Harassed

An American freelance journalist detained over his coverage of recent riots said Friday last he had been released, while authorities announced at least nine Egyptian journalists were being held, according to an Associated Press (AP) report. James Buck and his Egyptian translator were among several taken into custody in Mahalla el-Kobra, a northern industrial city where protests over high prices...

Two South African technicians were back in a Harare court on Wednesday to face charges of contravening Zimbabwe's media laws, the South African Press Associaiton (SAPA) has reported. Abdulla Gaibee and Sipho Maseko were granted bail of 200-million Zim dollars on Monday but were only released from police custody on Tuesday as they were unable to immediately pay the amount, said Ebrahim Gaibee...

The Madhya Pradesh police on Tuesday released a Delhi-based journalist after detaining him for 42 hours. Nadeem Ahmad of the Milli Gazette was in the state to report on the recent arrests of activists of the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), acording to a report in the Central Chronicle. The Chronicle reported: Nadeem Ahmad said that on April 6, he went to Aroda village under...

A BBC reporter in the UK was pinned to the ground by six policemen and searched under the Terrorism Act after his radio transmitter was mistaken for bomb equipment, says a report in the Telegraph. Max Khan, a correspondent for BBC Radio Stoke, was made to kneel down with his face to the floor in the centre of Hanley, Staffs. Police moved in on Khan after several shoppers raised concerns about an...

Seven employees of a pro-peace radio station in Israel were released from jail Tuesday, a day after police raided the station's Jerusalem office and seized its transmission equipment, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. On Monday, police shut down the transmitter and closed the studio, saying the station was broadcasting without a permit. There are numerous pirate radio stations broadcasting...

A Bangladeshi journalist who has reported extensively on alleged police corruption has been detained by the police and accused of robbery. Rabiul Islam, a journalist for the Daily Sunshine, a Rajshahi-based newspaper in the Bangla language, has written several reports implicating the Durgapur police force in alleged corruption and malpractice. On March 28, Rabiul was taken in to custody accused of...

A New York Times correspondent and a British freelancer who were arrested and accused of reporting illegally in Zimbabwe have been freed on bail, but their passports are being held and they are unable to leave the country, the Associated Press (AP) has reported quoting a lawyer. Barry Bearak, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for the Times, suffered a back injury during a fall in his cell, said...

Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has called for the release of Ahmed Mahmud Hassan, of satellite al-Sumariya television, who has been held since March 30 by Iraqi authorities who have not given any reason for his arrest. Mahmud Hassan was picked up in Mahmudiya, 30 km south of Baghdad, while he was covering clashes between Iraqi forces and rebel insurgents. He is thought to be detained in a...

The Rwandan government has launched an intensive hunt for the founder and editor of the private bi-monthly newspaper Umuco “for insulting the president”. The newspaper has already been suspended for a year and Managing Editor Bonaventure Bizumuremyi is now in hiding after he compared President Paul Kagame to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. Local journalists said six police cars surrounded Bizumuremyi’s...

Authorities in in the Russian republic of Ingushetia want to see the back of a private television channel that has shown critical reports from the region. In an open letter to the Russian parliament, the prosecutor-general, the FSB security service and the interior ministry, delegates of the region’s Popular Assembly demanded that Moscow-based REN-TV stop broadcasting in the Republic, according to...