The opening of two government investigations into private television network Teleamazonas and threats of legal action by Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa against critical media outlets are an attempt by the government to stifle dissent, the Committee to Protect Journalists has said. During his weekly radio address on Saturday, President Correa said that he would resort to legal action to "finish...
Serbia's war crimes prosecutor has launched a probe into the role of journalists in stoking war crimes during 1991-1995 wars in the former Yugoslavia, Reuters reported quoting an official on Monday. The Special War Crime Prosecutor's office plans to focus on links between war-mongering reporting and 1991-92 atrocities in the Croatian and Bosnian towns of Vukovar and Zvornik. Some details from the...
North Korea's top court convicted two American journalists and sentenced them to 12 years in a prison Monday, intensifying the communist nation's confrontation with the United States. The sentencing came amid soaring tensions fueled by the North's latest nuclear and missile tests. The Central Court tried American TV reporters Laura Ling and Euna Lee and confirmed their unspecified "grave crime"...
The Libyan government has decided to nationalise the country's few privately-owned news media, which until now were controlled by Al-Ghad, a company launched two years ago by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s son, Seif Al-Islam, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. “This is clearly a retrograde measure,” Paris-based RSF reacted. “The launch of several privately-owned media by Seif Al-Islam...
Two American journalists went on trial trial Thursday in North Korea on accusations of illegal entry and "hostile acts" in a case that could send them to a labour camp for 10 years. US television journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling were on assignment for San Francisco-based Current TV when they were picked up on March 17. They were later charged with illegally entering the Democratic Peoples...
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has welcomed the decision of the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to withdraw legal action against a website after an IFJ call for restraint by Iraq's political leaders in their dealings with media. At a historic meeting of journalists' leaders from 30 countries in Baghdad ten days ago IFJ had called for more professionalism from Iraqi media...
Elena Maglevannaya, a Russian journalist who was recently ordered to pay a fine of 200,000 roubles (4,500 euros) and to publicly retract her articles about the torture of a Chechen detainee, has asked for political asylum in Finland, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. She filed her asylum request while in Helsinki to attend a civic forum organised by the Finnish human rights group...
A Paris appeal court has ruled that the latest issue of the monthly magazine Choc can go back on sale only if a photograph of murder victim Ilan Halimi on the cover and inside pages is blacked out, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. Halimi’s alleged murderers are currently on trial. The ruling was the result of Choc’s appeal against a court order issued at the request of Halimi’s family...
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on all parties to pursue diplomatic efforts to gain the release of detained US journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who are facing trial in North Korea this week. The families of the two journalists spoke out Monday morning on US television to urge diplomatic talks to resolve the detentions independent of the larger geopolitical issues on the...
The European Federation of Journalist (EFJ) has protested against proposals for the draft legislation in Finland which would compel journalists to reveal their sources in certain criminal cases. "This bill is unbelievable. Protection of sources is a cornerstone of independent journalism and the free flow of information. Journalists have to be certain that media freedom is secured and journalists'...
