Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has hailed the provisional release of French photographer Jean-Paul Ney, who had been held in Abidjan since late December 2007 in connection with a conspiracy to overthrow the Ivorian government known as the “Christmas in Abidjan” affair. The provisional release of Ney on Wednesday and all the other persons held in connection with the case was ordered this afternoon...
Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has written to Rwandan information minister Louise Mushikiwabo expressing deep concern about the “temporary suspension” of BBC broadcasts in the local language Kinyarwanda because of comments about the 1994 genocide which Rwandan citizens made in one of these broadcasts. “We are aware that the genocide continues to be a highly sensitive subject in your country and...
Amid Thailand's continuing political chaos, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has strongly condemned the assassination attempt against media owner, television commentator, and political activist Sondhi Limthongkul on Friday and called on Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's government to ensure a quick investigation. According to local and international news reports, at around 5:30 a.m...
As part of its declaration of a state of emergency on Sunday, the Thai government issued a decree that empowered officials to censor news considered a threat to national security, according to international and local news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on the government to immediately rescind this order of censorship. On Monday, the government ordered the blocking...
Fiji's interim government must relax its reporting restrictions after the government declared a 30-day state of emergency on Friday, the Committee to Protect Journalists has demanded. Three foreign reporters have since been ordered to be deported and one local journalist detained, according to international news reports, and newspapers and broadcasts have been censored. Australian Sean Dorney and...
Moldovan authorities have been arresting journalists and even using violence against them amid angry protests and rioting about the results of last weekend’s parliamentary elections, Paris-based Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. Both Moldovan and Romanian journalists have been affected. “We appeal to the authorities to act with care and restraint,” RSF said. “They have a duty to ensure...
The Algerian government has decided to ban the distribution of the current issues of three French publications – L'Express, Marianne and Journal du Dimanche – on the eve of the April 9, 2009 election (where the President Abdelaziz Bouteflika is running for the third term), Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported.. "This censorship is disgraceful," Paris-based RSF said, expressing outrage at...
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has written to the king of Bahrain to protest the recent deterioration of press freedom in the country and his government's ongoing campaign against critical or opposition websites and blogs. The crackdown against those sites has resulted in dozens of them being blocked inside the kingdom, according to local and international human rights and press...
China's inconsistency in applying its own new rules and regulations for non-mainland journalists amounts to obstacle-setting in which bureaucrats continue to restrict reporting regardless of government edicts, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has said. According to local media reports, officers of the Sichuan provincial government sought to bar journalists from entering...
Chun Keun Lee, a journalist employed by public TV station MBC, who was arrested March 24 evening in Seoul on the orders of the prosecutor’s office, Reporters sans frontières (RSF) has reported. When a RSF representative met Lee on March 25, he said he knew he might be arrested in connection with a report about beef imports from the United States. After Lee’s arrest, the representative went to MBC...
