted journalism award. Thomas, who is associated with The Australian newspaper, won the “Gold Walkley” award for covering and highlighting the mistakes made by the government in the...

Australia's proud international reputation for the strength of its democratic institutions and civil rights records received a blow with the latest findings of the 'Report of the Independent Audit into the State of Free Speech in Australia'. RSF focused on the anti-terrorism laws in Australia that “risk being abusively used against the press” such as phone-tapping without judicial supervision or...

New Zealand newspaper publisher APN News & Media has begun outsourcing editorial production work, a plan that will be extended to five daily and three weekly newspapers by year end, the Associated Press (AP) reported. The changes, effective from yesterday, mean that news editing and layout operations at the New Zealand Herald, the country's biggest daily, and a string of regional dailies will be...

A New Zealand newspaper publisher announced Thursday it plans to outsource much of its editorial production to another company — a move that brought a pledge from unions to fight the proposal. APN New Zealand, half-owned by Irish businessman Tony O’Reilly’s Dublin-based Independent Newspapers Ltd., told staff up to 70 editorial staff jobs would be lost if it sources some editorial production from...