Legal Action

Fatou Jaw Manneh, a US-based Gambian journalist, faces a possible prison sentence if found guilty of sedition charges following an interview highly critical of President Yahya Jammeh and his administration, which she granted to the media in 2004. The Kanifing Magistrate court trying her has fixed August 18 as the day it will give its ruling on the case. Manneh has been charged on three counts of...

The trial of a Bangladeshi editor arrested for advocating ties with Israel began in Dhaka on Wednesday, the Jerusalem Post has reported. Salahuddin Shoaib Choudhury, editor of the Weekly Blitz, an English-language newspaper published in the Bangladeshi capital, is facing a series of charges that include sedition. If convicted, he could be sentenced to death. Details from the Post: In November 2003...

Regional authorities in Dagestan have decided to open a criminal case against Nadira Isayeva, editor-in-chief of an independent weekly, after the newspaper quoted a former guerilla leader in an article. According to news website Lenta, regional prosecutors in Dagestan's capital, Makhachkala, charged Isayeva with making public calls to extremism and incitement of hatred; if convicted, she faces up...

An Ethiopian judge overseeing the high-profile trial of an imprisoned pop singer jailed the editor of an independent weekly for contempt of court on august 4. The contempt charge came after the weekly published an interview with the singer's lawyer, according to local journalists. Mesfin Negash, editor-in-chief of the current affairs weekly Addis Neger, could be sentenced to as many as six months...

A Panamanian judge has barred sports columnist Bienvenido Brown from leaving the country and ordered him to stand trial on criminal defamation charges filed in 2005. Eleventh Criminal Court Judge Josefina Sclopis issued the ruling on Friday against Brown, a columnist with the daily La Estrella de Panamá, the newspaper reported. The judge's decision stemmed from a criminal defamation suit against...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has condemned the recent arrest and criminal defamation charges filed by the Malaysian government against prominent blogger Raja Petra Kamarudin, editor and founder of the Malaysia Today news website. Raja Petra was arrested and charged on July 17 at police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur and later released on bail, according to local news reports. The three...

California Judge Cormac Carney has ordered William Gertz, a national security reporter for the Washington Times, to appear in court for open-ended questioning on his reporting techniques. The order comes regarding Gertz's article discussing supposed espionage attempts by China in the United States. "Confidentiality of sources is essential to the news-gathering process. The judge's decision to have...

A French magistrate placed a journalist under formal investigation on Thursday over the unauthorised publication of pictures of a new model of car, drawing protests from press freedom campaigners, says a Reuters report. Prosecutors raided the offices of specialist magazine Auto Plus on Tuesday, seizing computers and documents and arresting journalist Bruno Thomas, the author of the scoop last year...

A Rabat court Friday fined Al-Jazeera's Rabat bureau chief, Hassan Rachidi, 50,000 dirhams (approx. 4,500 euros) under article 42 of the press law because the Qatar-based satellite TV station wrongly reported in June that people were killed in clashes between police and protesters in the southern port city of Sidi Ifni. "We welcome the fact that the judges had the good sense not to impose a jail...

The Kanifing Court trying Dida Halake, former Managing Director of the Observer Company Limited, publishers of the pro-government Daily Observer newspaper, on June 25 granted him bail after almost two weeks in detention. Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) sources reported that he was granted bail in the sum of 25,000 Gambian Dalasi (approx. US$11,901) and one surety to reappear on July 9...