After each name was read aloud, the ring of a bell resonated through the studio auditorium that included many relatives, friends, and colleagues of the journalists whose names were being added to the Newseum Journalists Memorial. Some, like Tom Borrelli of The Buffalo News, died unexpectedly; Borrelli fell while climbing steep stairs on his way to a press box to cover a high school football game.
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On Monday, the parents of detained Iranian-American
journalist Roxana Saberi left their home in
We've launched the Arabic version
of our Web site, featuring translated content from CPJ's
Nearly a week after CPJ sent
a letter to Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali urging him to end the
"ongoing cycle of repression of critical journalists and media outlets," Tunisia's
Ministry of Justice and Human Rights told Mohamed Abbou, a prominent human
rights lawyer and writer, in a phone call on Saturday that he was free to
travel abroad.
Testifying at the
Daniel
Coronell's name didn't come up in a hearing this week on Capitol Hill, even
though CPJ had just learned that a Colombian court had ordered the arrest of the
respected Canal Uno TV reporter and Semana magazine columnist over his work.
Coronell is one of many journalists and human rights monitors
who've lately been forced to defend themselves against irregular, if not bogus, criminal charges brought in Colombian courts. The hearing held by
the Tom
Lantos Human Rights Commission of the House Foreign Affairs Committee did,
however, hear important testimony from one of Coronell's colleagues.
Washington Post columnist Al Kamen had a generous thought for CPJ today. Kamen writes that an Office of Management and Budget e-mail sent to the Pentagon recently declared: "This Administration prefers to avoid using the term 'Long War' or 'Global War on Terror' [GWOT]. Please use 'Overseas Contingency Operation.' "
During his address to the nation on the anniversary of
The case had all the hallmarks of a sordid thriller.
There was "a rogue politician, a journalist getting killed, a staunchly
incurious police, and the media in frenzy," veteran journalist Lansana Gberie wrote
in the New African, describing the fatal
2005 beating of editor Harry Yansaneh in
March 20 marked the sixth anniversary of the three-day 2003
crackdown on the independent Cuban press. That day, Oleivys García Echemendía was scheduled to visit her husband, imprisoned
Cuban journalist Pablo Pacheco Ávila, at 1 p.m. at the Morón prison in the
central
Today CPJ launched its 2009
Global Impunity Index in
In Russia
Combating impunity has been a long and difficult process, full of obstacles and problems. At the national level it has not been easy, so much of our work is carried out using the supranational tools that we helped develop. They began taking shape through international intergovernmental declarations, in conclusions reached by international legislative and judicial conferences and, especially, in opinions and decisions of the Inter-American Human Rights Court and Commission.
The Czech prime minister has expressed support for CPJ's efforts to gain the release of imprisoned Cuban jouirnalists. We sent Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek, who is also president of the Council of the European Union, a copy of a March 17 letter to an EU envoy. In the letter, we asked envoy Louis Michel to seek the release the 21 Cuban journalists now behind bars.
There's a familiar pattern emerging in Sri Lanka
March 18, 19, and 20 will mark
the sixth anniversary of the detention of 75 peaceful journalists and
librarians, as well as human rights activists, convicted weeks later to up to
28 years in jail during summary trials. Fifty-four of these innocent people,
who demanded a democratic society and respect for human rights, remain
imprisoned under inhumane conditions; 20 of them are journalists.
Reporters who dig up carefully buried facts about those in power can easily find
themselves in danger. In countries where a tradition of watchdog journalism has
not yet taken hold, the risks of practicing investigative reporting can be real
and physical for those reporters that take it on.
Has the Chinese government learned a public
relations lesson from its handling of the unrest in Tibet
The staff at CPJ was
relieved to hear that former CPJ Press Freedom
Award winner Alexis Sinduhije was released from prison today. The former radio
station director and veteran Burundian journalist was acquitted by a About two weeks ago, traditional authorities in the mountain kingdom of Swaziland slapped the nation's most outspoken political columnist, Mfomfo Nkambule, with a fine--to be paid in cows--for criticism of the administration of King Mswati III, Africa's last absolute ruler.
Seven major news organizations including NPR, ABC, and the BBC issued a joint statement on behalf of Roxana Saberi, a U.S.-Iranian freelance journalist who is currently being held in Tehran's Evin prison. The outlets asked that "one or more international organizations that have responsibilities and rights under the Geneva Conventions be permitted access to Roxana immediately to ascertain her health and well-being and to determine the conditions under which she is held." Full text of the statement follows...
CNN.com is reporting that Roxana Saberi met
with a lawyer in
Roberto de Jesús Guerra Pérez, a Havana-based independent journalist, sent an e-mail message this morning to his "brothers, colleagues, and organizations that protect and watch over press freedom around the world" announcing that he had been released from police custody after a four-day detention. In his e-mail, titled "Thanks to you and to your demands, I am at it again," Guerra Pérez detailed the ordeals of his arrest.
January
6, 2009: The main control room of
Journalists in
CPJ will be collecting
signatures until midnight tonight on a Facebook
petition in support of Roxana Saberi, an American journalist who is being
held without charge at Tehran
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