Iraq
2016
Getting Away With Murder
CPJ’s 2016 Global Impunity Index spotlights countries where journalists are slain and the killers go free By Elisabeth Witchel, CPJ Impunity Campaign Consultant Published October 27, 2016. Some of the highest rates of impunity in the murders of journalists can be attributed to killings by Islamist militant groups, CPJ found in its latest Global Impunity…
Iraqi journalist killed in Kirkuk fighting
New York, October 21, 2016 – An Iraqi journalist was killed today covering fighting between militants from the Islamic State group and Kurdish security forces, according to news reports. The killing came as at least seven journalists were injured in the past two days while covering the joint offensive to reclaim the city of Mosul…
CPJ Newsletter: We fight back against defamation, highlight impunity in India, and host an exhibit on Shawkan’s works
September edition IOC creates mechanism for journalist complaints after CPJ consultation In early August, we welcomed the creation of a press freedom complaints mechanism by the International Olympic Committee. The move followed years of advocacy with the IOC by CPJ and other rights groups to do more to hold governments that host the Olympic Games…
Iraqi media technician and journalist killed in separate attacks
New York, August 24, 2016 – Media technician Ali Ghani was killed in an attack by mortar fire while reporting in Jaziret al-Khalideya, in Iraq’s Anbar province on Saturday, August 20. Correspondent Hussein al-Fares was wounded in the same attack, according to Al-Ahad TV, which employed both men. Al-Ahad TV is affiliated with Asaib Ahl…
Infographic: Islamic State’s assault on the press
When Mosul fell to Islamic State on June, 10, 2014, it sparked one of the biggest attacks on press freedom in recent times. Newspapers were shuttered, TV channels were ransacked, radio stations disappeared from the airwaves, and dozens of journalists vanished. Within days, the militants had a monopoly on information output.
Global Magnitsky Act could be powerful weapon against impunity in journalist murders
Last week, the proposed Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act emerged from the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee with approval. The bill was passed by the Senate last year. If passed by the full House of Representatives and signed into law by the president, it has the potential to offer partial redress to one of…
Iraq withdraws Al-Jazeera’s license
New York, April 28, 2016 – Iraqi authorities should immediately restore Al-Jazeera’s operating license, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. The Qatari broadcaster reported that Iraqi authorities informed it Wednesday that its license to operate had been withdrawn.
The Struggle for Candid Interviews
Inside a four-room apartment in Antakya, Turkey, a town on the border with Syria, more than a dozen men sat on mattresses on the floor. It was just past 10 p.m. and the soldiers, all men in the Free Syrian Army, the rebel opposition group in Syria, were busy coordinating their next trip into the…
My Islamic State Social Network
My first conversation with Islamic State was about my reporting. I had just shared an article I’d written about the terrorist group recruiting Western fighters on my Twitter when I saw that someone using the Twitter handle Abu Omar had also posted a link to the piece on his own account. His profile photo unabashedly…