Follow-up

The Committee to Protect Journalists has called for the immediate release of Ramazan Yesergepov, editor of the independent Almaty-based weekly Alma-Ata Info, who was seized by security agents from his hospital bed a month ago. The Kazakhstan Security Committee (KNB) took Yesergepov on January 6 from an Almaty hospital where he was being treated for high blood pressure, and put him in a KNB...

Eritrean authorities must disclose the medical condition and care being provided to jailed journalist Dawit Isaak, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has demanded following unofficial reports saying that he was hospitalised. CPJ pointed out that the well-being of the long-jailed Isaak, an Eritrean with Swedish citizenship, is the responsibility of the government, which has yet to provide...

A Cairo appeals court has struck down a one-year jail term against four editors. On January 31, appellate court judge Mohamed Samir struck down a one-year jail-term given in September 2007 to four editors for "publishing false information likely to disturb public order." However, the court upheld a 20,000 Egyptian pound (US$3,540) fine against Ibrahim Eissa of the daily Al-Dustour, Adel Hamouda of...

A former military chief of the Basque separatist group ETA, Javier Garcia Gaztelu, was sentenced to 30 years in prison Thursday for ordering the assassination of a journalist in 2000, Agence France-Presse (AFP) has eported. The National Court found Garcia Gaztelu guilty of "a terrorist crime consisting in an attack against a person resulting in a painful death" and sentenced him to 30 years in...

The investigation into the murder of Paul Abayomi Ogundeji, journalist on the privately-owned daily Thisday, and member of its editorial committee, has been handed to the judicial police, regional authorities in Lagos State said on January 20, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. The journalist was shot dead in the Dopemu district of the capital Lagos on August 17, 2008 as he was...

Nazari Paryani, the news editor of the daily Payman, has been released after eight days of detention in Kabul because of an allegedly blasphemous article that was published by mistake. Paryani was freed provisionally and still faces possible prosecution. Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has called for all charges to be dropped. Exhausted by the ordeal, Paryani on Thursday told Paris-based RSF: “I...

A Colombian judge has sentenced a former mayor to 28 years in prison for ordering the April 2003 killing of a journalist who had repeatedly denounced the politician as corrupt. The convictions of three former public officials on charges of plotting the murder of Colombian radio commentator José Emeterio Rivas represent a historic step forward in the campaign to end impunity in the killings of...

The shocking murders of lawyer Stanislav Markelov and young journalist Anastasia Barburova on Monday brings Russia's human rights record to a new low, press freedom groups have said. The crime is compounded by the knowledge that Russia has a culture where impunity reigns and murderers are rarely brought to justice, ARTICLE 19 and Index on Censorship have said. Even in the case of a journalist as...

The Malawi High Court has declared that the decision by the Malawi Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA) to revoke Joy Radio's license was unconstitutional, ultra vires and unreasonable, effectively dismissing all cases that MACRA had brought against the private radio station. According to this ruling, it means there is no case between Joy Radio and MACRA, the Media Institute of Southern...

Israel has released two Palestinian journalists employed by the Iranian Arabic-language TV station Al-Alam after being held for 10 days on spying charges. However, they were freed on bail on January 15 and are still accused of “revealing secret information” and “transmitting information to the enemy in war time.” Khader Shahin, a Jerusalem resident and Al-Alam correspondent, was summoned for...