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(FXI/IFEX) - After two attempts by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) to obtain court interdicts this week, the SABC's legal head Mafika Sihlali succeeded where his employer failed. Last night's gag order was granted against the Mail & Guardian (M&G), Media 24 "or any other person", which appears both vague and overbroad. The order by Pretoria High Court Judge Lettie Molopa is an...

MANILA — Fifty-three journalists have been killed in the Philippines since 2001, when Gloria Macapagal Arroyo came to power. Known in their communities as radio and TV broadcasters, as newspaper reporters and as columnists as well as publishers, 33 were killed for reporting or commenting on a public issue. The reasons for the killing of the remaining 20 vary from undetermined to personal grudges...

The recent decision by the San Antonio Express-News to temporarily remove its border correspondent from its Laredo bureau was a judicious move. The paper temporarily withdrew reporter Mariano Castillo after a U.S. law enforcement source warned that an unspecified American journalist was on the hit list of a Mexican criminal group. In the current context of rampant violence, the threat must be...

July 19, 2007 (RFE/RL) -- An independent Uzbek journalist and laureate of a prestigious international journalism award says he fears he's worn out his welcome with U.S. authorities. Ruslan Sharipov served a prison term in his native Uzbekistan for what he and activists insist were trumped-up child-molestation charges. He fled his homeland after what he describes as threats against his life by...

New York, July 19, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists expresses its grave concern about new anti-terrorism legislation recently enacted in the Philippines. A top justice ministry official has said that in certain circumstances it would allow the government to wiretap journalists. While the Human Security Act (HSA) specifically prohibits the surveillance and interception of communications...

(JED/IFEX) - Pold Kalombo, a reporter with the Kinshasa-based weekly "Le Soft International", was sentenced in absentia by a Kinshasa/Ngaliema court on 18 May 2007 to six months' prison without bail and a fine of 20,000 Congolese francs (approx. US$40). Kalombo and his paper were also ordered to pay damages in the amount of US$150,000. Kalombo was found guilty of defaming SOCIR (Société congolaise...

(Adil Soz/IFEX) - Olga Ushakova, a journalist with "Ustinka Plus" newspaper in Ust-Kamenogorsk, eastern Kazakhstan, is facing libel charges under the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan over a 15 September 2006 article. The charges stem from a complaint filed by Eugeniyi Nazarenko, convicted on 31 August 2006 to three years in prison for "possessing a large quantity of drugs." In her...

(RSF/IFEX) - Alfonso Teja, television station TV Azteca's news director in the city of Monterrey in the northern state of Nuevo León announced on 10 July 2007 that he had "given up hope" that two employees who went missing on 10 May, reporter Gamaliel López and cameraman Gerardo Paredes, will be found alive. "The state attorney general's office has told us the anti-kidnapping unit that was...

(CMFR/IFEX) - The Court of Appeals has downgraded to homicide the conviction for murder of the killer of dzMM senior editor Alberto Berbon in December 1996, citing the prosecution's failure to provide evidence for the "abuse of superior strength," necessary for a murder conviction. Convicted of murder by a regional trial court in 1999, Jose "Danny" Espineli's life sentence was reduced to...

(CPJ/IFEX) - New York, July 19, 2007 - The Committee to Protect Journalists expressed concern today at the imprisonment of Anatoly Sardayev, founder and editor-in-chief of the independent weekly newspaper Mordoviya Segodnya (Mordoviya Today) in the city of Saransk, the capital of the central Russian republic of Mordoviya. The Lenin District Court in Saransk found Sardayev guilty on June 29 of...