Follow-up

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) is closely following the imminent trial of two suspects who have been charged with plotting to murder Ahmed Mira, editor-in-chief of the Sulaymania, Iraq-based ‎magazine Livin. ‎Mira and his lawyer, Othman ‏Sidiq, told CPJ that investigations have been completed and that two ‏suspects have been formally charged with planning to murder Mira. The first...

Iranian-American freelance journalist Roxana Saberi, who was sentenced to eight years in prison by an Iranian Revolutionary Court on charges of spying for the United States, remains on a hunger strike that she started a week ago, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) Her father, Reza Saberi, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) after visiting her in Tehran's Evin Prison on her 32...

North Korea has announced that it would try American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee on unspecified criminal charges, according to international news reports. The Associated Press (AP) reported that a dispatch from the country said the pair would be tried for "confirmed charges" without specifying the nature of those charges or a timetable for the legal proceedings. "The relevant agencies of...

Park Dae-sung, who blogs under the name Minerva, was acquitted of charges in South Korea on April 20, 2009, under a rarely used law of "spreading false information with the intent of harming the public interest." The Seoul court that heard his case ruled that Park wrote without malicious intent, even if his articles were misleading his articles, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has...

In response to a letter sent on Sunday by Iran's president urging the public prosecutor to ensure justice for Iranian-American ‎journalist Roxana Saberi, the Committee to Protect Journalists on Monday called for Saberi to be released on bail pending her appeal. An Iranian Revolutionary Court found Saberi guilty of espionage and sentenced her to eight years in prison on Saturday in a closed, one...

Gambian authorities must authoritatively account for the whereabouts, health, and legal status of journalist "Chief" Ebrima Manneh, who was taken into government custody by security agents in July 2006, the Committee to Protect Journalists has said. Authorities, who have held Manneh in secret locations since the arrest, have provided conflicting and incomplete accounts this month regarding his...

Iranian-American freelancer, Roxana Saberi, who has been charged with espionage after being arrested in late January, appeared in court for the first time on Monday. Iranian judiciary spokesman Alireza Jamshidi told a news conference in Tehran Tuesday that Saberi appeared before a Revolutionary Court for a closed, one-day trial, during which she presented a defence, Reuters and the Associated...

Following Thursday's release of independent journalists Sakit Zakhidov and Asif Marzili in Azerbaijan, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has urged Azerbaijani authorities to free the remaining journalists serving jail terms on trumped-up criminal charges. Zakhidov, a prominent satirist and commentator for the pro-opposition daily Azadlyg in Baku, was released early Thuesady morning under...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has condemned the conditions in which journalists and cyber-dissidents are being held in Iran and the arbitrary nature of their detention, and has called for their release. The organisation issued its appeal after the US-based parents of a detained American-Iranian journalist were able to visit her in Tehran's Evin prison on April 6, 2009. "It is very good news that...

Police in the Moscow suburb of Khimki must conduct a thorough investigation into the sudden death of newspaper designer Sergei Protazanov, the circumstances of which are in dispute, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has said. Anatoly Yurov, chief editor of the pro-opposition Grazhdanskoye Soglasiye, told CPJ that he spoke with his employee by telephone on Monday. Protazanov, 40, said an...