Georgian Journalist Found Dead
New York, July 27, 2001–A popular 26-year-old Georgian journalist was found dead in his Tbilisi apartment yesterday, according to local and international reports. Georgy Sanaya was shot once in the head at close range with a 9mm weapon. Sanaya anchored “Night Courier,” a nightly political talk show in which he interviewed Georgia’s leading politicians on…
Wife of missing cameraman calls for independent investigation
New York, July 27–The wife of missing Belarusian cameraman Dmitri Zavadsky called on the United States and the international community to establish an independent commission to investigate her husband’s disappearance and other politically motivated deaths and disappearances in Belarus. Svetlana Zavadskaya visited Washington, D.C., for four days in mid-July with a small delegation that included…
Horacio Verbitsky: Awardee 2001
HORACIO VERBITSKY is one of Argentina’s leading investigative journalists, and a columnist and press freedom activist. He has built his distinguished career by fearlessly exposing government corruption and battling restrictive press laws. A working journalist since 1960, Verbitsky’s relentless pursuit of a story has earned him his nickname el perro, or the dog. In January 1991, Verbitsky…
Awards 2001 – Announcement
October 17, 2001 – The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) will present its 2001 International Press Freedom Awards to four journalists from China, Zimbabwe, Argentina, and the West Bank who have defied death threats, braved bullets, and endured jail to report the news. The 11th Annual Press Freedom Awards will be presented at a dinner…
CPJ testifies before U.S. Congress on press freedom conditions in Central Asia
New York, July 19, 2001–A CPJ representative testified before a joint congressional subcommittee yesterday about the terrible state of press freedom in Central Asia. [Read the transcript] “Repression and violence, or the threat thereof, are ever present for many reporters, encouraging self-censorship as a survival mechanism,” CPJ Washington representative Frank Smyth told the joint hearing…
Media executive assaulted
His attackers said, “We are sick of you!” Police are treating the assault as a robbery. New York, July 17, 2001–Oleh Velichko, the head of the Avers media corporation in western Ukraine, was brutally beaten by two unknown assailants outside his home in the late evening hours of Wednesday, July 11, according to CPJ sources…
Journalists attacked by angry Milosevic supporters in Belgrade
New York, June 29, 2001 — Enraged supporters of former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic attacked several journalists at a rally in central Belgrade on Thursday evening, June 28, local and international press reported. The demonstrators attacked the journalists because they were angry at local media coverage of Milosevic’s extradition to the international war crimes tribunal…
CPJ’S PETER ARNETT MEETS RUSSIAN AMBASSADOR TO DISCUSS PASKO TRIAL
New York, June 27, 2001 — A CPJ delegation led by board member Peter Arnett met today with Russian ambassador Yuri Ushakov in Washington, DC, to express its deep concern about the forthcoming trial of military journalist Grigory Pasko in Vladivostok. Russian military authorities have been pursuing Pasko for nearly four years on charges of…