An Iraqi in America: In the middle of nowhere
We are all stuck in the middle of nowhere. Millions in Iraq and millions outside it face an ambiguous future. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis fled Iraq under Saddam’s regime, which lasted for almost 40 years, but since the led-American invasion in 2003 that number has exceeded 4 million, according to United Nations estimates.
New lawyer network serves bloggers and online journalists
Whether you are an old-school journalist looking to move online or a Net native with journalistic aspirations, chances are at some point you’re going to need a lawyer. The Citizen Media Law Project at Harvard’s Berkman Center is aware of that and wants to help.
American journalist interrogated at Canadian border
New York, December 2, 2009—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned by the detention and interrogation of a U.S. journalist crossing the border into Canada. News host Amy Goodman of the syndicated, community-oriented radio and television program “Democracy Now!” was detained on Nov. 25 as she tried to cross the Canadian border south of Vancouver and questioned about her work. Goodman…
Doubling down on playing the spy card
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…
Obama responses stun Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez
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.”
International press decries attack on Rosenberg
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…
A letter to the American hikers being held in Iran
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…
Free Speech Protection Act could slow ‘libel tourism’
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.”
Mexican court did not call for release of Brad Will suspect
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.