New libel legislation proposed by the British government has been met with general approval by reform campaigners, who will now train their sights on further strengthening some aspects of the bill during the parliamentary process.
Committee to Protect Journalists
CPJ Blog
Press Freedom News and Views
Borja Bergareche
Borja Bergareche is a Spanish journalist based in London and a CPJ European consultant.Spanish press associations have expressed concern about recent episodes of police violence against journalists covering demonstrations against Pope Benedict's four-day visit to Madrid and protests staged as part of the anti-corruption 15-M movement.
Sunday marked the end of the
four-month deadline Cuban President Raúl Castro had agreed to with
representatives of the Cuban Catholic Church and the Spanish government to free
52 prisoners of conscience who remained in jail since the March 2003 crackdown
against dissidents, known as the "Black Spring." The Spanish foreign minister
at the time, Miguel Angel Moratinos, said in Havana on July 8 that the move to
release the prisoners "opens a new era in Cuba." But have things changed
in the EU regarding Cuba? Not really. Has anything changed on the island? Not
really. On Monday, at midnight, 13 of the 52 prisoners remained in jailed.
The World Association of Newspapers on Wednesday honored the jailed Iranian journalist, Ahmad Zaid-Abadi with its Golden Pen of Freedom Award in the German city of Hamburg. Zaid-Abadi, right, was sentenced in 2009 to six years in prison, five years of internal exile, and a lifetime ban on working as a journalist. He is behind bars in Tehran's Evin Prison where, he told Xavier Vidal-Folch, president of World Editor's Forum, "the desperation that jailers create is such that you are convinced it's the end of the world."
The Havana government has not explicitly demanded that political prisoners go into exile as a condition of release, but it’s clear that’s what Cuban authorities want. The first journalists and dissidents to be freed from jail were immediately whisked away to Spain, which, along with the Catholic Church, had negotiated for their freedom. That leaves political prisoners with a terrible dilemma: fly to Spain or stay in jail, at least for a while. Thus emerges a moral dimension when assessing news of up to 52 Cuban prisoners, including numerous journalists, being released in the coming weeks. Can a human being live happily in a land he or she never chose? Will they find in Spain, or in some other foreign country, the paradise of freedom they deserve?
The utility company had just cut off the electricity supply to
his house. Darkness and shadows were back in Alejandro Gonzalez Raga's life.
His rented apartment in Madrid--shared with his wife, siblings, and in-laws--was as
devoid of light as the Cuban cells in which he was jailed for five years after
Castro´s "Ofensiva 2" operation in March 2003, also known as the "Black Spring."
Even so, Gonzalez Raga came to the presentation of Attacks on the Press 2008 at the Madrid Press Association.
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