West Asia - North Africa

Systematic harassment of the Association of Iranian Journalists by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government took a new turn on June 24 when Labour Minister Mohammad Jahromi threatened to dissolve the organisation. "This is yet another attempt by the Iranian authorities to silence those who defend free expression in Iran," Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) said. "It is vital that...

The Moroccan government should allow the news media to report on human rights abuses committed during the reign of King Hassan II, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said after a court ordered an independent newspaper to stop publishing victim testimony given to a royal truth and reconciliation commission. Ali Anouzla, editor of Al-Jarida al-Oula, a newly established daily, was ordered to...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has condemned the arrest of journalist Ahmed Al-Majoun in a raid by US and Iraqi soldiers on his home in Tikrit (180 km north of Baghdad) early on June 24. His son was also arrested. Majoun heads a journalists union based in Salah El Din, the province of which Tikrit is the capital. No reason has been given for their arrests. "We are disturbed to see that, just a...

An 11-year prison sentence has been imposed on Kurdish journalist Mohammad Sadegh Kabovand for "activity against national security." The former editor of Payam-e Mardom-e Kurdestan, a weekly closed down in 2005, Kabovand received his 11-year sentence on June 22 from a Tehran revolutionary court for creating a human rights organisation in Iran's Kurdish region. Since his arrest in July 2007, he has...

A 10-day prison sentence has been handed down to independent journalist Mazen Darwish, President of the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression, according to the Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). He was sentenced under Article 387 of the criminal code for "defamation and insulting state administrative bodies". The verdict will appear on his record for a period of three to...

The International Press Institute (IPI) has condemned the jailing of Mohammed Al-Mokaleh, one of the founding members of the Yemeni Journalist Syndicate, for laughing in a Yemeni court. On June 15, a Yemeni prosecutor accused Al-Mokaleh of "attacking and defaming the judicial system," for laughing out loud during the concluding moments of the trial of Abdelkarim Al-Khaiwani, former editor-in-chief...

The first six months of 2008 have been marked inMorocco by an avalanche of trials and repressive judicial and administrative decisions. At the same time, promises by Prime Minister Abbas El Fassi’s government to reform the press law have still not materialised. No bill has yet been submitted to the chamber of deputies. Journalists were stunned when reporter Mostapha Hurmatallah of the weekly Al

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has appealed for charges to be dropped against Mazen Darwish, the president of its partner organisation, the Syrian Centre for Media & Freedom of Expression, two days ahead of the verdict in his defamation trial on June 18. Darwish, a journalist and human rights activist, was arrested on January 12 while covering violent clashes in the Damascus suburb of Adra and...

The Algerian government is becoming increasingly intolerant of criticism. The communications ministry stripped the Agence France-Presse (AFP) bureau chief and the Reuters correspondent in Algiers of their accreditation on June 10, and a court fined the daily Liberté's publisher and editor and one of its cartoonists for defamation on June 16. "The lack of tolerance for outspoken journalists has...

Mohieddin Abdul Hameed al-Naqib, a news presenter for the local affiliate of state-run television station Al-Iraqiya TV, was gunned down by assailants in the Iraqi city of Mosul Tuesday. Al-Naqib, 49, was leaving his house outside Mosul on his way to work at around 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday, when a car with two to three men inside drove by and fired at him, killing him instantly, Samir Sloka, the head...