State Control

The arrest of a prominent blogger and a journalist under Malaysia's draconian Internal Security Act (ISA) is being seen by free speech advocates as the start of a wider crackdown ahead of an anticipated opposition push to gain control of parliament. Malaysia's leading blogger, Raja Petra Kamaruddin, a staunch government critic on his website Malaysia Today, was the first to be taken into custody

The Egyptian government is increasing its control over the media, especially the broadcast media. Egypt already has a repressive press law and a state of emergency law that has been in effect since 1981. In November, parliament is due to examine a new broadcasting bill that is causing further concern. At the same time, several production companies working with foreign satellite TV stations have...

Authorities in Niger summarily suspended a private broadcaster for a month citing unspecified regulatory violations, according to local journalists and news reports. The station has provided sympathetic coverage of the country's former prime minister, now jailed on corruption charges, according to several sources. In a ruling obtained by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has urged the FBI to release more information about the procedures they used in 2004 to obtain reporters' telephone records while they were stationed at the New York Times and the Washington Post bureaus in Indonesia. Paris-based RSF welcomed Thursday the apology the FBI made to the newspapers' editors for improperly using the so-called "exigent letters" to obtain...

The Committee to Protect Journalists' website, www.cpj.org, is blocked in the Main Press Centre and at least one other Olympic press venue, according to a number of foreign journalists there. CPJ is calling on the Chinese authorities to provide the free Internet access they promised foreign reporters when they were awarded the Games. “We call on China and the International Olympic Committee to...

The US government's attempts to flout news-gathering privilege hit another road-block on August 11 when a court denied its request to block an amicus curiae brief signed by numerous news organisations in support of CBS in its effort to quash a government subpoena. The case concerns an interview with US Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich by Scott Pelley, aired on March 18, 2007 on "60 Minutes". Wuterich...

Security service agents in Egypt recently confiscated copies of the independent newspapers Al-Dustour and Al Badil from stores, following the newspapers' publication of a story about an Egyptian businessman's connection to the murder of the well-known Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) has reported. The seizure of...

Reporters covering the aftermath of Monday's attack on a border police outpost in Kashgar have been detained, beaten, and harassed, according to international news reports. Japan's Kyodo News Agency reported Wednesday that police in Kashgar dragged Masami Kawakita, a photographer from the Chunichi Shimbun newspaper's Tokyo headquarters, and Shinji Katsuta, a reporter for Nippon Television Network...

President Alexander Lukashenko has signed a restrictive new media law which will allow authorities to further restrict press freedom in Belarus. The Belarusian parliament - before its adjournment in late June - rushed the bill through in three consecutive readings and passed it to the Constitutional Court for review. According to the local press, the court rubberstamped the bill in July and...

The International Federation of Journalists has condemned changes being made in the management of major broadcast media in Korea which amount to political interference. According to IFJ affiliate, the Korean Association of Journalists (JAK), the government of Lee Myung Bak, which took over in February, is trying to manipulate media to suit their political tastes by appointing executives to state...