Could face three years in prison for espionage
New York, November 18, 2004—George Buhnici, a reporter for the Romanian private television station Pro-TV, was detained yesterday by Bulgarian border police in the northern Bulgarian city of Ruse while he was trying to return to Romania, according to The Associated Press. The Bulgarian information agency Focus reported that he was arrested for using a…
Barred from international travel, writer misses Courage Award ceremony
New York, October 12, 2004—The Committee to Protect Journalists strongly protests a travel ban imposed on Iranian journalist and human rights activist Emadeddin Baghi, who was due to be honored here today with an award recognizing his courage in fighting injustice. Iranian officials confiscated Baghi’s passport at Tehran’s airport on October 4, and prevented him…
Journalist jailed after sentence upheld
New York, June 23, 2004—The Polish Supreme Court yesterday upheld the three-month jail sentence of a journalist found guilty of libeling a local official in November 2003 and ordered that he be jailed immediately. Andrzej Marek, editor in chief of the weekly Wiesci Polickie (Police News) in the western town of Police, was convicted in…
Journalists prison sentence postponed following protests
New York, March 23, 2004—The prison sentence of a journalist convicted of libeling a local official has been postponed after a large group of journalists protested the imprisonment. Andrzej Marek, editor-in-chief of the weekly Wiesci Polickie (Police News) in the western Polish town of Police, was convicted in November 2003 of libeling Piotr Misilo, then…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Europe and Central Asia Analysis
While integration into NATO and the European Union has had a positive effect on press freedom conditions in most of Central Europe and the Baltic states, the situation for journalists in Russia and the former Soviet republics has worsened steadily, with governments relying on authoritarian tactics to silence the media. Even reformist governments in the…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Belarus
Squeezed by the expansion of NATO and the European Union to the west and tepid relations with Russia to the east, Belarus grew ever more isolated. In the face of that isolation, President Aleksandr Lukashenko continued his assault on the media in 2003, tightening his grip on the impoverished country. Local analysts suspect that Lukashenko’s…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Croatia
Gradual political stabilization in the western Balkans and the implementation of political reforms required for Croatia to join the European Union by 2007 have led to greater press freedom and media pluralism in the country. However, rivalries in the ruling reformist coalition, a powerful far-right opposition, politicized media owners, and a judiciary in need of…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Nigeria
In Nigeria’s first successful transfer between civilian administrations since independence in 1960, President Olusegun Obasanjo was re-elected in a landslide victory that also saw his ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) make significant gains in polls across the country. Despite the relatively peaceful conduct of the election, opposition parties and election observers alleged widespread fraud, irregularities,…
Attacks on the Press 2003: Romania
Since the Social Democratic Party (PSD) came to power in 2001, the Romanian government has repeatedly tried to silence its critics in an attempt to stabilize relations with Europe and the United States and thereby secure membership in the European Union (EU) and NATO. Rather than battle the corruption that jeopardizes its status within the…