November 2009

We issued the following statement after confirming the release today of Canadian freelance reporter Amanda Lindhout and Australian photojournalist Nigel Brennan, both held in Somalia since August 2008...

New York, November 25, 2009—A brutal election-related massacre in the Philippine province of Maguindanao on Monday appears to be single deadliest event for the press since 1992, when CPJ began keeping detailed records on journalist deaths.

Small in stature but strong in her words, Naziha Réjiba tells a reporter of all the things the Tunisian government does to try to frighten her. But Réjiba said that she will not be scared, that she will never allow such tactics to have power over her. Editor of Kalima, an online news Web site blocked in her own country, Réjiba was honored Tuesday at CPJ’s International Press Freedom Awards at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria for displaying just that sort of courage. Four other leading journalists were recognized as well. 

New York, November 24, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists is working with local and international media support groups to extend assistance to the families of the numerous journalists killed Monday in a brutal election-related massacre in the Philippine province of Maguindanao. 

New York, November 24, 2009—After almost 18 months in detention, prominent Internet publisher and human rights activist Huang Qi was sentenced to three years imprisonment on Monday by a court in Wuhou in China’s Sichuan province. The sentencing hearing lasted 10 minutes, according to international news reports. Police in Chengdu detained Huang on June 10, 2008, on charges of illegally holding state secrets and convicted him in August. Huang had been a prominent critic of the government’s response to the Sichuan earthquake disaster in May 2008.

The toll in the brutal, election-related killings in Maguindanao province, Philippines, was still being determined tonight. Several journalists were believed to be among the dead, making the massacre one of the deadliest single events for the press in memory. Here are some other deadly episodes as recorded by CPJ:

Another foreign journalist was “outed" in Pakistan on Friday. A front-page story in the November 20 edition of the daily newspaper The Nation ran the picture of an unidentified journalist at the scene of a bomb blast in Peshawar, identifying him as a CIA spy. He was actually Daniel Berehulak, who works for the international photography agency Getty Images. Hugh Pinney, Getty’s senior director of photography, wrote to the paper’s editor, Shireen Mazari on Saturday, setting the record straight. A PDF of the full letter is here, but here’s what is most likely the most salient part: “He is not an employee of the CIA and has never pursued any agenda other than, as a photographer, to capture important moments and events on camera for historic record.”

New York, November 23, 2009—Several journalists covering relatives and supporters of a local politician who was about to file his gubernatorial candidacy on the Philippines island of Mindanao today were believed to be among those killed by a gang of armed men in Maguindanao province, according to international news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists joined today with Philippine journalists and press organizations around the world in condemning the attack, and called for a full investigation into the details of the slaughter and prosecution of those responsible.

In response to news reports that a large number of people — possibly more than 20 — including many journalists, were killed on the Philippine island of Mindanao today while accompanying a gubernatorial candidate to register his candidacy, we issued this statement...

We issued the following statement today in reaction to news that Iranian journalist Ahmad Zaid-Abadi was sentenced to six years in prison, five years in exile in Khorasan Province, and a lifetime ban on social and political activity, effectively barring him from writing...

Maziar Bahari’s chilling account of his 118 days in an Iranian prison is the cover story of Newsweek this week. Bahari, a renowned journalist and documentary filmmaker, was arrested soon after the disputed June 12 elections. While in prison, he was subjected to psychological and physical abuse. His captors wanted to convince him that he was alone, that the world had forgotten about him. When Bahari, left, discerned that there was in an international campaign to win his release his spirits were bolstered.

I shall never forgive myself for having initiated and encouraged my younger brother, Didace Namujimbo, to take up journalism. Working for 21 years in Bukavu, a city nestled on the picturesque shores of Lake Kivu, led me to cover every aspect of the brutal conflict and humanitarian catastrophe in this part of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, but a year ago nothing prepared me to deal with the news that my brother had been killed.

New York, November 20, 2009—A Mexican reporter who had recently covered corruption and organized crime was reported missing this week in the western state of Michoacán, according to local news reports. María Esther Aguilar Cansimbe, at left, was last seen on November 11 near her home in Zamora. The Committee to Protect Journalists today called on state and federal authorities to do everything in their power to immediately bring her to safety.

New York, November 20, 2009—Authorities in Odessa, Ukraine, should immediately cease harassment of independent and pro-opposition broadcasters, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Officials from the Odessa Public Utility Service and mayor’s office have been physically obstructing the work of several local television and radio stations on the grounds of alleged building renovation, according to local news reports. 

Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez was astounded this week by President Barack Obama's decision to respond a written questionnaire Sánchez submitted to the White House. Still recovering from bruises left by a recent vicious attack by state security agents, she told CPJ from her home in Havana: "This is the best way to get better." 

New York, November 19, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the Singapore government’s refusal to renew British freelance journalist Benjamin Bland’s work visa and its rejection of his application to cover the recently concluded Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit meeting. Bland had planned to report on the summit for the U.K.’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.

CPJ introduces 2009 International Press Freedom Awardees

Washington, November 19, 2009—Naziha Réjiba, editor of the Tunisian online news journal Kalima, said she knows what to expect when she returns home—surveillance, harassment, and threats conducted by one the world’s most repressive governments.

We issued the following statement today in response to Wednesday’s approval by the Argentine Senate of a government-sponsored bill that repeals criminal defamation provisions from the penal code...

New York, November 18, 2009—Two Somali correspondents for international media outlets were injured in separate shootings, one in the northeast semi-autonomous region of Puntland, and the other in the capital, Mogadishu, according to local journalists and news reports.

November 2009

News from the Committee to Protect Journalists

New York, November 18, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the Indonesian government’s decision to deport Raimondo Bultrini, a reporter with Italy’s weekly L’Espresso, and Kumkum Dasgupta, an assistant editor with India’s Hindustan Times, for lacking accreditation. 

As the news editor of Zambia’s largest circulation newspaper and a mother to two young children, Chansa Kabwela already has her hands full. For the last four months, however, this 29-year-old journalist was mired in a court case with a peculiarity that made international headlines and sparked a debate on press freedom in this landlocked nation in southern Africa. The case was finally resolved on Monday.

Twenty-one international news editors have signed on to a letter to the Pakistan government today. It was addressed to Minister for Information and Broadcasting Qamar Zaman Kaira and was drafted by Islamabad’s foreign correspondent community. They were concerned about an article that appeared in Pakistan’s The Nation daily on November 5 accusing Wall Street Journal reporter Matthew Rosenberg of working for the CIA, Israeli intelligence, and the U.S. military contractor Blackwater (now known as Xe). 

The families of Shane Bauer, Josh Fattal, and Sarah Shourd, the three hikers detained in Iran, said today they are concerned about their children’s emotional well-being after nearly four months in prison. They asked supporters to send letters, which they will seek to deliver to them in Evin Prison in Tehran, where the three are being held.

We want to thank all of you who responded to the challenge set out by our chairman, Paul Steiger, calling on individuals who care about independent media to support CPJ. His e-mail has already generated an unprecedented response, but we still have a ways to go before reaching our goal. Paul has offered a $25,000 matching gift that will effectively double new or increased contributions, up to $500.  

After The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, the autobiography of ingenious 22-year-old William Kamkwamba’s homemade electric windmill in Malawi, comes “the boy who harnessed the airwaves” by building a radio station with rudimentary materials. The tale of 21-year-old Malawian Gabriel Kondesi also showcases the inventiveness spawned by life in this impoverished, landlocked nation in southeastern Africa. Unlike the story of Kamkwamba, though, Kondesi’s tale is still unfolding.

We issued the following statement after the Lusaka Magistrate Court acquitted Zambian journalist Chansa Kabwela today on pornography charges. The independent daily Post editor was charged with pornography for disseminating photos to several government officials of a woman giving birth in a hospital car park during a nurses strike in June...

Free press advocates in Britain are looking to a bill stuck in the U.S. Congress for moral support in the fight to reform England’s draconian defamation laws. The U.S. bill, the Free Speech Protection Act 2009, is itself the product of those laws, which have made London the capital of “libel tourism.” 

New York, November 12, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the suspension of six private newspapers by the government-controlled media-monitoring body, the National Communications Council, in Gabon. The council announced the suspensions, which range from one to three months, on Tuesday evening on state-run TV. The papers have been suspended for “violating the ethics of journalism” and “inciting ethnic divisions” according to local reports.

We issued this statement on the first anniversary of the brutal attack on Mikhail Beketov, editor-in-chief of the Khimki-based independent newspaper Khimkinskaya Pravda, who was beaten nearly to death and left in his backyard. Beketov had criticized the Khimki administration’s decision to cut down a vast area of the region’s forest in order to build a highway. As a result of the attack, Beketov underwent a series of surgeries, had a leg and several fingers amputated, and is still hospitalized...

New York, November 12, 2009—A Norwegian freelance journalist and an Afghan colleague were released Thursday after nearly a week in captivity in eastern Afghanistan, according to international news reports.

You wouldn’t have heard it from her, but Hu Shuli resigned from her post as editor of Caijing magazine on Monday. The battle over political coverage and finances at Caijing (cai is  “finance” and jing is “economics”) had been reported for about three months, but the missing component in the coverage was Hu herself—she has never made a public statement about what was going on at what was most likely China’s most provocative yet mainstream magazine (it’s a biweekly.) Wang Shuo, Caijing’s managing editor, posted his resignation on his Twitter page. Wang said almost all the other top editors who hadn’t already left are leaving too. 

New York, November 11, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns today’s prison sentences given to two video bloggers detained in July on fabricated charges of “hooliganism” and “inflicting minor bodily harm.” 

New York, November 11, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists denounces a Baghdad court’s ruling that the London-based Guardian newspaper defamed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, left, in an April 2009 article depicting increasing authoritarianism in his government. CPJ calls on an appeals court to overturn the decision. 

New York, November 11, 2009—A court in Oaxaca has not ordered the release of Juan Manuel Martínez Moreno, who was charged last year for the 2006 killing of U.S. journalist Bradley Roland Will, contrary to initial news reports in the Mexican press.  

We issued the following statement today in response to reports that a tribunal in Oaxaca state called for the release of Juan Manuel Martínez Moreno, who was charged last year for the 2006 killing of U.S. journalist Brad Will. The tribunal determined there was insufficient evidence to continue holding the suspect...

Dear President Obama: We are heartened by news reports that you plan to talk to Chinese leaders about human rights and related issues when you visit the country next week. On World Press Freedom Day in May, you specifically raised the cases of two of China’s jailed journalists—Shi Tao, imprisoned for allegedly “leaking state secrets,” and Hu Jia, behind bars for alleged “incitement to subvert state power.” Both men remain jailed, and we ask that you now press for their immediate release.

My looks have completely changed in recent months. Long hair now colonizes my chin and my head. Never in my adult life have I waited longer than a week without a shave or a haircut, let alone for four months. One ends up doing the strangest things for press freedom in Sierra Leone.

New York, November 9, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Moroccan King Mohammed VI to order the release of a jailed editor and to put an end to the use of the judiciary to silence independent media.

New York, November 9, 2009—Three American hikers who inadvertently crossed the border into Iran on July 31 are facing chargers of espionage, according to a report from the state news agency IRNA.

Last Thursday, Pakistan’s The Nation newspaper published a reckless and unsubstantiated story accusing Wall Street Journal South Asia correspondent Matthew Rosenberg of being a spy. It’s an accusation that gravely endangers Rosenberg’s safety. Wall Street Journal Managing Editor Robert Thomson responded with a scathing letter to The Nation’s editor, Shireen Mazari, expressing his disgust at the publication of the story, which he called baseless and false. He demanded an immediate retraction. 

Jointly authored by CPJ's Kati Marton and Nina Ognianova, an op-ed piece is running on The New York Times' Web site today and will be published in the November 10 edition of The International Herald Tribune. The article is a follow-up to Marton and Ognianova's mission to Russia to launch our special report Anatomy of Injustice: The Unsolved Killings of Journalists in Russia. The op-ed argues that Russia must put an end impunity in the cases of murdered journalists as it positions itself as a legitimate democracy and requests equal treatment with what it calls other "great nations." 

We issued the following statement in response to reports that Cuban bloggers Yoani Sánchez, Claudia Cadelo, and Omar Luís Pardo Lazo were detained, assaulted and harassed by state security agents on their way to a peaceful march in Havana. Details of the incident were published on the Web site of Global Voices. 

New York, November 6, 2009—No charges have been brought against three American hikers nearly 100 days since they were detained after accidentally crossing the border from Iraqi Kurdistan into Iran while on a hiking trip on July 31. 

Our news alert on Wednesday detailing a vicious attack on Albanian editor Mero Baze elicited e-mail comments from both victim and a businessman accused in the attack. Baze said he is recovering but is experiencing head pain. He also echoed reported witness statements that identified Rezart Taci, a principal in local oil companies, as being involved in the attack. Taci, who responded to us through one of his companies, denied involvement in the assault.

We issued this statement following today’s announcement by Russia’s Investigative Committee at the Prosecutor General’s Office that two individuals have been arrested and charged with the January 19 murder in Moscow of human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasiya Baburova. The two suspects are 29-year-old Nikita Tikhonov and 24-year-old Yevgeniya Khasis, identified in the press as members of a neo-fascist group. Reports identify Tikhonov as the shooter and Khasis as the woman who followed Markelov and Baburova, and informed Tikhonov of their whereabouts...

Dear Prime Minister Brown: The Committee to Protect Journalists wishes to offer our condolences on the loss of British Parachute Regiment Cpl. John Harrison, who died in a September 9 military operation to rescue two journalists kidnapped by Taliban forces in Afghanistan. We are grateful that New York Times reporter Stephen Farrell, a British-Irish national, was safely rescued, but we’re saddened by the loss of his colleague, fellow New York Times reporter Sultan Munadi.

New York, November 4, 2009—Assailants badly beat Mero Baze, chief editor of the independent Albanian daily Tema and host of the prime-time television show “Faktor Plus,” at a bar in the capital, Tirana, on Monday, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the attack and calls on authorities to bring the assailants to justice. 

New York, November 4, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists is outraged that Tunisian police stripped and mistreated journalist Taoufik ben Brik, a well-known contributor to French newspapers and one of the top critics of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, during his arrest on October 29. CPJ urges Ben Ali to order Ben Brik’s immediate release and to end the intensifying campaign of intimidation and assaults against critical reporters, and censorship.

New York, November 3, 2009—Crime reporter Bladimir Antuna García was found murdered Monday night, according local news reports, after reportedly being abducted from a street in the Mexican city of Durango that morning. The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Mexican authorities to show their commitment to press freedom and the protection of Mexican journalists by immediately bringing all those responsible to justice.

New York, November 3, 2009—Police in Kyrgyzstan should investigate work-related motives in a weekend assault that left Kubanychbek Zholdoshev, a reporter with the government weekly Osh Shamy, with a concussion and broken ribs, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

New York, November 2, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists urges Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to end the intensifying judicial and media campaign to silence critical journalists and eradicate press freedom.

A basement in the gray, Gothic heart of the University of Toronto is home to the CSI of cyberspace. “We are doing free expression forensics,” says Ronald Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab, based at the Munk Centre for International Studies. Deibert and his team of academics and students investigate in real time governments and companies that restrict what we see and hear on the Internet. They are also trying to help online journalists and bloggers slip the shackles of censorship and surveillance. Deibert is a co-founder of the OpenNet Initiative (ONI), a project of the Citizen Lab in collaboration with the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School. ONI tracks the blocking and filtering of the Internet around the globe.

On October 26, CNN anchor Lou Dobbs announced on the air that a shot had been fired at his home while his wife and her driver were standing outside in the driveway. Dobbs made the announcement on CNN and his syndicated radio program, saying the gunshot struck his home about three weeks earlier as his wife was standing outside. He said on the broadcasts that he had long received threatening phone calls, but noted that he had decided not to report the calls to police.