New York, March 16, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned that Mauritanian authorities detained a journalist for reporting on the illegal slave trade. According to press reports and a Mauritanian source, police detained freelance journalist Mohamed Ould Lamine Mahmoudi on Sunday, March 13, after he interviewed a woman in the southern town Mederdra who…
MARCH 13, 2005 Posted: March 17, 2005 Mohamed Ould Lamine Mahmoudi, freelance IMPRISONED According to press reports and a Mauritanian source, police detained freelance journalist Mahmoudi after he interviewed a woman in the southern town Mederdra who claimed that she was kept as a slave by a family in another small Mauritanian town.
In 2003, Mauritania’s press remained subject to the whims of the Interior Ministry, which continued to use the country’s broadly defined, restrictive press law to stifle independent reporting. For years, Article 11 of the law has been the state’s strongest weapon against the press. The article grants the Interior Ministry the power to suspend any…
The Arab world continues to lag behind the rest of the globe in civil and political rights, including press freedom. Despotic regimes of varying political shades regularly limit news that they think will undermine their power. Hopes that a new generation of leaders would tolerate criticism in the press have proved illusory, with many reforms…
While the press is largely free within Israel proper, the country’s military assault on the Occupied Territories fueled a sharp deterioration in press freedom in the West Bank and Gaza during much of 2002. Despite vocal international protest, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) committed an assortment of press freedom abuses, ranging from banning press access…
Mauritanian authorities continue to use the country’s harsh 1991 press law to punish journalists who run afoul of the regime. Article 11 of the law allows the interior minister to ban the sale of publications that commit such vague offenses as “insulting Islamic principles or the credibility of the state,” harming “the public interest,” or…
The ruling Republican Democratic Party swept general and local elections in October, and President Maaouya Ould Sid Ahmed Taya remained firmly in control of the country. Authorities have for years used prior censorship and Article 11 of the 1991 Press Ordinance to harass journalists who cover sensitive issues. Under the harsh statutes, the minister of…
THE GOVERNMENT CONTINUED TO PROSCRIBE OUTSPOKEN PUBLICATIONS under Article 11 of the 1991 Press Ordinance, which gives authorities power to ban any newspaper deemed detrimental to Islam or state authority, threatening to public order, or defamatory to foreign heads of state. During 2000, several independent newspapers were confiscated or suspended for long periods. Victims included…
Mauritania’s press remained at the mercy of strict laws that give the government broad discretion to close down outspoken newspapers. The infamous Article 11 of the 1991 press ordinance has been the authorities’ weapon of choice against critical independents for much of the past decade. It grants the authorities broad power to ban the distribution…