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Dear President Lee: The Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned by your administration’s increasing pressure on the Republic of Korea’s media. The arrest on April 28 of four staff members with your country’s second-largest broadcaster, Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC), is only the most recent step in what appears to be a broader effort to stifle independent reporting critical of government policies.

New York, May 7, 2009–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply concerned about the Yemeni government’s decision to ban at least eight newspapers that have covered unrest in the southern part of the country. 

New York, May 4, 2009–After confiscating thousands of copies of a critical independent newspaper, authorities laid siege today to the paper’s offices in Aden, Yemen. The daily, Al-Ayyam, has been covering the ongoing conflict in the country’s southern region. 

The media have become part and parcel of Thailand’s intensifying political conflict: Two privately held satellite television news stations are openly aligned with competing political street movements, and state-controlled outlets are under opposition fire for allegedly misrepresenting recent crucial news events. 

On Tuesday, the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission convened a hearing on Sri Lanka. The impetus was the disintegrating human rights situation in the northeastern “no fire zone.” CPJ was invited to testify about attacks on Sri Lankan journalists and the fact that both sides to the Tamil secessionist war–the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and the government–do…

On March 2, 2006, Kenyan state agents conducted a commando-style midnight raid on the Standard Group, owner of an independent daily and KTN Television in the capital, Nairobi. The agents seized computers and tapes, vandalized a printing press, and burned roughly 20,000 copies of The Standard, Chief Executive Officer Tom Mshindi told me recently in…

Dear Mr. President: The Committee to Protect Journalists is writing to protest the rising incidence of press freedom violations, many of which occurred during the recent electoral campaign that resulted in your re-election to a third term.

New York, April 17, 2009–Amid Thailand’s continuing political chaos, the Committee to Protect Journalists strongly condemns the assassination attempt against media owner, television commentator, and political activist Sondhi Limthongkul today and calls on Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva’s government to ensure a quick investigation.

China’s National Human Rights Action Plan for 2009-2010 (English/Chinese), released Monday, contained plenty for the domestic media to praise, but enough omissions for international rights activists to jump on. 

“Get that guy–he’s a reporter.” The order, shouted in Burmese amid the chilling sound of gunfire, can be heard in the preview of the new documentary, “Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country” by Danish filmmaker Anders Ostergaard. The preview also includes the now-notorious footage of a Burmese soldier fatally shooting Japanese cameraman Kenji Nagai…