State Persecution

The government of South Korea has ordered home documentary filmmaker Kim Young Me from Iraq, where she was on assignment, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has eported. Kim returned to Seoul on August 9, after leaving Iraq on August 3. She had been embedded with American forces in Iraq's dangerous Diyala province, when US military authorities were told she did not have her...

Fatou Jaw Manneh, a US-based Gambian journalist, faces a possible prison sentence if found guilty of sedition charges following an interview highly critical of President Yahya Jammeh and his administration, which she granted to the media in 2004. The Kanifing Magistrate court trying her has fixed August 18 as the day it will give its ruling on the case. Manneh has been charged on three counts of...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has called on Iranian authorities to make public any charges against a Kurdish journalist and human rights activist who they have held for more than two weeks, or release him immediately. On July 27, security forces arrested Saman Rasoulpour, 23, a Kurdish journalist and a member of the Organisation for the Defence of Human Rights in Kurdistan, in his...

The Labour Court has ordered the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC) to reinstate immediately, without loss of salary or benefits, six journalists who were suspended in June 2008, the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) has reported. The six - Lawrence Maphosa (television production manager), Patrice Makova (news editor), Sibonginkosi Mlilo (executive producer, Nhau/Indaba), Monica...

Zimbabwean freelance photojournalist Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi has decided to flee to South Africa with his family after being assaulted by the police and having his car confiscated, the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) has reported. Before leaving the country, Mukwazhi told MISA-Zimbabwe that the police accused him of possessing an "improperly registered vehicle" and of having used the...

Regional authorities in Dagestan have decided to open a criminal case against Nadira Isayeva, editor-in-chief of an independent weekly, after the newspaper quoted a former guerilla leader in an article. According to news website Lenta, regional prosecutors in Dagestan's capital, Makhachkala, charged Isayeva with making public calls to extremism and incitement of hatred; if convicted, she faces up...

The editor-in-chief of independent news website Ingushetiya has fled Russia and is seeking asylum in Europe, daily the Moscow Times reported Thursday. Ingushetiya's lawyer, Kaloy Akhilgov, told CPJ that Roza Malsagova left Russia two weeks ago after being harassed, threatened, and beaten by Ingush authorities. She also faces criminal prosecution. Earlier this year, regional prosecutors opened...

An Iranian newspaper journalist has been executed for allegedly associating with a militant group and threatening national security, officials in Iran said Tuesday, according to a report in the Guardian. Yaghoob Mirnehad, a reporter for the Tehran-based Mardomsalari newspaper, was executed along with another man on Monday, a spokesman for the judiciary said. Some background: Mirnehad, who was...

Ethiopian police in the capital, Addis Ababa, threatened on August 4 to block distribution of an independently owned newspaper if it continues its leading coverage of a new political opposition movement, according to local journalists. The Amharic-language weekly Awramba Times reported Tuesday that it had received two separate phone warnings from top police officials to stop any coverage of "anti...

The police in the western Uzbek city of Nukus have brought another charge against an independent journalist to justify his arrest and detention, after initially bringing charges of drug use, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). On August 2, investigators in Nukus acknowledged that Salidzhon Abdurakhmonov's blood test results revealed no sign of drug use but...