Censored

The Jericho Church, an indigenous Christian denomination, has moved an application at the High Court of Swaziland to ban the media from reporting on the split that has rocked the Church as a result of a leadership dispute, the Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) has reported. The Church wants to gag the country's two daily newspapers, the Times of Swaziland and the Swazi Observer, as well as...

Malaysian authorities have seized the latest editions of two opposition newspapers. Tempers have flared since last week when the National Front government took over the northern Perak state from the opposition after several of its lawmakers switched allegiance, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. Details: [ Link] Tian Chua, information chief of the People's Justice Party, said at least 20,000...

Radio Kalima journalist Zakia Dhifawi was arrested by six plain-clothes Tunisian policemen Tuesday afternoon as she was leaving a trade union building in Tunis and was held for an hour at the Charles de Gaulle Street police station, where she was subjected to humiliating treatment. Kalima trainee journalist Faten Hamdi was meanwhile threatened with prosecution yesterday, three days after she was...

An Argentine radio station political commentator has been fired allegedly motivated by pressure from the Cristina Kirchner government over a controversy unleashed in the country's news media. Journalist Nelson Castro had signed a contract to host the program "Puntos de vista" (Points of View), aired by Radio del Plata radio station, through to the end of 2009, but it was cancelled after he...

The Iranian ministry of culture and Islamic guidance Wednesday suspended Hemat, a weekly that supports allies of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The ministry said a spoof movie poster on the front page of the latest issue, on February 1, had insulted senior government officials, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. “There would be something comic about this suspension if it did not...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has condemned a proposed criminal law amendment before Czech Republic parliament that would ban the media from publishing the contents of police telephone taps or any information about the tapping of phones by the police. The proposed amendment provides for sentences of one to five years in prison and fines up to 5 million crowns (182,000 euros) for violators. “In...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has expressed dismay at Equatorial Guinea deputy information minister Purita Opo Barila’s arbitrary decision, announced on January 19, to dismiss four journalists from state radio and TV broadcaster RTVGE for “insubordination” and “lack of enthusiasm.” “Equatorial Guinea is one of those African countries about which nothing or almost nothing is known because the...

A wave of censorship has hit many Iranian and foreign Farsi-language websites since January 24. Most of the sites contain articles critical of the government and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose term expires on June 12. International news media websites have also been blocked since January 26, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. “After directly targeting human rights activists, the...

Iran's culture and Islamic orientation minister Mohammad Hossein Safar-Harandi has banned BBC’s new Farsi-language TV station from operating in the country, and also forbidden Iranian journalists to work for foreign news media, Reporters sans Frontières has reported. The decision follows the BBC World Service’s launch on January 14 of BBC Persian TV, a satellite TV station targeted at Farsi...

The Palestinian Authority (PA) has detained at least three journalists in the West Bank since Saturday, according to local news reports and journalists who spoke to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). On Monday, security forces detained Ahmad Dikkawi, correspondent for the London-based al-Quds TV station in Jenin. They also detained Samer Khuaira, the Nablus correspondent...