APRIL 23, 2005 Posted: May 3, 2005 Irina Petrushova, Respublika Delovoye Obozreniye HARASSED, IMPRISONED Police in the Russian city of Volokolamsk detained Petrushova, editor of the Kazakh opposition weekly Respublika Delovoye Obozreniye, for two days at the request of Kazakh authorities, the journalist told CPJ.
New York, March 24, 2005—The Russian Foreign Ministry has strongly criticized Swedish authorities and media for independent news reporting on the conflict in Chechnya, claiming the information was fomenting violence, according to local and international press reports. The Russian embassy in Stockholm criticized the independent Swedish news agency TT on Wednesday for publishing an interview…
New York, March 24, 2005—An appeals court yesterday reduced the massive damages levied against the independent Moscow daily Kommersant in what a newspaper lawyer called a “tactical victory” in its ongoing legal battle over its reporting on last summer’s banking crisis. Moscow’s Federal Arbitration Court upheld the finding of liability but reduced the damages to…
New York, March 16, 2005—Russian authorities in Chechnya and the Volga River city of Nizhny Novgorod are escalating their campaign of harassment and intimidation against Pravo-Zashchita (Rights Defense), a monthly newspaper that covers human rights abuses in Chechnya, according to local press reports. The newspaper is published by the nongovernmental organization Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (RCFS)…
New York, March 16, 2005—In a major setback in the decade-long quest to bring the killers of slain Russian journalist Dimitry Kholodov to justice, the Military Collegium of Russia’s Supreme Court on Monday upheld a June 2004 acquittal of six military officers accused of murdering Kholodov. Kholodov, a reporter for the Moscow-based independent newspaper Moskovsky…
When U.S.-led forces waged an offensive in Fallujah in November and a state of emergency was declared, the Iraqi interim government’s Higher Media Commission directed the media to “set aside space in your news coverage to make the position of the Iraqi government, which expresses the aspirations of most Iraqis, clear.” Those that didn’t comply…
Remember 1989? The collapse of the Soviet Union and the rise of democracy and democratic institutions in the old Communist bloc, including Mother Russia, inspired a new generation of journalists in places where a free press had been a state crime. Other journalists in other places, such as Central and South America, Southeast Asia, and…
by Ann CooperWith its myriad dangers and devastating death toll, Iraq remained the worst place to practice journalism throughout 2004, and one of the most dangerous media assignments in recent history. Twenty-three journalists and 16 media support workers were killed on the job in Iraq during the year. An insurgent kidnapping campaign also posed severe…
Overview by Alex Lupis Authoriatarian rulers strengthened their hold on power in many former Soviet republics in 2004. Their secretive, centralized governments aggressively suppressed all forms of independent activity, from journalism and human rights monitoring to religious activism and political opposition.
RussiaA midyear purge of independent voices on state television and an alarming suppression of news coverage during the Beslan hostage crisis marked a year in which Russian President Vladimir Putin increasingly exerted Soviet-style control over the media. Using intelligence agents and an array of politicized state agencies, Putin pushed for an obedient and patriotic press…